Method to Characterize the Air Flow and Water Removal Characteristics During Vacuum Dewatering. Part II—Analysis and Characterization

This is part II of a study reported earlier on a method to characterize the air flow and water removal characteristics during vacuum dewatering. This article presents experimental data and analysis of results from the use of a cyclically actuated vacuum dewatering device for removing moisture from wetted porous materials such as paper with the intermittent application of vacuum and accompanying air flow though the material. Results presented include sheet moisture content as a function of residence time and hence water removal rate under a variety of process conditions. Also, experimental results on air flow through the wet porous structure and hence the role and importance of air flow during vacuum dewatering are presented. Vacuum dewatering process conditions include exit solids content between 11 and 20% solid under applied vacuum conditions of 13.5 to 67.7 kPa (4 to 20 in. Hg). Regression analysis indicated that the exit sheet moisture content exhibited a nonlinear relationship with residence time with exit solids reaching a plateau after a certain residence time. Final moisture content correlated linearly with the average overall flow rate of air through the paper sample and the basis weight of the material.     

Formation of composites fabricated by exothermic dispersion reaction in A1-TiO2-B2O3 system

The formation of aluminum matrix composites fabricated by exothermic dispersion reaction in A1-TiO2-B2O3 system was investigated. The thermal analysis results show that the reactions are spontaneous and exothermic. The Gibbs free energy of α-Al2O3 is the lowest among all the combustion products, followed by TiB2 and Al3Ti. It is noted that when the B2O3/TiO2 mole ratio is below 1, the reaction products are composed of particle-like α-Al2O3, TiB2 and rod-like Al3Ti. The α-Al2O3 crystallites, resulting from the reaction between A1 and TiO2 or B2O3, are segregated at the grain boundaries due to a lower wettability with the matrix. SEM micrographs show that rod-like Al3Ti phase distributes uniformly in the matrix. When the BEO3/TiO2 mole ratio is around 1, the Al3Ti phase almost disappears in the composites, and the distribution of α-Al2O3 particulates is improved evidently.     

Effect of Wall Surface Properties at Different Drying Kinetics on the Deposition Problem in Spray Drying

Current methods in alleviating the wall deposition problem in spray drying emphasize mainly controlling the stickiness of the drying particles and less attention is placed on the properties of the dryer wall. In this experimental study, the effect of wall surface properties on the deposition mechanism has been investigated. Properties considered in classifying different wall materials were surface energy, roughness, and dielectric properties. The model solution contained sucrose, representing low-molecular-weight sugars commonly encountered in spray drying of fruit and vegetable juices. The effect of wall properties on deposition was explored at different drying rates producing particles of different surface rigidity. Larger surface roughness produced higher deposition fluxes for particles with high impact velocity and moisture. Surface energy and surface roughness were found to have no significant effect for dry rigid particles at the middle and bottom elevation of the drying chamber. However, material with lower surface energy (Teflon) exhibited less deposition for rubbery particles at such elevations. Analysis shows that dielectric wall material (Teflon) tends to enhance deposition of dry particles because of attrition at the surface. Higher wall temperature was found to produce slightly more deposition. The results of this work give a general indication of the effect of wall material on the deposition problem and provide the fundamental understanding for further studies along this line. Proper selection of dryer wall material will provide potential alternatives for reducing the deposition problem.     

Synthesis of TiO<Subscript>2</Subscript> Hybrid Molecular Imprinted Polymer for Ethofumesate Linked by Silane Coupling Agent

TiO₂ hybrid molecular imprinted polymer (MIP) for ethofumesate using methacrylic acid (MAA) as the functional monomer and silane coupling agent 3-(trimethoxysilyl) propylmethacrylate (KH570) as organic–inorganic connective bridge was synthesized via photo-excitation method. Hydrogen bond was proved to act between MAA and ethofumesate for pre- and post-polymerization binding properties as testified by UV spectrometric method. KH570 modified TiO₂ nanoparticles were prepared via sonochemical reaction, which can accelerate hydrolysis, increase collision chance for the reactive system and improve the dispersion of the nanoparticles. Scanning electron microscope (SEM), transmission electron microscope (TEM), binding and the adsorption kinetics experiments as well as thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) were employed for characterization. The results indicated that the hybrid MIP revealed a larger surface area and more ordered imprinting cavities with improved thermal stability compared to organic-only MIP. Furthermore, faster adsorption kinetics and enhancive adsorption capacity were achieved, which made it promising in chemical sensor applications.     

Effects of different kind of sesame materials on the physical properties of gomatofu (sesame tofu)

Gomatofu (sesame tofu) is one of the traditional Japanese healthy foods and is representative of all shojin (vegetarian) dishes. Gomatofu, one of the mixed gels consisting of kudzu (arrowroot) starch and sesame, possesses an extremely unusual textural characteristic which is soft, smooth, and springy. The textural properties are greatly influenced by preparation, ingredients and roasting conditions of sesame seeds. Hence there are many kinds of sesame materials which can be used to prepare gomatofu such as white, black, huskless or not and roasted or unroasted sesame materials, in this study, the effects of these materials on the physical properties of gomatofu were studied. The sample of Ra-W prepared with unroasted huskless sesame seed had the least hardness, but mouthfeel of this sample were the highest. The samples of Ro-B and Ro-W prepared with roasted husk (black and white) sesame seed were evaluated to have the best palatability because of their superior springiness. It was clarified that different kinds of sesame materials affected the forming of structure and physical properties of gomatofu, because the chemical components were different from varieties of sesame materials.     

Spin Dependent Hopping in Ti Doped La0.67 Ca0.33 MnO3

A systematic investigation of the magnetic and transport properties of Ti doped La0.67Ca0.33MnO3 was reported. The Ti substitution for Mn ions results in a reduction in ferromagnetism and conductivity. The metal-insulator transition temperature is close to Curie temperature which decreases from 274 to 82 K as x increases from 0 to 0.17. The most important effect of Ti doping is to introduce spin clusters in the samples due to the distortion of local lattice and the inhomogeneous magnetic structure induced primarily by the random distribution of Mn ions. A maximum magnetoresistance ratio as large as 90% in 1 T at 122 K was obtained for the sample with x =0. 055, which is four times larger than that obtained for LCMO sample at 272 K. There is a remarkable field-history dependent MR in the cooling process for the doped samples while such phenomenon disappears in the warming run. The resistivity follows well the variable range hopping behavior in paramagnetic state. Both the size effect and spin dependent hopping of carriers between the spin clusters should be considered in this system.     

Interfacial hybridization kinetics of oligonucleotides immobilized onto fused silica surfaces

Fused silica optical fibers have been used in an intrinsic mode optical configuration as biosensors for fluorescence based detection of hybridization of nucleic acids. In this work, the kinetics of hybridization of single-stranded oligonucleotides that were covalently immobilized were studied. The probe DNA was dT₂₀, and the target was Fluorescein-labeled non-complementary (dT₂₀) or complementary (dA₂₀) oligonucleotide. Chronofluorimetric monitoring of the adsorption and hybridization processes was used to investigate oligonucleotide films of different density, in different salt concentrations, at temperatures of 25 and 40 °C, with the concentration of the target DNA being 0.005–0.1 μM. Mathematical models based on first- and second-order Langmuir adsorption have been examined to describe both the adsorption and the hybridization processes. Experimental data were processed using the models, and the hybridization kinetics were calculated. Hybridization kinetics on these optical fiber DNA sensors was found to be up to three orders faster than results presented for a number of other experiments using different immobilization chemistries.     

Electrochemical C-V Characteristics and Photoluminescence of a-C∶N Films

Amorphous carbon (a-C) films and amorphous carbon films incorporating with the nitrogen (a-C∶N) were deposited on silicon substrates in a radio-frequency driven plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition system, while the surface electrical properties of films were investigated by electrochemical capacitance-voltage measurements. It was examined the effect of the interface defects on the properties and deduced that the conducting type of a-C∶N films was n-type. Subsequently, a comparative studies of a-C and a-C∶N films were performed by photoluminescence spectra depending on the temperature. With the decrease of the temperature, the main band with peak energy of 2.48 eV in the a-C∶N films was more intense compared with the other three bands caused by amorphous C in the a-C films.     

Experimental Research on Erbium-doped Superfluorescent Fiber Source

The effects of the variations in fiber length, fiber mirror reflectance on efficiency and output power are experimentally investigated for erbium-doped double pass backward superfluorescent fiber sources (SFSs). The influence of fiber length on mean wavelength stability (MWS) has also been demonstrated. By incorporating a short section of un-pumped erbium-doped fiber (EDF) at the output port, the pump power dependent on MWS becomes independent of pumped EDF length. This is a novel phenomenon that hasn‘t been reported up to now,and should be helpful to SFS fabrication and theory analysis. By using a fiber Michelson interferometer as spectrum slicing component,a multi-wavelength fiber source (MWFS) with ～20 channels (from 1542nm to 1559nm) is got. The MWFS has a channel spacing of ～0. 8 nm which satisfies ITUstandard. The intensity fluctuation among channels is less than 0.5dB,and the extinction ratio of all channels is above 14dB. This kind of MWFS should be useful to wavelength division multiplexing systems.     

A direct stiffness analysis of a composite beam with partial interaction

The use of the conventional semi-analytical stiffness method in finite element analysis, in which interpolation polynomials are used to develop the stiffness relationships, leads to problems of curvature locking when beam-type elements are developed for composite members with partial interaction between the materials of which it is comprised. The curvature locking phenomenon that occurs for composite steel–concrete members is quite well reported, and the general approach to minimizing the undesirable ramifications of curvature locking has been to use higher-order polynomials with increasing numbers of internal nodes. This paper presents an alternate formulation based on a direct stiffness approach rather than starting from pre-defined interpolation polynomials, and which does not possess the undesirable locking characteristics. The formulation is based on a more general approach for a bi-material composite flexural member, whose constituent materials are joined by elastic shear connection so as to provide partial interaction. The stiffness relationships are derived, and these are applied to a simply supported and a continuous steel–concrete composite beam to demonstrate the efficacy of the method, and in particular its ability to model accurately both very flexible and very stiff shear connection that causes difficulties when implemented in competitive semi-analytical algorithms. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.