Inhibitive properties, adsorption and a theoretical study of 3,5-bis(n-pyridyl)-4-amino-1,2,4-triazoles as corrosion inhibitors for mild steel in perchloric acid

Corrosion inhibition of mild steel in molar perchloric acid by 3,5-bis(n-pyridyl)-4-amino-1,2,4-triazoles (n-PAT, n = 2, 3 and 4) was studied at 30 °C using gravimetric and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy techniques. Protection efficiencies of 95% and 92% were obtained with 12 × 10⁻⁴ M of 3-PAT and 4-PAT, respectively; while 2-PAT reached only 65%. The inhibiting properties of n-PAT were found to depend on the concentration and the order of increasing inhibition efficiency was correlated with the modification of the position of the nitrogen atom in the pyridinium substituent. It was shown that adsorption of 4-aminotriazole derivatives on the steel surface is consistent with the Langmuir adsorption isotherm and the obtained standard free energy of adsorption () values indicate that the corrosion inhibition of the mild steel in 1 M HClO₄ is depends on both physic-and chemisorption. A significant correlation is obtained between inhibition efficiency and quantum chemical parameters using semi-empirical quantitative structure-activity relationships (QSAR) approach.     

Complex susceptibility analysis of magneto-fluids: Optical band gap and surface studies on the nanomagnetite-based particles

An aqueous stable magnetic fluid containing Fe₃O₄ nano-particles with a mean diameter of 4–7 nm, which is in the range of super-paramagnetism, is prepared. The particles are synthesized via co-precipitation method from ferrous and ferric solutions. X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, transformer method are used to study the physical properties of the magnetic fluids and powders. A method is given to analyze and resolve the real and imaginary parts of the measured complex susceptibility of magnetic fluids. The band gap parameters of the magneto-nanopowders such as the direct-, indirect-band gap energies, Fermi energy and Urbach energy are determined. A comparative study between the different techniques used to calculate the powder particle size is presented. Adsorption of nitrogen gas is used to identify and determine the particles mean diameter and to study their microstructure, the magnetic properties and surface porosity. The study showed that the total pore system of the magnetic nano-powders consists mainly of mesopores.     

Silane-functionalized Al2O3-modified polyurethane powder coatings: Nonisothermal degradation kinetics and mechanistic insights

This work reports on nonisothermal degradation kinetics of polyurethane (PU)-based powder coatings containing 1, 3, and 5%wt% vinyltrimethoxysilane functionalized Al₂O₃ (V-Al₂O₃) nanoparticles. Thermogravimetric analysis of PU/V-Al₂O₃ powder coatings with different V-Al₂O₃ contents has been performed at different heating rates. Variation of activation energy (E_a) of PU/V-Al₂O₃ powder coatings was modeled as a function of partial mass loss by using Kissinger–Akahira–Sunose, Ozawa–Wall–Flynn and modified Coats–Redfern isoconversional approaches. The results revealed hindered decomposition process of PU/V-Al₂O₃ nanocomposite powder coatings, featured by an increase in activation energy of degradation from ∼158 for blank PU to 225, 183, and 229 kJ/mol for nanocomposites filled with 1, 3, and 5 wt% of V-Al₂O₃, respectively. Likewise, pre-exponential factor values increased for samples containing V-Al₂O₃ nanoparticles compared to that of blank sample. Sestak–Berggren kinetic model appropriately captured thermal degradation behavior of PU/V-Al₂O₃ nanocomposites than that of nth order decomposition kinetic reaction models.     

Passivity and passivity breakdown of zinc anode in alkaline medium

The electrochemical behaviour of zinc in NaOH solutions has been investigated by using potentiodynamic technique and complemented by X-ray analysis. The E/i curves exhibit active, passive and transpassive regions prior to oxygen evolution. The active region displays two anodic peaks. The passivity is due to the Formation of a compact Zn(OH)₂ film on the anode surface. The transpassive region is assigned to the electroformation of ZnO₂. The reverse sweep shows an activation anodic peak and one catholic peak prior to hydrogen evolution. The influence of increasing additives of NaCl, NaBr and Nal on the anodic behaviour of zinc in NaOH solutions has been studied. The halides stimulate the active dissolution of zinc and tend to break down the passive film, leading to pitting corrosion. The aggressiveness of the halide anions towards the stability of the passive film decreases in the order: I^? > Br^? > Cl^?. The susceptibility of zinc anode to pitting corrosion enhances with increasing the halide ion concentration but decreases with increasing both the alkali concentration and the sweep rate.     

Rayonnement parasite des terminaisons court-circuitées en ligne microfente et en guide d’onde coplanaire

An integral equations technique solved by the moment method associated with simple one-port model is used to analyse parasitic radiation of short circuit terminations of slotlines and coplanar waveguides. This parasitic effect is represented by a frequency-dependent normalized resistance. Theoretical results are compared to experimental ones for substrates with several dielectric constants.     

Mélangeur équilibré dans la bande de 26,5 à 40 GHz en technologie de la ligne à ailettes

The fin line technique has been used in a balanced 27.25–29.75 GHz mixer with a 3.75 GHz intermediate frequency. The performance of essential mixer circuits elements is presented. The mixer has an available conversion loss of 5.8 ± 0.8 dB. The mixer is tunable by variable shorts.     

Conception assistée par ordinateur de circuits millimétriques incluant des discontinuités de type ligne à ailettes

Single and complex fin line discontinuities are precisely computed by means of the modal analysis combined with the spectral domain approach. Validity of the results is established by measurements of the scattering parameters of symmetrical configurations including these discontinuities in a «back to back» arrangement. Frequency dependent equivalent networks are derived and they can be used as data base in circuit simulation programs.     

Optical properties of vanadium thin films

The optical constants of vanadium thin films of different thicknesses were determined in the spectral range of 2.5 to 8.5 m. These optical constants were used to evaluate some microcharacteristics of vanadium thin films such as the free charge concentration, the relaxation time, the static conductivity, the electron velocity at the Fermi surface, the mean free path and the specularity parameter.The determination of the microcharacteristics were carried out in conjunction with Drude's theory of free charge carriers as well as with anomalous skin effect theory.     

Next generation of low global warming potential refrigerants: Thermodynamic properties molecular modeling

The recent global agreement signed in Kigali to limit the use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) as refrigerants, starting by 2019, has promoted an active area of research toward the development of low global warming potential (GWP) new refrigerants. Hydrofluoroolefins (HFOs) have been proposed as a low GWP alternative to third generation HFC refrigerants, but further work on fully characterizing them and their blends with other compounds is still required to fully assess their performance to replace the ones in current use. In this work, the polar and perturbed chain statistical associating fluid theory coupled with the density gradient theory is used to predict the vapor–liquid equilibrium, isobaric heat capacity, speed of sound, and surface tension of selected HFC and HFO‐based commercial azeotropic blends as fourth generation low GWP refrigerants, seeking for a predictive tool for these properties. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 63: 250–262, 2018     

Transient performance analysis in robust nonlinear adaptive control

This paper deals with the problem of controlling unknown linear systems in the presence of strictly proper unmodelled dynamics and bounded disturbances. Adaptive controllers that ensure the closed-loop global (uniform) stability and asymptotic performances can be designed following either the backstepping approach or the certainty-equivalence method. The main shortcoming of the involved controllers is that they do not allow quantification of the closed-loop transient behaviour. In this paper, the transient issue is addressed for backstepping adaptive controllers. A L_∞ bound on the tracking error is explicitly given as a function of the design parameters. This shows that the error can be made arbitrarily small by sufficiently increasing the design gains.