Design,synthesis and physical properties of poly(styrene-butadiene-styrene)/poly(thiourea-azo-sulfone) blends

A new aromatic azo-polymer, poly(thiourea-azo-sulfone), has been synthesized using 1-(4-thiocarbamoylaminophenylsulfonylphenyl)thiourea and diazonium salt solution. Conducting and thermally stable rubbery blends of poly(styrene-block-butadiene-block-styrene) (SBS) triblock copolymer and poly(thiourea-azo-sulfone) (PTAS) were produced by solution blending technique. PTAS possessed fine solubility in polar solvents and high molar mass 63 × 10₃ g moL^?1. Microscopic analysis on SBS/PTAS blends revealed good adhesion between the two polymers without macro phase separation. Electrical conductivity measurement recommended that blending of SBS with 60% PTAS was sufficiently conducting 1.43 S cm^?1. A relationship between PTAS loading and thermal stability of blends was observed. With the increasing PTAS content, 10% gravimetric loss was increased from 481 to 497 °C, while glass transition improved from 123 to 136 °C (better than neat SBS but lower than PTAS). The blends also established higher tensile strength (52.40–59.96 MPa) relative to SBS. Fine balance of properties renders new SBS/PTAS, potential engineering plastics for a number of aerospace relevance.     

Meat as a functional food with special reference to probiotic sausages

Consumers believe that foods are associated directly to their health. Today foods are not only used to satisfy our hunger but also to provide indispensible nutrients for humans and these nutrients having the health benefits regarding in controlling the diseases. The market for functional foods has seen a sharp rise in demand in the recent years. This has driven researchers to multiply their efforts in producing functional meat products also. Feed manipulation and post-mortem modification of meat coupled with enrichment of bioactive compounds are gaining importance. This review discusses the candidate ingredients and strategies, utilized in crafting such functional meat products, and the notable developments and commercial successes in functional meat industry. Dry fermented sausages meet the conditions required to carry viable probiotic microbes. This article enlists various microorganisms that are being commercially used in functional food products and potential bacteria for probiotic sausage production.     

Highly Efficient,Solution‐Processed,Single‐Layer,Electrophosphorescent Diodes and the Effect of Molecular Dipole Moment

A new family of highly soluble electrophosphorescent dopants based on a series of tris‐cyclometalated iridium(III) complexes (1–4) of 2‐(carbazol‐3‐yl)‐4/5‐R‐pyridine ligands with varying molecular dipole strengths have been synthesized. Highly efficient, solution‐processed, single‐layer, electrophosphorescent diodes utilizing these complexes have been prepared and characterized. The high triplet energy poly(9‐vinylcarbazole) PVK is used as a host polymer doped with 2‐(4‐biphenylyl)‐5‐(4‐tert‐butyl‐phenyl)‐1,3,4‐oxadiazole (PBD) for electron transport. Devices with a current efficiency of 40 cd A^?1 corresponding to an EQE of 12% can thus be achieved. The effect of the type and position of the substituent (electron‐withdrawing group (CF₃) and electron‐donating group (OMe)) on the molecular dipole moment of the complexes has been investigated. A correlation between the absorption strength of the singlet metal‐to‐ligand charge‐transfer (¹MLCT) transition and the luminance spectral red shift as a function of solvent polarity is observed. The strength of the transition dipole moments for complexes 1–4 has also been obtained from TD‐DFT computations, and is found to be consistent with the observed molecular dipole moments of these complexes. The relatively long lifetime of the excitons of the phosphorescence (microseconds) compared to the charge‐carrier scattering time (less than nanoseconds), allows the transition dipole moment to be considered as a “quasi permanent dipole”. Therefore, the carrier mobility is sufficiently affected by the long‐lived transition dipole moments of the phosphorescent molecules, which are randomly oriented in the medium. The dopant dipoles cause positional and energetic disorder because of the locally modified polarization energy. Furthermore, the electron‐withdrawing group CF₃ induces strong carrier dispersion that enhances the electron mobility. Therefore, the strong transition dipole moment in complexes 3 and 4 perturbs both electron and hole mobilities, yielding a reduction in exciton formation and an increase in the device dark current, thereby decreasing the device efficiency.     

Terahertz tomographic imaging of XVIIIth Dynasty Egyptian sealed pottery

A monochromatic millimeter-wave imaging system coupled with an infrared temperature sensor has been used to investigate historic objects preserved at the Museum of Aquitaine (France). In particular, two-dimensional and three-dimensional analyses have been performed in order to reveal the internal structure of nearly 3500-year-old sealed Egyptian jars.     

Why do infants make A not B errors in a search task, yet show memory for the location of hidden objects in a nonsearch task?

In 4 experiments, infants aged 8 to 12 months were tested on A not B search tasks, and nonsearch A not B tasks following the violation-of-expectation paradigm. A 1-location task and 2 control tasks were also conducted. In the nonsearch tasks, a toy was hidden in A, moved to B, and retrieved after a delay from either A (impossible) or B (possible). Results showed significantly longer looking times at impossible events, indicating some memory for where the object was hidden and an expectation of where it should be found. This effect occurred at delays at which infants made the A not B error when searching, and at a longer delay of 15 s. The results showed clearly that infants have some memory for the object's location, even at delays at which they search at the incorrect location. Discussion centers on how these results are accounted for within explanations of the A not B error. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Production of biodiesel from palm oil (Elaeis guineensis) using heterogeneous catalyst: An optimized process

Response surface methodology (RSM) based on central composite design (CCD) was used to optimize the three important reaction variables — methanol/oil molar ratio (x₁), reaction time (x₂) and amount of catalyst (x₃) for production of biodiesel from palm oil using KF/ZnO catalyst. Based on the CCD, a quadratic model was developed to correlate the reaction variables to the biodiesel yield. From the analysis of variance (ANOVA), the most influential factor on the experimental design response was identified. The predicted yield after process optimization was found to agree satisfactory with the experimental value. The optimum conditions for biodiesel production were found as follows: methanol/oil ratio of 11.43, reaction time of 9.72 h and catalyst amount of 5.52 wt%. The optimum biodiesel yield was 89.23%.     

A self-tuning fuzzy PI controller for TCSC to improve power system stability

In this paper, a self-tuning fuzzy PI controller (STFPIC) is proposed for thyristor-controlled series capacitor (TCSC) to improve power system dynamic performance. In a STFPIC controller, the output-scaling factor is adjusted on-line by an updating factor (α). The value of α is determined from a fuzzy rule-base defined on error (e) and change of error (Δe) of the controlled variable. The proposed self-tuning controller is designed using a very simple control rule-base and the most natural and unbiased membership functions (MFs) (symmetric triangles with equal base and 50% overlap with neighboring MFs). The comparative performances of the proposed STFPIC and the standard fuzzy PI controller (FPIC) have been investigated on two multi-machine power systems (namely, 4 machine, 2 area system and 10 machine 39 bus system) through detailed non-linear simulation studies using MATLAB/SIMULINK. From the simulation studies it has been found out that for damping oscillations, the performance of the proposed STFPIC is better than that obtained by the standard FPIC. Moreover, the proposed STFPIC as well as the FPIC have been found to be quite effective in damping oscillations over a wide range of operating conditions and are quite effective in enhancing the power carrying capability of the power system significantly.     

Numerical study of mixed convection nanofluid in an annulus enclosure between outer rotating cylinder and inner corrugation cylinder

Numerical investigations are presented for mixed convection problems in a concentric inner sinusoidal cylinder and an outer rotating circular cylinder, which were kept at constant hot and cold temperatures, respectively. The free space between the cylinders and the enclosure walls was filled with a water‐Cu nanofluid. The governing equations are formulated for velocity, pressure, and temperature formulation and are modeled in COMSOL5.2a, a partial differential equation solver based on the Galerkin finite element method. The governing parameters considered are the solid volume fraction, [0, 0.02, 0.04, and 0.06], Re (1, 25, 100, 200, and 300), and Ra (less than 10⁴), and the inner cylinder corrugation frequencies varied from (N = 3, 6, and 9). According to the calculations, the Reynolds number, the Rayleigh number, the nanoparticle volume fraction, and the number of corrugations play an important role of forming the stream and isothermal lines, the local and the average Nusselt number inside the annulus enclosure. The average Nusselt number decreases with increasing Reynolds number and the number of corrugations, while it increases as the Rayleigh number and the volume fraction increase.     

An Innovative Approach to the Synthesis of PMMA/PEG/Nanobifiller Filled Nanocomposites with Enhanced Mechanical and Thermal Properties

A facile route was adopted to blend the matrix. The PMMA/PEG blend was reinforced with three types of nanofillers, i.e., pristine MWCNT (P-CNT), amine functionalized MWCNT (PDA-EA-CNT) and nanobifiller i.e. nanodiamond functional MWCNT (PDA-EA-CNT-ND) to yield three different types of nanocomposites i.e. PMMA/PEG/P-CNT, PMMA/PEG/PDA-EA-CNT and PMMA/PEG/PDA-EA-CNT-ND. These nanocomposites were reinforced with nanofiller loading (1 wt. %, 3 wt. %, 5 wt. %, 10 wt. %, 30 wt. % and 50 wt. %) by solution casting method. Structure of composite and nanofillers was confirmed by FTIR. FESEM imaging revealed that nanocomposites have micro porous morphology. At high magnification, distribution of functionalized CNT/ND appears to be protruding out of the polymeric matrix. The TGA result suggests that the thermal stability of the nanocomposites was enhanced in comparison to PMMA due to grafting of filler molecules with PMMA/PEG macromolecules. The DTG results showed that the bifiller nanocomposites (PMMA/PEG/PDA-EA-CNT-ND) exhibited improved thermal stability with T_max (431^°C) as compared to P-CNT and amine functionalized CNT (PMMA/PEG/PDA-EA-CNT) with T_max of 395^°C and 418^°C respectively. XRD results showed fine interaction between filler and the polymeric matrix. As the filler loading was increased the composites showed pronounced XRD peak at 25.9^°, corresponding to (002) reflection of nanotubes. Significant improvement in the mechanical properties of composites was recorded with the reinforcement of fillers as compared to the neat matrix. The most significant improvement in tensile strength and elastic modulus was observed for the bifiller nanocomposites with 5 wt. % PDA-EA-CNT-ND. They showed a tensile strength and elastic modulus of 29.9 MPa and 1474.31 MPa respectively as compared to amine functionalized CNT with tensile strength (25.7) and elastic modulus (1466.99 MPa)and P-CNT with tensile strength(25 MPa) and elastic modulus (1155.75 MPa).