Environmental Control Symposium

MAN is but a part of the universe; his capabilities make him a significant link, in the cycle of life. To ensure this life, man must live in harmony with his environment. Recently, a disharmony has been discovered which could have grave effects upon the existence of man. It appears that man in his great thrust forward is destroying his own environment. The gravity of this threat to man's own existence carries some intrinsic problems of its own: man must allow his reason rather than his emotion to take command.     

Thermal analysis of polymer–water interactions and their relation to gas hydrate inhibition

Gas hydrates formed in oil production pipelines are crystalline solids where hydrocarbon gas molecules such as methane, propane, and their mixtures are trapped in a cagelike structure by hydrogen‐bonded water molecules to form undesirable plugs. Methanol and glycol are currently used to prevent these plugs via thermodynamic inhibition. Small amounts of water‐soluble polymers may provide an alternate approach for preventing gas hydrates. In this study, we expand the fundamental understanding of water–polymer systems with differential scanning calorimetry. Nonfreezable bound water was used to quantify polymer–water interactions and relate them to the chemical structure for a series of polymers, including acrylamides, cyclic lactams, and n‐vinyl amides. For good interactions, the water structure needs to be stabilized through hydrophobic interactions. An increased hydrophobicity of the pendant group also appears to favor polymer performance as a gas hydrate inhibitor. Good inhibitors, such as poly(diethyl acrylamide) and poly(N‐vinyl caprolactam), also show higher heat capacities, which indicate higher hydrophobicity, than poor performers such as polyzwitterions, in which hydrophilicity dominated. The phase behavior and thermodynamic properties of dilute polymer solutions were also evaluated through measurements of the heat of demixing and lower critical solution temperature. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 103: 2642–2653, 2007     

An SDP Primal-Dual Algorithm for Approximating the Lovász-Theta Function

The Lovász ?-function (Lovász in IEEE Trans. Inf. Theory, 25:1–7, 1979) of a graph G=(V,E) can be defined as the maximum of the sum of the entries of a positive semidefinite matrix X, whose trace Tr(X) equals 1, and X _ij =0 whenever {i,j}∈E. This function appears as a subroutine for many algorithms for graph problems such as maximum independent set and maximum clique. We apply Arora and Kale’s primal-dual method for SDP to design an algorithm to approximate the ?-function within an additive error of δ>0, which runs in time $O(\frac{\vartheta ^{2} n^{2}}{\delta^{2}} \log n \cdot M_{e})$ , where ?=?(G) and M _e =O(n ³) is the time for a matrix exponentiation operation. It follows that for perfect graphs G, our primal-dual method computes ?(G) exactly in time O(? ² n ⁵logn). Moreover, our techniques generalize to the weighted Lovász ?-function, and both the maximum independent set weight and the maximum clique weight for vertex weighted perfect graphs can be approximated within a factor of (1+?) in time O(? ^?2 n ⁵logn).     

Some elements in domestic and imported fresh fruits marketed in the Netherlands

Summary Sodium, potassium, arsenic, selenium and tin have been determined in 38 different types of domestic and imported fresh fruits. All samples (n=242) were analysed for Na und K whereas a limited number of samples (n=85) of each fruit type was selected for the determination of As, Se and Sn. The median contents, in mass fractions of the edible portion, found for fresh fruits are: Na<0.001%; K 0.17%; As 4 g/kg; Se 2 g/kg and Sn< 0.05 mg/kg. The corresponding 90th percentile values are: Na 0,002%, K 0.34%; As 12 g/kg; Se 10 g/kg and Sn 0.10 mg/kg. Results for selenium reported here differ substantially from those given for a number of fresh fruits in the German Food Composition Tables 1986/1987. The average consumption of 129 g fresh fruit by Dutch citizens in the age category of 22–75 years contributes, in general, marginally to the total daily dietary intake of sodium, arsenic, selenium and tin. Fresh fruit can contribute substantially, up to 23%, to the average oral daily intake of potassium.

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Einige Mineralstoffe im einheimischen und importierten Frischobst vom niederländischen Markt

Zusammenfassung Natrium, Kalium, Arsen, Selen und Zinn wurden in 38 verschiedenen Sorten von in- und ausländischem Frischobst bestimmt. Alle Proben (n=242) wurden auf Na und K untersucht; während nur eine beschränkte Zahl von Proben (n=85) für die Bestimmung von As, Se und Sn ausgewählt wurde. Die Medianwerte, in Massenanteilen der eßbaren Portionen, betrugen für frisches Obst: Na<0,001%; K 0,17% As 4 g/kg; Se 2 g/kg und Sn<0,05 mg/kg. Die dazugehörigen Werte für den 90 Perzentil sind: Na 0,002%; K 0,34%; As 12 g/kg; Se 10 g/kg und Sn 0,10 mg/kg. Für einige Obstsorten wurden Selenwerte erhalten, die erheblich von denen der Deutschen Nährwert-Tabellen 1986/1987 abweichen. Frischobst, dessen Verzehr für Einwohner der Niederlande in der Altersklasse von 22–75 Jahre im Schnitt 129 g/Tag beträgt, liefert einen vernachlässigbaren Beitrag zur täglichen Einnahme von Natrium, Arsen, Selen und Zinn; für Kalium hingegen kann dieser Beitrag, mit bis zu 23%, erheblich sein.

     

Synthesis methods of array antenna excitation laws

Standard numerical optimization methods become very computational time consuming when dealing with synthesis of array antenna excitation laws, especially when number of elements exceeds a few tenths. Array antenna designer needs a fast and efficient synthesis tool, since the design phase implies several reoptimizations within the definition phase, in order to satisfy tradeoffs on antagonistic requirements : performances, size, cost,… We propose the use of an efficient, from the computational time point of view, and secured, from the convergence point of view, synthesis method illustrated by two examples. The optimized solution satisfies a sta-tionarity condition, which leads to steady solutions in frequency but also with regard to errors (manufacturing, …). Based on analytical calculus performed before any numerical resolution and together with the use of fast Fourier transform algorithms, this method leads to reduced optimization times (in the order of a minute) for arrays of some tenths up to some hundred feeds, computations being performed on a pc. Two theoretical applications are presented and for each of them a computed example is also shown; moreover possible extensions are considered.