A New Ultrasonic Thermostatic-Assisted Cloud Point Extraction/Spectrophotometric Method for the Preconcentration and Determination of Bisphenol A in Food,Milk, and Water Samples in Contact with Plastic Products

Bisphenol A (BPA) contamination in foods and beverages usually occurs as a result of migration from the packages that contain it. In this context, a simple, easy-to-use, and efficient method was developed for the spectrophotometric determination of BPA in food, milk, and water samples in contact with plastic products after preconcentration by ultrasonic-thermostatic-assisted cloud point extraction (UTA-CPE). The method is based on the charge transfer-sensitive complexation of BPA with 3-methylamino-7-dimethylaminophenothiazin-5-ium chloride (AzB) in the presence of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) at pH 8.5 and then extraction of the formed complex into the micellar phase of polyethylene glycol dodecyl ether (Brij 35). The effects of the analytical variables affecting complex formation and extraction efficiency were systematically studied and optimized. Under optimized conditions, a good linear relationship was obtained in the range of 1.2–160 μg L^?1 with a detection limit of 0.35 μg L^?1. After preconcentration of a sample of 20 mL, a sensitivity enhancement factor was found to be 180. The accuracy and reliability of the method were evaluated by recovery studies from the spiked quality control samples and intraday and interday precision studies. From the studies conducted, the extraction efficiency (E%) was in the range of 94–103% with a relative standard deviation lower than 5.2% (as RSD%, n = 5). The method was successfully applied to the preconcentration and determination of BPA from the selected sample matrices.

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Graphical Abstract Migration of bisphenol A into the foodstuffs

     

Properties of the 4.45 eV optical absorption band in LiF:Mg,Ti

The optical absorption (OA) and thermoluminescence (TL) of dosimetric LiF:Mg,Ti (TLD-100) as well as nominally pure LiF single crystal have been studied as a function of irradiation dose, thermal and optical bleaching in order to investigate the role of the 4.45 eV OA band in low temperature TL. Computerised deconvolution was used to resolve the absorption spectrum into individual gaussian bands and the TL glow curve into glow peaks. Although the 4.45 eV OA band shows thermal decay characteristics similar to the 4.0 eV band its dose filling constant and optical bleaching properties suggest that it cannot be associated with the TL of composite peaks 4 or 5. Its presence in optical grade single crystal LiF further suggests that it is an intrinsic defect or possibly associated with chance impurities other than Mg, Ti.     

Capacity requirements of traffic handling schemes in multi-service networks

This paper deals with the impact of traffic handling mechanisms on capacity for different network architectures. Three traffic handling models are considered: per-flow, class-based and best-effort (BE). These models can be used to meet service guarantees, the major differences being in their complexity of implementations and in the quantity of network resources that must be provided. In this study, the performance is fixed and the required capacity determined for various combinations of traffic handling architectures for edge-core networks. This study provides a comparison of different QoS architectures. One key result of this work is that on the basis of capacity requirements, there is no significant difference between semi-aggregate traffic handling and per-flow traffic handling. However, best-effort handling requires significantly more capacity as compared to the other methods.     

Fixed-point analysis of a network of routers with persistent TCP/UDP flows and class-based weighted fair queuing

Fixed-point models have already been successfully used to analytically study networks consisting of persistent TCP flows only, or mixed TCP/UDP flows with a single queue per link and differentiated buffer management for these two types of flows. In the current study, we propose a nested fixed-point analytical method to obtain the throughput of persistent TCP and UDP flows in a network of routers supporting class-based weighted fair queuing allowing the use of separate queues for each class. In particular, we study the case of two classes where one of the classes uses drop-tail queue management and is intended for only UDP traffic. The other class targeting TCP, but also allowing UDP traffic for the purpose of generality, is assumed to employ active queue management. The effectiveness of the proposed analytical method is validated in terms of accuracy using ns-3 simulations and the required computational effort.     

Spectrophotometric determination of low levels arsenic species in beverages after ion-pairing vortex-assisted cloud-point extraction with acridine red

A new, low-cost, micellar-sensitive and selective spectrophotometric method was developed for the determination of inorganic arsenic (As) species in beverage samples. Vortex-assisted cloud-point extraction (VA-CPE) was used for the efficient pre-concentration of As(V) in the selected samples. The method is based on selective and sensitive ion-pairing of As(V) with acridine red (ARH⁺) in the presence of pyrogallol and sequential extraction into the micellar phase of Triton X-45 at pH 6.0. Under the optimised conditions, the calibration curve was highly linear in the range of 0.8–280 µg l^?1 for As(V). The limits of detection and quantification of the method were 0.25 and 0.83 µg l^?1, respectively. The method was successfully applied to the determination of trace As in the pre-treated and digested samples under microwave and ultrasonic power. As(V) and total As levels in the samples were spectrophotometrically determined after pre-concentration with VA-CPE at 494 nm before and after oxidation with acidic KMnO₄. The As(III) levels were calculated from the difference between As(V) and total As levels. The accuracy of the method was demonstrated by analysis of two certified reference materials (CRMs) where the measured values for As were statistically within the 95% confidence limit for the certified values.     

Fixed point analysis of limited range share per node wavelength conversion in asynchronous optical packet switching systems

In this article, we study an asynchronous optical packet switch equipped with a number of wavelength converters shared per node. The wavelength converters can be full range or circular-type limited range. We use the algorithmic methods devised for Markov chains of block-tridiagonal type in addition to fixed-point iterations to approximately solve this relatively complex system. In our approach, we also take into account the finite number of fiber interfaces using the Engset traffic model rather than the usual Poisson traffic modeling. The proposed analytical method provides an accurate approximation for full range systems for relatively large number of interfaces and for circular-type limited range wavelength conversion systems for which the tuning range is relatively narrow.

Hydrogeochemistry along the flow path of a confined aquifer,Düzce plain,north western Turkey

The Düzce plain is formed of Quaternary deposits derived from the surrounding hills, which feed water to three aquifers. The groundwater flow direction in the first confined aquifer is towards Efteni Lake and the Büyük Melen River. Generally the waters have a low concentration of minerals adjacent to the hills from which they are recharged while the groundwater increases in mineral content as it passes through the confined aquifer. Although Ca²⁺, HCO₃ ⁻, total hardness, TDS-EC and Na⁺ values increase along the groundwater flow path, they remain within the limits specified by standards related to drinkability and industrial/agricultural usages.