A new reactor concept for combining oxidative coupling and steam re‐forming of methane: modeling and analysis

A new and very promising application of auto‐thermal reactors is the coupling of endothermic and exothermic reactions where the product of the endothermic reaction is the desired one. Therefore, in this work, a reactor in which oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) and steam re‐forming of methane (SRM) reactions take place simultaneously was modeled. The results were obtained in a wide range of different conditions such as inlet feed, inlet temperature, portions of OCM and SRM catalysts, and inlet velocity. In selection of the catalysts, more attention was drawn to prevent re‐forming of OCM products. The main parameters of each reaction under different conditions such as conversion of the feed components, products selectivity and yield, temperature in the length of reactor, and component's concentration in the reactor were considered in course of this study. The results revealed that simultaneous OCM and SRM reactions in one reactor will tend to be auto‐thermal, and the waste of energy will be reduced. The results also show that complete conversion of water and majority of methane and oxygen will decrease the amount of unwanted products at the reactor's discharge–a constraint that exists in single reactors of each reaction specially OCM. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Oxidation of alcohols with tert-butylhydroperoxide catalyzed by Mn (II) complexes immobilized in the pore channels of mesoporous hexagonal molecular sieves (HMS)

The oxidation of alcohols with tert-butylhydroperoxide (TBHP), in the presence of Mn²⁺ complexes immobilized in the pore channels of mesoporous hexagonal molecular sieves (HMS), were investigated. It was found that immobilized [Mn(bpy)₂]²⁺/HMS is an efficient catalyst for the oxidation of alcohols such as benzyl alcohol, n-hexanol and cyclohexanol. The effects of reaction time, amount of Mn²⁺ in the catalyst, type of substrates and oxidants in this catalysis system were investigated. At optimum conditions, TBHP is more efficient oxidant with respect to H₂O₂. Following order has been observed for the percentage of conversions of alcohols: benzylic >1° >2°.     

Putative mechanism for anticancer properties of Ag–PP (NPs) extract

One of the most important challenges in treating cancer is the invasion and the angiogenesis of cancer cells. The synthesis of green nanoparticles (NPs) and their use in therapeutic fields is one of the most effective methods with minimal side effects in cancer treatment. In this study, cytotoxic and anti‐angiogenic effects of silver NPs (AgNPs) coated with palm pollen extract [Ag–PP(NPs)] were evaluated. For this purpose, the cells were treated with NPs and then were subjected to trypan blue testing (48 h). Then, the cancer invasion was evaluated by the scratch procedure and the expressions of the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and its receptor (VEGF‐R) genes were estimated using real‐time PCR assay. Also, the angiogenesis effect of the NPs was investigated with chick chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) assay. The Ag–PP(NPs) induced cytotoxicity on MCF7 cells. The findings also showed that Ag–PP(NPs) inhibit invasive cancer cells and reduce the expression of VEGF and VEGF‐R and significantly reduced the number and vessels lengths and the lengths and weights of the embryos in CAM assay. Ag–PP(NPs) with the induction of cytotoxic effects, metastatic inhibition and anti‐angiogenesis properties should be considered as an appropriate option for treatment of cancerInspec keywords: nanomedicine, genetics, cellular biophysics, toxicology, patient treatment, silver, cancer, biochemistry, biomedical materials, nanoparticles, nanofabrication, membranesOther keywords: minimal side effects, cancer treatment, silver NPs, cancer invasion, vascular endothelial growth factor, receptor genes, VEGF‐R, real‐time polymerase chain reaction assay, angiogenesis effect, chick chorioallantoic membrane assay, MCF7 cells, invasive cancer cells, cytotoxic effects, putative mechanism, anticancer properties, antiangiogenic effects, antiangiogenesis properties, Ag–PP‐induced cytotoxicity, metastatic inhibition, palm pollen extraction, trypan blue testing, time 48.0 hour, Ag     

Kinetic study of styrene atom transfer radical polymerization from hydroxyl groups of graphene nanoplatelets: Heterogeneities in chains and graft densities

Confinement effect of graphene nanoplatelets on the kinetics of styrene atom transfer radical polymerization was studied by a “grafting from” reaction. Graphene oxide was modified by different amounts of (3‐aminopropyl) triethoxysilane and then alpha‐bromoisobutyryl bromide from the hydroxyl groups. Polymerization of styrene in the presence of modified graphene and free initiator, ethyl alpha‐bromoisobutyrate, was accomplished at 110°C. Then, effect of various graft densities and different graphene loadings on the heterogeneous graft and free polystyrene chains characteristics and also kinetics of polymerization was studied by gas and gel permeation chromatographies. Efficiency of grafting reactions along with the graft contents was studied by X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy, elemental analysis, and thermogravimetric analysis. Confinement effects of graphene on the relaxation behavior of polystyrene chains and also morphology of the graphenes were studied by differential scanning calorimetry and transmission electron microscopy, respectively. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 55:1720–1732, 2015. © 2014 Society of Plastics Engineers     

The effect of MWNTs concentration and nanofiber orientation on mechanical properties of PAA nanocomposite nanofibrous web

In this research, nanocomposite nanofibrous webs of poly(acrylic acid) (PAA)/multi‐walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) were obtained via electrospinning. The effect of MWNTs concentration on the morphology and mechanical properties of PAA/MWNTs nanofibers was investigated by changing the MWNTs content from 0 to 5 wt%. The results showed that average diameter of nanofibers increased with increasing the MWNTs concentration and presence of MWNTs led to the enhancement of mechanical properties. Also, the results revealed that the strength, modulus, and elongation at break of samples increased 3.22, 2.70, and 4.27 fold, respectively, after adding 3 wt% of MWNTs. In addition, the effect of rotating speed of collector on the orientation of PAA nanofibers and its effect on mechanical properties was investigated. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) studies demonstrated that the degree of nanofibers orientation increased with the augmentation of drum speed to 25 rps. Moreover, the average nanofibers diameter decreased with the increase of drum speed. Improvement of nanofiber orientation resulted in superior mechanical properties that is, higher strength and modulus of aligned nanofiber layers were obtained in comparison to nonaligned layers (12.6 and 26.6 fold, respectively). POLYM. COMPOS., 37:3149–3159, 2016. © 2015 Society of Plastics Engineers     

A multi-product multi-period inventory control problem under inflation and discount: a parameter-tuned particle swarm optimization algorithm

In this paper, a seasonal multi-product multi-period inventory control problem is modeled in which the inventory costs are obtained under inflation and all-unit discount policy. Furthermore, the products are delivered in boxes of known number of items, and in case of shortage, a fraction of demand is considered backorder and a fraction lost sale. Besides, the total storage space and total available budget are limited. The objective is to find the optimal number of boxes of the products in different periods to minimize the total inventory cost (including ordering, holding, shortage, and purchasing costs). Since the integer nonlinear model of the problem is hard to solve using exact methods, a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is proposed to find a near-optimal solution. Since there is no bench mark available in the literature to justify and validate the results, a genetic algorithm is presented as well. In order to compare the performances of the two algorithms in terms of the fitness function and the required CPU time, they are first tuned using the Taguchi approach, in which a metric called “smaller is better” is used to model the response variable. Then, some numerical examples are provided to demonstrate the application and to validate the results obtained. The results show that, while both algorithms have statistically similar performances, PSO tends to be the better algorithm in almost all problems.     

Surface and Subsurface Deformation of Wear-Resistant Steels Exposed to Impact Wear

The impact wear resistance of four different wear-resistant steel grades was investigated using different impact bodies. Post-test evaluation of the impact tested samples was performed by different techniques including 3D surface profilometry, microhardness indentation, optical and scanning electron microscopy, and energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy. The tribological response of the steel plates during the impact is strongly dependent on the properties of the impacting body. The subsurface deformation was found to increase with increasing impact energy and/or impact velocity and decreasing steel hardness. On a microscopic scale, a number of interesting mechanisms were revealed within the deformed impact sites. Besides an overall plastic deformation, localized deformation resulting in narrow adiabatic shear bands with an ultra-fine microstructure was observed. Within these shear bands, showing intense shearing strain, nucleation of microvoids was frequently observed. Growth and linkage of these voids lead in crack formation along the shear bands and eventually flake-like wear fragments are detached when these cracks reach the surface.     

Measurement and correlation of the individual ionic activity coefficients of aqueous electrolyte solutions of KF,NaF and KBr

Ion selective electrodes were used to measure the activity coefficients of individual ions at 298.2 K in aqueous solutions of KF, KBr and NaF up to 3, 2 and 1 molal, respectively. The mean ionic activity coefficients of the electrolytes obtained from the values of individual ions show good agreement with values reported in the literature. The experimental results confirm that the activity coefficients are different for the anion and the cation in an aqueous solution of a single electrolyte. It is also confirmed that the deviation from ideality for each ion depends on its counterion. The Khoshkbarchi—Vera equation was used to correlate the experimental data.     

An extended compromise ratio method for fuzzy group multi-attribute decision making with SWOT analysis

The technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) is a well-known multi-attribute decision making (MADM) method that is used to identify the most attractive alternative solution among a finite set of alternatives based on the simultaneous minimization of the distance from an ideal solution (IS) and the maximization of the distance from the nadir solution (NS). We propose an alternative compromise ratio method (CRM) using an efficient and powerful distance measure for solving the group MADM problems. In the proposed CRM, similar to TOPSIS, the chosen alternative should be simultaneously as close as possible to the IS and as far away as possible from the NS. The conventional MADM problems require well-defined and precise data; however, the values associated with the parameters in the real-world are often imprecise, vague, uncertain or incomplete. Fuzzy sets provide a powerful tool for dealing with the ambiguous data. We capture the decision makers’ (DMs’) judgments with linguistic variables and represent their importance weights with fuzzy sets. The fuzzy group MADM (FGMADM) method proposed in this study improves the usability of the CRM. We integrate the FGMADM method into a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis framework to show the applicability of the proposed method in a solar panel manufacturing firm in Canada.