Foaming of EPDM with water as blowing agent in injection molding

Chemical foaming of elastomers is state of the art and preferred to the more complex systems engineering of physical foaming, yet, many commonly used chemical blowing agents often are hazardous. In current investigations, we introduced water bound to carrying substances (silica, carbon black) into elastomer compounds. A stable, reproducible foaming process can be implemented using water as physical blowing agent. In first tests, the average cell diameters in injection molded elastomer parts exceed the average cell diameters of chemically foamed parts. Yet, varied amounts of blowing agent can reduce the cell diameters. Furthermore, nucleating agents and water carriers are being examined to reduce cell diameters and reach cellular structures and mechanical properties of chemically foamed parts. In conclusion, foaming of elastomers with water is a promising. Yet, further examinations have to cover the effect mechanism of foaming and vulcanization as well as continuous processing and compounding. Rear end of an EPDM part foamed with water carried on silica in injection molding process (mold temperature 195 °C, breathing mold opening 2 mm) © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016 , 133, 43613.     

Cuticular Hydrocarbons as Sex Pheromone of the Bee <Emphasis Type="Italic">Colletes cunicularius</Emphasis> and the Key to its Mimicry by the Sexually Deceptive Orchid, <Emphasis Type="Italic">Ophrys exaltata</Emphasis>

Male Colletes cunicularius bees pollinate the orchid, Ophrys exaltata, after being sexually deceived by the orchid’s odor-mimicry of the female bee’s sex pheromone. We detected biologically active volatiles of C. cunicularius by using gas chromatographic–electroantennographic detection (GC-EAD) with simultaneous flame ionization detection. After identification of the target compounds by coupled gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS), we performed behavioral tests using synthetic blends of the active components. We detected 22 EAD active compounds in cuticular extracts of C. cunicularius females. Blends of straight chain, odd-numbered alkanes and (Z)-7-alkenes with 21–29 carbon atoms constituted the major biologically active compounds. Alkenes were the key compounds releasing mating behavior, especially those with (Z)-7 unsaturation. Comparison of patterns of bee volatiles with those of O. exaltata subsp. archipelagi revealed that all EAD-active compounds were also found in extracts of orchid labella. Previous studies of the mating behavior in C. cunicularius showed linalool to be an important attractant for patrolling males. We confirmed this with synthetic linalool but found that it rarely elicited copulatory behavior, in accordance with previous studies. A blend of active cuticular compounds with linalool elicited both attraction and copulation behavior in patrolling males. Thus, linalool appears to function as a long-range attractant, whereas cuticular hydrocarbons are necessary for inducing short-range mating behavior.     

添加碳纳米管对选区激光熔化AlSi10Mg合金缺陷的影响

利用选区激光熔化成形技术制备了纯AlSi10Mg合金及碳纳米管(carbon nanotubes,CNTs)-AlSi10Mg复合材料。当添加CNTs含量为0.05%(质量分数)时具有一定增强效果,但随着CNTs添加量增大,复合材料性能却因为缺陷的增加而明显下降。木实验利用纳米CT技术对纯合金及CNTs(0.5%)-AlSi10Mg复合材料进行缺陷的三维重构。结果表明,添加0.5%的CNTs后,成形缺陷体积所占比例由12%增加至46%;气孔型缺陷数量明显增加,并且等效直径相对较大。CNTs在粉体中的团聚及对气体的吸附作用是两种类型缺陷增加的根本原因。     

Evaluation of the corrosion resistance of anodized aluminum 6061 using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS)

The corrosion resistance of anodized Al 6061 produced by two different anodizing and sealing processes was evaluated using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). The scanning electron microscope (SEM) was employed to determine the surface structure and the thickness of the anodized layers. The EIS data revealed that there was very little change of the properties of the anodized layers for samples that were hard anodized in a mixed acid solution and sealed in hot water over a 365 day exposure period in a 3.5 wt% NaCl solution. The specific admittance A_s and the breakpoint frequency f_b remained constant with exposure time confirming that the hard anodizing process used in this study was very effective in providing excellent corrosion resistance of anodized Al 6061 over extended exposure periods. Some minor degradation of the protective properties of the anodized layers was observed for samples that were hard anodized in H₂SO₄ and exposed to the NaCl solution for 14 days.     

Phase Separation and Spatial Morphology in Sodium Silicate Glasses by AFM,Light Scattering and NMR

The morphological and structural properties of sodium silicate (Na₂O–SiO₂) glasses were analyzed using atomic force microscopy (AFM) and light scattering following thermal treatments. AFM observations indicated that the glass surface microstructure evolves during the phase separation mechanisms from continuous interpenetrating phases in the spinodal decomposition process to separated droplets embedded in a continuous matrix for the nucleation/growth one. Raman mapping gave evidence of a phase separation through the nucleation/growth process with formation of silica‐rich clusters characterized by higher polymerization degree as separate droplets. The variations in inhomogeneities versus temperature investigated by Brillouin are exponential for spinodal decomposition and linear in the case of nucleation/growth mechanism. Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy was used to investigate the spatial distribution of the various Q_n species present in thermally treated glasses and allows determining fractal dimension between two and three.     

Reconstruction of graphs based on random walks

The analysis of complex networks is of major interest in various fields of science. In many applications we face the challenge that the exact topology of a network is unknown but we are instead given information about distances within this network. The theoretical approaches to this problem have so far been focusing on the reconstruction of graphs from shortest path distance matrices. Often, however, movements in networks do not follow shortest paths but occur in a random fashion. In these cases an appropriate distance measure can be defined as the mean length of a random walk between two nodes — a quantity known as the mean first hitting time.In this contribution we investigate whether a graph can be reconstructed from its mean first hitting time matrix and put forward an algorithm for solving this problem. A heuristic method to reduce the computational effort is described and analyzed. In the case of trees we can even give an algorithm for reconstructing graphs from incomplete random walk distance matrices.     

Elongational creep experiments - A new method for investigations of morphology development in polymer blends

This work is focused on the changes of phase structure in polystyrene/polyethylene blends with up to 15 wt.% of dispersed phase during elongational experiments in creep. In the first part, features of the experiments at constant stress with a special attention to morphology development in polymer blends are discussed. In the second part of the paper the deformation behavior of the dispersed droplets in dependence on applied stress and total strain is studied. It was found that with increasing the initial particle size the formation of homogeneously deformed long fibrils is preferred during the elongation. A maximum deformability of the droplets was observed, which cannot be increased by applying higher stresses, although the affine deformation of the droplets was not reached.