High performance polyethersulfone UF membrane for manufacturing spiral wound module: preparation,morphology, performance,and chemical cleaning

Large sheet asymmetric polyethersulfone (PES) ultrafiltration membranes were prepared via phase inversion process in a continuous conveyor system with addition of PVP to the casting solution. Dimethylacetamide (DMAc) and mixture of water and isopropyl alcohol (70/30 v%) were used as solvent and non‐solvent respectively. The prepared membrane was 0.96 m wide and 3 m long. The pieces of the membrane were selected randomly for characterization in terms of performance using cross flow filtration for milk concentration, image analysis, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and cleaning procedures. It was found that the prepared membrane has high porosity and high water flux during milk filtration. In addition, cleaning experiments indicated that NaOH/HCl/NaOH sequence is an effective procedure for cleaning the fouled membrane during milk concentration. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

CoFe2O4 nano-particles functionalized with 8-hydroxyquinoline for dispersive solid-phase micro-extraction and direct fluorometric monitoring of aluminum in human serum and water samples

A simple dispersive solid-phase micro-extraction method based on CoFe₂O₄ nano-particles (NPs) functionalized with 8-hydroxyquinoline (8-HQ) with the aid of sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) was developed for separation of Al(III) ions from aqueous solutions. Al(III) ions are separated at pH 7 via complex formation with 8-HQ using the functionalized CoFe₂O₄ nano-particles sol solution as a dispersed solid-phase extractor. The separated analyte is directly quantified by a spectrofluorometric method at 370 nm excitation and 506 nm emission wavelengths. A comparison of the fluorescence of Al(III)–8-HQ complex in bulk solution and that of Al(III) ion interacted with 8-HQ/SDS/CoFe₂O₄ NPs revealed a nearly 5-fold improvement in intensity. The experimental factors influencing the separation and in situ monitoring of the analyte were optimized. Under these conditions, the calibration graph was linear in the range of 0.1–300 ng mL⁻¹ with a correlation coefficient of 0.9986. The limit of detection and limit of quantification were 0.03 ng mL⁻¹ and 0.10 ng mL⁻¹, respectively. The inter-day and intra-day relative standard deviations for six replicate determinations of 150 ng mL⁻¹ Al(III) ion were 2.8% and 1.7%, respectively. The method was successfully applied to direct determine Al(III) ion in various human serum and water samples.     

Carrier Ampholyte Isoelectric Focusing Based Two-Dimensional Electrophoresis in Preliminary Screening of Differential Proteomics Analysis

Two-dimensional electrophoresis is a current method for separating complex protein mixtures of a given sample in different states. In this study an improved carrier ampholyte isoelectric focusing method has been evaluated for its capacity for preliminary screening of expressional proteomics subjects. In comparison with current carrier ampholyte isoelectric focusing, this method showed enough resolution power to display major expressional changes in proteomic samples and demonstrated it can be used as a substitution for the immobiline based isoelectric focusing method.     

Deferiprone solubility in some non-aqueous mono-solvents at different temperatures: experimental data and thermodynamic modelling

The solubility of deferiprone (DFP) in five organic solvents including ethyl acetate, chloroform, acetonitrile, 1,4-dioxane and dichloromethane was investigated by the flask-shake method under atmospheric pressure at temperatures ranging from 293.15 to 313.15 K. In general, the solubility (mol L^–1) obeyed the following order from high to low in different mono-solvents: dichloromethane > chloroform > acetonitrile > 1,4-dioxane > ethyl acetate. The solubility of DFP in the mono-solvents increased with a rise of temperature. The solubility data were successfully correlated with the van’t Hoff equation. The generated data in this work and the previously published data were used to calculate the thermodynamic parameters of the system using the modified van’t Hoff equation, and the derived thermodynamic properties were correlated using Abraham solvation parameters.     

Mechanical and transport properties of the poly(ethylene oxide)-poly(acrylic acid) double network hydrogel from molecular dynamic simulations

We used atomistic molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to investigate the mechanical and transport properties of the PEO-PAA double network (DN) hydrogel with 76 wt % water content. By analyzing the pair correlation functions for polymer-water pairs and for ion-water pairs and the solvent accessible surface area, we found that the solvation of polymer and ion in the DN hydrogel is enhanced in comparison with both PEO and PAA single network (SN) hydrogels. The effective mesh size of this DN hydrogel is smaller than that of the SN hydrogels with the same water content and the same molecular weight between the cross-linking points (Mc). Applying uniaxial extensions, we obtained the stress-strain curves for the hydrogels. This shows that the DN hydrogel has a sudden increase of stress above approximately 100% strain, much higher than the sum of the stresses of the two SN hydrogels at the same strain. This arises because PEO has a smaller Mc value than PAA, so that the PEO in the DN reaches fully stretched out at 100% strain that corresponds to 260% strain in the PEO SN (beyond this point, the bond stretching and the angle bending increase dramatically). We also calculated the diffusion coefficients of solutes such as D-glucose and ascorbic acid in the hydrogels, where we find that the diffusion coefficients of those solutes in the DN hydrogel are 60% of that in the PEO SN and 40% of that in the PAA SN due to its smaller effective mesh size.     

Coherent Control of the Goos-Hänchen Shifts in a Four-Level N Type Atomic Medium

The behavior of the Goos-Hänchen (GH) shifts of the reflected and transmitted probe light beams is theoretically investigated. In a fixed geometrical configuration, the effect of quantum interference induced by spontaneous emission on the phase control of the GH shifts is analyzed in this paper. It is found that in a four-level N-type atomic system as an intracavity medium, the GH shifts of the reflected and transmitted probe light beam are completely phase dependent.     

Phonon-dependent transport through a serially coupled double quantum dot system

Using Keldysh nonequilibrium Green function formalism and mapping a many-body electron–phonon interaction onto a one body problem, the electron transport through a serially coupled double quantum dot system is analyzed. The influence of the electron–phonon interaction, temperature, detuning, and interdot tunneling on the transmission coefficient and current is studied. Our results show that the electron–phonon interaction results in the appearance of the side peaks in the transmission coefficient, whose height is strongly dependent on the phonon temperature. We have also found that the inequality of the electron–phonon interaction strength in two dots gives rise to an asymmetry in the current–voltage characteristic. In addition, the temperature difference between the phonon and electron subsystems results in the reduction of the saturated current and the destruction of the step-like behavior of the current. It is also observed that the detuning can improve the magnitude of the current by compensating the mismatch of the quantum dots energy levels induced by the electron–phonon interaction.     

Optical Bistability and Multistability in an EIT Medium with Two-Photon Resonance Transitions

Intensity threshold of optical bistability (OB) and optical multistability (OM) can be controlled by amplitude and phase control of microwave driven field in the two-photon resonance transitions in a parametric region. It is found that in two-photon resonance case, the weak microwave field can reduce the threshold of optical bistability and strong microwave field can lead to optical multistability. The effect of relative phase between applied fields is also discussed. It is shown that for weak and strong microwave field, intensity threshold of OB and OM can be modified. Moreover, it is found that for strong microwave field, relative phase has an essential role for switching between OB and OM or vice versa.     

Heat transfer enhancement by combination of serpentine curves and nanofluid flow in microtube

Heat transfer and flow characteristics of Cu/water nanofluids' flow in the serpentine microtubes are investigated experimentally. The serpentine microtubes are fabricated by bending a straight copper microtube with an inner diameter of 787 μm. Also, the Cu/water nanofluids are prepared using a novel one-step technique, namely electro-exploded wire. The effects of serpentine microtubes' geometrical parameters (pitch spacing, p, and straight section, l) and nanofluid concentration (weight fraction, φ) are examined. It is found that the heat transfer enhances by decreasing both the pitch spacing and the straight section of the serpentine microtube as well as increasing the weight fraction of the nanofluid. Also, the results show that the friction factor tends to increase in the same manner. A noticeable average enhancement in the thermal performance factor of 21.8% is obtained for a specific operating condition, i.e., the nanofluid at φ = 0.3% through the serpentine microtube with p = 9.6 mm and l = 10 mm. Finally, two correlations of Nusselt number and friction factor for the Cu/water nanofluids across the serpentine microtubes are proposed.