Three-dimensional mesoporous titanosilicates prepared by modified sol-gel method: Ideal gold catalyst supports for enhanced propene epoxidation

Mesoporous titanosilicates with 1-12 mol % Ti content and with three-dimensional wormhole-like mesoporosity are prepared by a modified sol-gel technique. Sorption analysis shows that there is little change in the surface properties with increasing Ti concentration in the samples, implying that Ti atoms either are well-dispersed on the walls of the silica matrix or are present inside the framework with no pore blocking effect. Spectroscopic analysis shows that the Ti atoms are atomically dispersed in the silica matrix even at very high Ti concentration and there is no observable Ti aggregate (anatase) present in the samples. These titanosilicate samples after Au deposition followed by trimethylsilylation (for enhanced hydrophobicity) are highly efficient catalysts for vapor-phase propene epoxidation using O2 and H2. It was possible to achieve commercially desirable performance with about 7% propene conversion, >90% propene oxide selectivity, and about 40% hydrogen efficiency.     

Energy spectrum of superfluid turbulence with no normal-fluid component

The energy of superfluid turbulence without the normal fluid is studied numerically under the vortex filament model. Time evolution of the Taylor-Green vortex is calculated under the full nonlocal Biot-Savart law. It is shown that for k<2pi/l the energy spectrum is very similar to the Kolmogorov's -5/3 law which is the most important statistical property of the conventional turbulence, where k is the wave number of the Fourier component of the velocity field and l is the average intervortex spacing. The vortex length distribution converges to a scaling property reflecting the self-similarity of the tangle.     

Kolmogorov spectrum of superfluid turbulence: numerical analysis of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation with a small-scale dissipation

The energy spectrum of superfluid turbulence is studied numerically by solving the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. We introduce the dissipation term which works only in the scale smaller than the healing length to remove short wavelength excitations which may hinder the cascade process of quantized vortices in the inertial range. The obtained energy spectrum is consistent with the Kolmogorov law.     

Rotating superfluid turbulence

Almost all studies of vortex states in helium II have been concerned with either ordered vortex arrays or disordered vortex tangles. This work numerically studies what happens in the presence of both rotation (which induces order) and thermal counterflow (which induces disorder). We find a new statistically steady state in which the vortex tangle is polarized along the rotational axis. Our results are used to interpret an instability that was discovered experimentally by Swanson et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 50, 190 (1983)]] and the vortex state beyond the instability that has been unexplained until now.     

Spin polarization of β-emitting fragments in high energy heavy ions on Be collisions

The degrees of nuclear spin polarization of ^8,12B, ⁹C, ¹²N, ¹³O, ^20,21F, ²³Mg, ²⁷Si and ³⁹Ca produced in the high energy ^12,13C, ¹⁶O, ²²Ne, ²⁴Mg, ²⁸Si and ⁴⁰Ca ions on Be collisions have been measured systematically, for the technical developments of the nuclear moment studies as well as the hyperfine interaction studies by means of β-NMR technique. The fragment momentum dependences were well reproduced by the simple kinematical model. Incident energy dependence and the mass dependence as well as the reaction angle dependences were qualitatively explained by the mixing of the near and far side collisions. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Oxidation activity of Au nanoparticles on aerogel supports

We have prepared titania aerogel and titania-coated silica aerogel incorporating thiol-capped Au nanoparticles. Both composite materials showed high CO oxidation activity after they were calcined at 673 K. Compositional and morphological changes driven by calcination were evaluated with thermogravimetry and X-ray diffractometry. From the results, it was suggested that the nanoparticles transformed from a faulted to a near-regular FCC structure presumably in concert with the formation of firm contacts between the nanoparticles and the gel substrates. While the diameters of the Au particles in the titania aerogel considerably increased upon calcination, those in the titania-coated silica aerogel were almost unchanged. As a consequence, the latter composite aerogel showed higher activity for oxidation of CO.