Numerical study of coal particle cluster combustion under quiescent conditions

Behavior of ignition and combustion of coal particle cluster under a quiescent condition was numerically simulated by solving balance equations of mass and enthalpy with combustion kinetic models of volatiles and char. Two-flame structure, one flame penetrating into the cluster and the other moving out of the cluster, was predicted during the combustion of coal particle cluster. Effects of radiative heat transfer, group number, ambient temperature, coal particle size, and oxygen concentration on ignition and combustion of coal particle clusters were also analyzed. Simulations indicated that the gas volume fraction of coal particle cluster increases with time after devolatilization. Gas velocity passing through the cluster surface varied significantly at volatile liberation. The ignition time delay was reduced with the increase of ambient temperature. The cluster devolatilization rate and char burning rate increased while the ignition time delay decreased with the increase of ambient oxygen concentration.     

Mobile phase composition for resolving whey proteins in reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography

Reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography was successfully developed for the simultaneous and rapid separation for the main whey proteins, α-Lactalbumin and β-Lactoglobulin. This method consisted of a linear gradient of the two mobile phases of 0.1% trifluoroacetic acid in water and 0.1% trifluoroacetic acid in acetonitrile. The total run time for this separation was approximately 30 min, and α-Lactalbumin was eluted followed byβ- Lactoglobulin. The injection volume was fixed at 20 μl and the flow rate was 1 ml 1/min. The optimum mobile phase composition and gradient conditions to separate α-Lactalbumin and β-Lactoglobulin (A+B) were experimentally obtained at the 15 μm particle with a pore size of 300 Å on the linear-gradient mode.     

Effect of Antimony Addition on Electrical and Optical Properties of Tin Oxide Film

Antimony-doped tin oxide films were prepared on Corning glass substrate by chemical vapor deposition from a gas mixture of SnCl₄–SbCl₅–H₂O. The electrical conductivity and optical transmission of tin oxide films were studied with antimony doping. The film conductivity increased largely without losing optical transparency with a small addition of antimony. The increase of the conductivity was attributed mainly to more electrons donated by pentavalent Sb ions in the SnO₂ lattice. Large additions of antimony, however, diminished the conductivity, optical transparency, and crystallinity of the film. The diminution was found to be caused by fine Sb₂O₅ phases codeposited with SnO₂.     

Influence of Potassium on Preparation and Performance of PTC Resistors

Different amounts of K₂CO₃ were added to (Ba,Sr)TiO₃-based PTCR (positive temperature coefficient of resistance) ceramics to investigate their influence on the microstructural and electrical properties. Experimental results showed that the incorporation of K acted as an A-site acceptor-type dopant. In addition to enhancing discontinuous grain growth, the increase of K₂CO₃ was found to raise the room-temperature resistivity which was dominated by grain-boundary resistance rather than grain resistance. By adjusting to a suitable amount of donor dopant, the inherent contamination of K in raw material can be compensated to achieve a high-quality PTC resistor.     

Effect of reactive diluents on properties of unsaturated polyester/montmorillonite nanocomposites

Unsaturated polyester (UP)/montmorillonite (MMT) nanocomposite was prepared by using hydroxypropylacrylate (HPA) as a reactive diluent instead of conventional styrene monomer and the effect of polarity of reactive diluent on properties of nanocomposite was investigated. X‐ray and mechanical test data indicated that mixing for an extended period of time is essential to enhance the physical properties of nanocomposites in the UP/Cloisite 6A system. This was attributed to the high polarity of HPA that may disturb the preintercalation of UP resin into the galleries of MMT. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 92: 238–242, 2004     

A randomized algorithm for natural object colorization

Natural objects often contain vivid color distribution with wide variety of colors. Conventional colorization techniques, on the other hand, produce colors that are relatively flat with little color variation. In this paper, we introduce a randomized algorithm which considers not only the value of target color but also the distribution of target color. In essence, our algorithm paints a color distribution to a region which synthesizes color distribution of a natural object. Our approach models the correlation between intensity and color in HSV color space in terms of H – S, H – V and S – V joint histogram. During the colorization process, we randomly swap and reassign color of a pixel to minimize a cost function that measures color consistency to its neighborhood and intensity‐to‐color correlation captured in the joint histogram. We tested our algorithm extensively on many natural objects and our user study confirms that our results are more vivid and natural compared to results from previous techniques.     

Microstructural Evidence for Diffusion-Driven Tetragonal-to-Orthorhombic Phase Transformation in Y-Ba-Cu-O Superconductor

Microstructures of Y-Ba-Cu-O superconductor were observed using a polarized microscope. Orthorhombic and tetragonal phases were easily distinguished by the optical etching with cross-polarized light. In the specimen cooled rapidly in oxygen, it was possible to see the path of oxygen diffusion by observing the variation of the twin concentration. At the boundary between transformed and untransformed materials, evidence for diffusion-driven transformation could be clearly seen.     

Model algorithmic control of grade change operations in paper mills

In this work, the Model Algorithmic Control (MAC) method is applied to control the grade change operations in paper mills. The neural network model for the grade change operations is identified first and the impulse model is extracted from the neural network model. Results of simulations for MAC control of grade change operations are compared with plant operation data. The major contribution of the present work is the application of MAC in the industrial plants based on the identification of neural network models. We can confirm that the proposed MAC method exhibits faster responses and less oscillatory behavior compared to the plant operation data in the grade change operations.     

The effects of Ni and Li doping on the performance of lithium manganese oxide material for lithium secondary batteries

Layered Li_0.7[M_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ (M=Li, Ni) was synthesized using a sol-gel method. P2-Na_0.7[M_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ precursor was first synthesized by a sol-gel method, and then O2-Li_0.7[M_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ was prepared by an ion exchange of Li for Na in P2-Na_0.7[M_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ precursor. From charge/discharge curves, it was seen that Li_0.7[Li_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ has two plateaus similar to those observed from a spinel structure, but Li_0.7[Ni_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ holds a single plateau as observed from a typical layered structure. It was considered that Li_0.7[Li_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ undergoes a phase transformation from layered to spinel structure during the charge/discharge cycle, but Li_0.7[Ni_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ maintains O2-layered structure after the cycles. Li_0.7[Ni_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂ was higher in discharge capacity and retention rate than Li_0.7[Li_1/6Mn_5/6]O₂.     

Electrochemical behavior of Sn8Hg (gamma-2) and dental amalgam in a phosphate buffer solution

The gamma-2 phase (Sn₈Hg) and a dental amalgam in phosphate buffer have been studied by means of potentiostatic and galvanostatic techniques, along with a rotating ring-disc electrode (RRDE). The analysis of results has shown that phosphate ions play an important role in the corrosion of amalgam. The anodic reaction leads to the formation of soluble species and a passivating film, which is probably composed of tin hydroxide and tin phosphate.