Rice husk silica as a sustainable filler in the tire industry

In this paper, we studied commercially available precipitated rice husk silica (RHS) with conventional precipitated silica, which has nearly the same surface area, and replaced part of the carbon black with RHS and conventional silica in a basic tread formulation. All formulations were mixed with the same amount of filler during the study. Silica was used at 15, 30 and 50 phr loading, and part of the carbon black was replaced by silica. Compound curing characteristics, physical properties, rebound resilience, heat generation, abrasion loss, dynamic properties and morphology were analyzed. The results indicated that RHS demonstrated compound properties comparable to those of conventional silica. As part of the carbon black was replaced with conventional silica, a slower cure rate, higher rebound resilience, lower heat generation, lower abrasion loss, and lower tan delta were observed with no significant change in physical properties, but some changes in physical properties were observed using one way ANOVA analysis. We found the same trend when replacing part of the carbon black with RHS, such as a slower cure rate, higher rebound resilience, lower heat generation, lower abrasion loss, and lower tan delta with no significant change in physical properties, but some changes in physical properties were observed using one way ANOVA. This sustainable material could be used to replace conventional silica in tire compounding, as well as to replace a portion of carbon black with RHS for improved heat build-up, rolling resistance, and abrasion loss.     

Highly dispersed palladium nanoclusters incorporated in amino‐functionalized silica spheres for the selective hydrogenation of succinic acid to γ‐butyrolactone

Highly dispersed palladium nanoclusters incorporated on amino‐functionalized silica sphere surfaces (Pd/SiO₂‐NH₂) were fabricated by a simple one‐pot synthesis utilizing 3‐(2‐aminoethylamino)propyltrimethoxysilane (AAPTS) as coordinating agent. Uniform palladium nanoclusters with an average size of 1.1 nm can be obtained during the co‐condensation of tetraethyl orthosilicate and AAPTS owing to the strong interaction between palladium species and amino groups in AAPTS. The palladium particle size can be controlled by addition of AAPTS and plays a significant role in the catalytic performance. The Pd/SiO₂‐NH₂ catalyst exhibits high catalytic activity for succinic acid hydrogenation with 100% conversion and 94% selectivity towards γ‐butyrolactone using 1,4‐dioxane as solvent at 240°C and 60 bar for 4 h. Moreover, the Pd/SiO₂‐NH₂ catalyst is robust and readily reusable without loss of its catalytic activity. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A technical review of face mask wearing in preventing respiratory COVID-19 transmission

Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, most countries have recommended their citizens to adopt social distance, hand hygiene, and face mask wearing. However, wearing face masks has not been well adopted by many citizens. While the reasons are complex, there is a general perception that the evidence to support face mask wearing is lacking, especially for the general public in a community setting. Face mask wearing can block or filter airborne virus-carrying particles through the working of colloid and interface science. This paper assesses current knowledge behind the design and functioning of face masks by reviewing the selection of materials, mask specifications, relevant laboratory tests, and respiratory virus transmission trials, with an overview of future development of reusable masks for the general public. This review highlights the effectiveness of face mask wearing in the prevention of COVID-19 infection.     

Scaling properties of fracture surfaces on glass strengthened by ionic exchange

In this work the results of the statistical topometric analysis of fracture surfaces of soda-lime-silica glass with and without ionic exchange treatment are reported. In this case, the mechanism of substitution is K⁺-Na⁺. atomic force microscopy (AFM) was employed to record the topometric data from the fracture surface. The roughness exponent (ζ) and the correlation length (ξ) were calculated by the variable bandwidth method. The analysis for both glasses (subjected and non-subjected to ionic exchange) for ζ shows a value ∼0.8, this value agrees well with that reported in the literature for rapid crack propagation in a variety of materials. The correlation length shows different values for each condition. These results, along with those of microhardness indentations suggest that the self-affine correlation length is influenced by the complex interactions of the stress field of microcracks with that resulting from the collective behavior of the point defects introduced by the strengthening mechanism of ionic exchange.     

Probability Collectives for Unstable Particles

Unstable particles, together with their stable decay products, constitute probability collectives that are defined as Hilbert spaces with dimension higher than one, nondecomposable in a particle basis. Their structure is considered in the framework of Birkhoff-von Neumann's Hilbert subspace lattices. Bases with particle states are related to bases with a diagonal scalar product by a Hilbert-bein involving the characteristic decay parameters (in some analogy to the n-bein structures of metrical manifolds). Probability predictions as expectation values, involving unstable particles, have to take into account all members of the higher dimensional collective. For example, the unitarity structure of the S-matrix for an unstable particle collective can be established by a transformation with its Hilbert-bein.     

Generic entangling through quantum indistinguishability

We present a general scheme for entangling any degree of freedom of two uncorrelated identical particles from independent sources by a combination of two-particle interferometry and which-way detection. We show that this entanglement generation procedure works for completely random initial states of the variable to be entangled. We also demonstrate a curious complementarity exhibited by our scheme and its applications in estimating the generated entanglement as a function of wave packet overlap at the beamsplitter.     

粒子-转子模型和推转壳模型中的能谱统计分析

用粒子–转子模型和推转壳模型研究了6个粒子分别填充在单j壳和双j壳上的混沌行为.分析了单j壳和双j壳情况下能谱的最近邻能级间距分布和谱刚度随自旋及推转频率的变化,结果表明,当组态空间大小不变时,系统在双j壳(g_7/2+d_5/2)情况下比在单j壳(i_13/2)情况下更规则,而当组态空间从单j壳(i_13/2)扩大到双j壳(i_13/2+g_9/2)时,系统的混沌程度变化不大.同时比较了将6个粒子的两体相互作用分别取为δ力和对力时的系统的混沌行为     

纳米颗粒团聚物流化特性的数值研究

基于气固两相流体动力学理论,建立气体纳米颗粒团聚物两相流动双流体模型.模型中采用了Jung ＆ Gidaspow (2002)测量的固相应力模量和王垚等(2001)提出的聚团曳力系数计算模型.对纳米颗粒团聚物的流化过程进行了数值模拟,得到纳米颗粒团聚物的流化特性.模拟得出的床层膨胀比与文献中实验的结果较为接近.     

The production of slow particles in 16O－Em interactions at 4.5 A GeV/c

A sample of 1233 events is used to study the general characteristics of {}^{16}O－Em interactions at 4.5 A GeV/c. Multiplicity and angular distributions of slow particles and correlations among them are discussed. The present data are compared with the corresponding results from the interactions of other projectiles at the same energy and also the same projectile at different energies. The results indicate that black particle production is independent of the energy and mass of the projectile, but for grey particles it is dependent on the mass of projectile.