CO2 Hydrogenation over Ru-NPs Supported Amine-Functionalized SBA-15 Catalyst: Structure–Reactivity Relationship Study

Catalysis Letters - We gave an effective protocol to support Ru NPs on amine-functionalized SBA-15 mesoporous silica to catalyze the CO2 hydrogenation reaction. The amine groups present in the...     

ResearchGate and Google Scholar: how much do they differ in publications,citations and different metrics and why?

ResearchGate has emerged as a popular professional network for scientists and researchers in a very short span. Similar to Google Scholar, the ResearchGate indexing uses an automatic crawling algorithm that extracts bibliographic data, citations, and other information about scholarly articles from various sources. However, it has been observed that the two platforms often show different publication and citation data for the same institutions, journals, and authors. While several previous studies analysed different aspects of ResearchGate and Google Scholar, the quantum of differences in publications, citations, and metrics between the two and the probable reasons for the same are not explored much. This article, therefore, attempts to bridge this research gap by analysing and measuring the differences in publications, citations, and different metrics of the two platforms for a large data set of highly cited authors. The results indicate that there are significantly high differences in publications and citations for the same authors captured by the two platforms, with Google Scholar having higher counts for a vast majority of the cases. The different metrics computed by the two platforms also differ in their values, showing different degrees of correlation. The coverage policy, indexing errors, author attribution mechanism, and strategy to deal with predatory publishing are found to be the main probable reasons for the differences in the two platforms.

     

Development of Low-Oxide MCrAlY Coatings for Gas Turbine Applications

Advanced high-energy plasma systems are being used to achieve the benefits of the high-velocity oxy-fuel (HVOF) system without losing the inherent advantages of plasma for coating of gas turbine parts. MCrAlY coatings play a very important role in the performance and reliability of gas turbine components. One of the important considerations for next generation of gas turbines, which have more demanding conditions and need to withstand ever increasing operating temperatures, is that they should possess very low oxygen content levels in the coating. Low oxygen content coatings are applied by the expensive low-pressure plasma spray (LPPS)/vacuum plasma spray (VPS) technique for critical components in aero- and land-based gas turbines. This work deals with the development of low-cost LPPS equivalent coatings (having low oxygen content) using the high-energy high-velocity plasma spray (HEHVPS) gun and inert gas shroud. A comparison has also been made with CoNiCrAlY coatings by HVOF.     

Biodegradation and corrosion behavior of manganese oxidizer Bacillus cereus ACE4 in diesel transporting pipeline

The degradation problem of petroleum products arises since hydrocarbon acts as an excellent food source for a wide variety of microorganisms. Microbial activity leads to unacceptable level of turbidity, corrosion of pipeline and souring of stored product. The present study emphasizes the role of Bacillus cereus ACE4 on degradation of diesel and its influence on corrosion of API 5LX steel. A demonstrating bacterial strain ACE4 was isolated from corrosion products and 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis showed that it has more than 99% similarity with B. cereus. The biodegradation and corrosion studies revealed that B. cereus degraded the aliphatic protons and aromatic protons in diesel and is capable of oxidizing ferrous/manganese into oxides. This is the first report that discloses the involvement of manganese oxidizer B. cereus ACE4 on biodegradation of diesel and its influence on corrosion in a tropical country pipeline.     

Nanocrystalline orthoferrite powders: Synthesis and magnetic properties

Nanocrystalline orthoferrite powders were synthesised at low temperatures by employing an aqueous sol–gel process. Colloidal sols and water re-dispersible gels of orthoferrite precursors were prepared by room-temperature processing of inexpensive metal salts. The average diameter (Z_av) of the precursor particles was in the size range from 4 to 7 nm; the diameters had a narrow size distribution. Water re-dispersible translucent gel monoliths were obtained by concentrating the aqueous sols followed by drying them under reduced pressure (10⁻² Torr) at room temperature. The sol–gel transition was found to be completely reversible. Nanocrystalline fine powders of orthoferrites of general formula, LnFeO₃ (Ln = La, Sm, Gd, Dy, Er, Yb and Y) having a crystallite size of about 25 nm were prepared by heating the gel precursors at 650–700 °C in air. Powder X-ray diffraction and thermogravimetry, respectively, were employed to identify perovskite phase formation and delineate thermal events that lead to gel to crystallite conversion. Magnetic measurements were carried out on the resultant powders at room temperature and down to 40 K. Nanocrystalline orthoferrite powders exhibited weak ferromagnetic behaviour, and reduced magnetic moments.     

A study of synthesizing benzaldehydes from propenylbenzenes and cinnamic acid derivatives

Propenylbenzenes and cinnamic acid derivatives yield correspondingly substituted benzaldehydes when oxidized by lead-ruthenium pyrochlore oxide in the presence of sodium hydrochlorite as a co-oxidant at pH 11 under heterogeneous conditions. The reaction of terminal and internal aliphatic alkenes under similar conditions affords no aldehydes.     

Distribution of Etoposide-Loaded Hydrophilic Albumin Microspheres in Mice

Hydrophilic albumin microspheres of etoposide were prepared by the emulsion polymerization technique using glutaraldehyde as the cross-linking agent. The microspheres prepared had a mean diameter of 1.5 μm. The microspheres were injected into mice by the intravenous route. In all, 12 mice were selected for the study, out of which 10 were given the drug-loaded microspheres and 2 were kept as solvent control. The mice were sacrificed after 24 hr and the accumulation of drug was determined in lungs, liver, and kidney.     

Variation resilient low-power memristor-based synchronous flip-flops: design and analysis

Microsystem Technologies - Flip-flops are the basic digital components for all types of complex digital electronics systems and sequential logic circuits. In this paper, new nonvolatile, low power,...     

Evaluation of high Ni-Cr-Mo alloys for the construction of sulfur dioxide scrubber plants

Corrosion in wet lime/limestone systems used for flue gas desulfurization in thermal power plants is of great concern. The frequent variations in acidity and in chloride and fluoride ion concentrations experienced by such systems pose a serious threat to the materials of construction. Currently used materials mostly type 316L stainless steel often fail to meet their life expectancy. The present study evaluates the performance of advanced Ni- Cr- Mo alloys 59 and C- 276 in a simulated sulfur dioxide scrubber environment. Accelerated tests showed that high Ni- Cr- Mo alloys have little tendency to leach metal ions such as chromium, nickel, and molybdenum at different impressed potentials. Scanning electron microscopy was used to examine the morphology of pitting attack.     

PHOTOCATALYTIC OXIDATION OF ALDEHYDES/PCE USING POROUS ANATASE TITANIA AND VISIBLE-LIGHT-RESPONSIVE BROOKITE TITANIA

We have synthesized an annealed porous aerogel titania (LUAG2), which demonstrates a very high photocatalytic activity for aldehydes and perchloroethylene (PCE) photocatalytic oxidation (PCO) in gas phase under blacklight and fluorescent light irradiation. LUAG2 has a BET surface area of 237 m²/g and a porosity of 0.31 (volume fraction). X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis shows LUAG2 is nearly pure anatase. It has improved the destruction of PCE and aldehydes as a group by 10-34% with black light compared to Degussa P-25. The optimum water vapor to butyraldehyde molar ratio is around 1/3. LUAG2 also shows better mineralization to CO₂ than Degussa P-25 TiO₂ does. Under irradiation of a 4 W fluorescent lamp LUAG2 gives a consistently higher conversion than that of Degussa P-25. The highly active photocatalyst indicates potential applications in indoor and outdoor environmental pollution control. A visible-light-responsive TiO₂, NTB 200, is also investigated for comparison purposes.