Studies on high-performance blended/multiblended cements and their durability characteristics

Number of blends were prepared by intergrinding clinker, gypsum, fly ash, calcined clay, microsilica and limestone in laboratory ball mill in varying percentages, and their physical properties such as fineness, consistency, setting time and compressive strength have been determined. The durability tests on selected compositions were also conducted by exposing the mortar cubes separately in 5% Na₂SO₄ and 5% NaCl solutions till the age of 90 and 180 days. The performance was observed by compressive strength development criteria after various length of exposure. Results have been discussed and found that the durability of blended cement is higher than the ordinary Portland cement.     

Pullout behavior of polypropylene fibers from cementitious matrix

A comprehensive experimental investigation was performed to understand the pullout behavior of polypropylene fibers from a cementitious matrix. The effect of embedded length on the pullout characteristics, the development of the interfacial bond with age of curing of matrix and the effect of exposure to degrading environments, like seawater and salt water, on the interfacial bond between the fibers and cementitious matrix were studied. The aim of these experiments was to understand the properties of fiber/matrix interface, which are of primary significance in predicting the overall behavior of fiber-reinforced cement-based composites. Polypropylene fibers have a weak bond with cementitious matrix because of smooth surface of fibers, which does not allow for sufficient friction to develop between the two. In this study a new method to improve the frictional bond by means of mechanical indentations of fibers was also proposed. The bonding performance was characterized by means of pullout tests of the plain and modified fibers from a cementitious matrix. An optimum level of fiber modification for maximization of bond efficiency was determined experimentally.     

Conductance measurements of some electrolytes in N,N-dimethyformamide and its binary mixtures witth other organic solvents—II

Equivalent conductances of Bu₄NBPh₄, Bu₄NNO₃, Bu₄NI,KClO₄, Kl, NaI, NaBPh₄, Ph₄PCl, LiCl, AgNO₃ and CuClO₄. 4AN have been measured at 25°C in binary mixtures of N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF) containing 1 mol % of 1, 1, 3, 3-tetramethylurea (TMU), dimethylsulphoxide (DMSO) and hexamethylphosphotriamide (HMPT). Such measurements for LiCl, NaI, KClO₄ and CuClO₄. 4AN have also been carried out in DMF and in binary mixtures of DMF containing 1 mol % pyridine (Py), α-picoline (α-Pic), β-picoline (β-Pic), γ-picoline (γ-Pic) and acetonitrile (AN). The conductance data in all the cases have been analyzed by the Shedlovsky equation. Limiting ion conductances have been obtained by the method of Fuoss et al. The actual solvated radii of ions, evaluated using limiting ion conductances show that Ag⁺ and Cu₊ have strong preferential solvation by all solvents which have been used to prepare the binary mixtures with DMF and the preferential solvation for both Ag⁺ and Cu⁺ with HMPT, DMSO and TMU is relatively stronger than with AN and is practically of similar magnitude as with the organic bases.     

Graft-copolymerization of starch with acrylamide,II. Thermal behaviour of graft copolymers

Thermal behaviour of starch-graft-polyacrylamide (S-g-PAM) copolymers was evaluated. Grafting of polyacrylamide onto starch lowers the initial decomposition temperature. However, the over-all stability as assessed by the shape of thermogravimetric curve and integral procedural decomposition temperature increased with an increase in % graft-on.     

Cationic surfactant-selective potentiometric sensors based on neutral ion-pair carrier complexes

Poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) membrane electrodes to determine monomer concentrations of tetradecyltrimethylammonium ion (TTA⁺) and hexadecylpyridinium ion (HPy⁺) based on neutral ion-pair carrier complexes of tetradecyltrimethylammonium dodecyl sulfate (TTA⁺-DS⁻) and hexadecylpyridinium dodecyl sulfate (HPy⁺-DS⁻), respectively, are reported here. The electrodes exhibit a Nernstian slope of 59 mV per decade for TTA⁺ and a sub-Nernstian slope of 34.5 mV per decade for HPy⁺ ions. The TTA⁺ ion-selective electrode (ISE) and the HPy⁺-ISE can determine the monomer units down to concentrations as low as 4.0×10⁻⁴M and 1.66×10⁻⁵ M, respectively. The effect of various additives, such as the anionic polyelectrolyte sodium dextran sulfate and macrocyclic β-cyclodextrin, on the surface activity exhibited by the cationic surfactants TTA⁺-DS⁻ and HPy⁺-DS⁻, in the presence of background concentrations of NaCl was also examined with surfactant-selective sensors. The Gibbs free energy of micelle formation (ΔG _m ) of both surfactants in the presence of various additives was calculated and found to be less favorable with respect to an increase in the amount of additives due to less availability of cationic surfactant monomer units. The ion-pair complexes TTA⁺-DS⁻ and HPy⁺-DS⁻ were found to behave as selective carrier compounds in PVC membranes in determining the concentration of monomer units of both TTA⁺ and HPy⁺, respectively. The proposed sensors worked well at a fairly acidic pH of 1–6.5 with response time of 60 s. The sensors responded well to the surfactant ions even in the presence of additives at lower concentration. The lifetime of the sensors is 3 mon.     

Has water-saving irrigation recovered groundwater in the Hebei Province plains of China?

This study performed a quantitative evaluation of the impact of water-saving irrigation on the groundwater regime in the Hebei Province plains area. In this work, the change in groundwater regime and the contributions of precipitation and water-saving irrigation development were investigated. The results indicate that the groundwater overdraft has been mitigated to some extent, mainly due to changes in precipitation and the implementation of water-saving irrigation, with contributions of 64.3% and 35.7%, respectively, when considering only these two factors. Water-saving irrigation is accepted as an important means for reducing groundwater depletion, but should be used in conjunction with other measures.     

A Scenario Based Impact Assessment of Trace Metals on Ecosystem of River Ganges Using Multivariate Analysis Coupled with Fuzzy Decision-Making Approach

The growing consciousness about the health risks associated with environmental pollutants has brought a major shift in global concern towards prevention of hazardous/trace metals discharge in water bodies. Majority of these trace metals gets accumulated in the body of aquatic lives, which are considered as potential indicators of hazardous content. This results in an ecological imbalance in the form of poisoning, diseases and even death of fish and other aquatic lives, and ultimately affect humans through food chain. Trace metals such as Cd, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn originated from various industrial operations containing metallic solutions and agricultural practices, have been contributing significantly to cause aquatic pollution. The present study develops a novel approach of expressing sustainability of river’s ecosystem based on health of the fish by coupling fuzzy sensitivity analysis into multivariate analysis. A systematic methodology has been developed by generating monoplot, two dimensional biplot and rotated component matrix (using ‘Analyze it’ and ‘SPSS’ software), which can simultaneously identify critical trace metals and their industrial sources, critical sampling stations, and adversely affected fish species along with their interrelationships. A case study of assessing the impact of trace metals on the aquatic life of river Ganges, India has also been presented to demonstrate effectiveness of the model. The clusters pertaining to various water quality parameters have been identified using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to determine actual sources of pollutants and their impact on aquatic life. The fuzzy sensitivity analysis reveals the cause-effect relationship of these critical parameters. The study suggests pollution control agencies to enforce appropriate regulations on the wastewater dischargers responsible for polluting river streams with a particular kind of trace metal(s).     

Benzoylation of benzene to benzophenone over zeolite catalysts

The liquid phase benzoylation of benzene with benzoyl chloride (BOC) to benzophenone is catalyzed by various zeolites at 353 K. Zeolite H-beta is found to be more active than the other zeolites. The conversion of benzoyl chloride to benzophenone over H-beta increases significantly with increase in the reaction time, temperature, catalyst/BOC (wt/wt) and benzene/BOC (mole) ratios. The yield of benzophenone decreases with increase in SiO₂/Al₂O₃ ratio and isomorphous substitution of Al-by Ga- and Fe-in zeolite H-Al-beta in the following order: Al-> Ga-> Fe-H-beta suggesting that high density of acidic centers along with strong acid sites are required for the reaction.     

Particle-in-Cell algorithms for emerging computer architectures

We have designed Particle-in-Cell algorithms for emerging architectures. These algorithms share a common approach, using fine-grained tiles, but different implementations depending on the architecture. On the GPU, there were two different implementations, one with atomic operations and one with no data collisions, using CUDA C and Fortran. Speedups up to about 50 compared to a single core of the Intel i7 processor have been achieved. There was also an implementation for traditional multi-core processors using OpenMP which achieved high parallel efficiency. We believe that this approach should work for other emerging designs such as Intel Phi coprocessor from the Intel MIC architecture.