Preparation of gold nanoparticles (GNP) aqueous suspensions by a new method involving Tiron

A new method is proposed to produce gold nanoparticles (GNP) by in situ reduction of a gold salt dissolved in water. The reducing agent used is Tiron instead of the citrate anion most often mentioned in literature. The influence of various parameters has been investigated, such as the content of Tiron with respect to that of the precursor of gold HAuCl₄, or the initial pH of the solution after mixing of reactants. It is shown that Tiron also exerts a positive influence as a dispersant, which impedes agglomeration of gold nanoparticles. The typical average size of GNP synthesized in the present work is close to 7 nm.     

Dissipation in Mesoscopic Superconductors with Ac Magnetic Fields

The response of mesoscopic superconductors to an ac magnetic field is investigated both experimentally and with numerical simulations. We study small square samples with dimensions of the order of the penetration depth. We obtain the ac susceptibitity χ=χ′+iχ″ at microwave frequencies as a function of the dc magnetic field H _dc. We find that the dissipation, given by x″, has a non monotonous behavior in mesoscopic samples. In the numerical simulations we obtain that the dissipation increases before the penetration of vortices and then it decreases abruptly after vortices have entered, the sample. This is verified experimentally, where we find that χ″ has strong oscillations as a function of H _dc in small squares of Pb.     

Residual toughness of poly(acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) (ABS) after fatigue loading—effect of uniaxial fatigue loading

Toughness variation of non-notched poly(acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) (ABS) subjected to uniaxial fatigue loading was investigated. The experiments were conducted by applying fatigue loading to strip specimens first, from which dog-bone specimens were machined. The dog-bone specimens were tested to measure the strain for the on-set of fracture, named cracking strain here, thus to monitor the toughness change due to the fatigue loading.The test results showed that the fatigue loading caused the toughness drop in ABS, even before any visible crack was developed. Damage development and fracture behavior were then analyzed using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The SEM analysis revealed that damage zones, not cracks, were initiated during the fatigue loading, and were the main cause of the toughness drop. Mechanisms for the damage initiation include matrix crazing and debonding of small rubber particles; however, large rubber particles remained intact. Based on the results, a deformation model is proposed for the damage zone initiation, which provides an explanation for the toughness change under the fatigue loading.