Electrokinetic and antibacterial properties of needle like‐TiO2/polyrhodanine core/shell hybrid nanostructures

The aim of this study was to fabricate needle like‐TiO₂/polyrhodanine nanostructures by polymerizing rhodanine monomer on the TiO₂ nanoparticles' surfaces and investigate their antibacterial activities. The structural, thermal, morphological, surface and electrical properties of non‐covalently functionalized nanoparticles were characterized by using FTIR, XPS, elemental analysis, TGA, XRD, SEM‐EDX, TEM, contact angle, and conductivity measurements. Characterization results confirmed the formation of needle like‐TiO₂/polyrhodanine (PRh) core/shell hybrid nanostructures. Alterations on the surface and electrokinetic properties of the materials were characterized by zeta (ζ)‐potential measurements with the presence of various salts and surfactants. The ζ‐potential of needle like‐TiO₂ was observed to increase from ?7.6 mV to +28.4 mV after forming a core/shell needle like‐TiO₂/PRh nanocomposite structure and with the presence of cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) surfactant. Thereby colloidally more stable dispersions were formed. Antibacterial properties of needle like‐TiO₂/PRh were also tested against Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Escherichia coli by various methods and they showed good antibacterial activity. The highest killing efficiency was determined for needle like‐TiO₂/PRh against E. coli by colony‐counting method as 0.95. TEM experiments also showed the immobilizations of the nanoparticles on E. coli and revealed the interactions between E. coli and the nanoparticles. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2015 , 132, 41554.     

Structural Response of World Trade Center Buildings 1, 2 and 7 to Impact and Fire Damage

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) conducted an extensive investigation of the collapse of World Trade Center towers (WTC 1 and WTC 2) and the WTC 7 building. This paper describes the component, subsystem, and global analyses performed for the reconstruction of the structural response of WTC buildings 1, 2, and 7 to impact and fire damage. To illustrate the component and subsystem analyses, the approach taken for simulating the performance of concrete slabs and shear stud connectors in composite floors subject to fire conditions are presented, as well as steel floor framing connections for beams and girders. The development of the global models from the component and subsystem analyses is briefly described, including the sets of input data used to bound the probable conditions of impact and fire damage. The final analysis results that were used to develop the probable collapse hypotheses, and a comparison of the results against observed events, are presented for each building. A review of research activities focused on improving understanding of structural system response to multi-floor fires following the WTC disaster is also provided.     

Flocculation of coal suspension with mono/dual polymer systems and contribution of Ca(II)/Mg(II) ions

In the experimental study carried out on mono-flocculation, anionic and especially non-ionic polymers strongly flocculated the coal suspension than cationic polymer. The dual-flocculation of the coal suspension with cationic and anionic polymer combination was also studied and the high performances of flocculation were also reached with dual-polymer approach. Furthermore, dual-polymer system required lower concentrations for the successful flocculation of coal particles. On the other hand, the pre-destabilization of the coal suspension with calcium and magnesium ions at particular pH and concentrations highly improved the flocculation of fine coal particles with these polymers.     

Machining strategy development and parameter selection in 5-axis milling based on process simulations

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) is one of the most popular additive manufacturing technologies for fabricating prototypes with complex geometry and different materials. However, current commercial FDM machines have the limitations in process reliability and product quality. In order to overcome these limitations and increase the levels of machine intelligence and automation, machine conditions need to be monitored more closely as in closed-loop control systems. In this study, a new method for in situ monitoring of FDM machine conditions is proposed, where acoustic emission (AE) technique is applied. The proposed method allows for the identification of both normal and abnormal states of the machine conditions. The time-domain features of AE hits are used as the indicators. Support vector machines with the radial basis function kernel are applied for state identification. Experimental results show that this new method can potentially serve as a non-intrusive diagnostic and prognostic tool for FDM machine maintenance and process control.     

Effective electrodeposition of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)-based organic coating on metallic food packaging for active corrosion protection

Journal of Applied Electrochemistry - Modern technologies continuously need special materials with specific properties to adopt the desired application. Recently, numerous researches have been...     

Efficient synthesis of enwrapped CuO@rGO nanowire arrays to improve supercapacitor electrode performance

Journal of Applied Electrochemistry - There has been a growing interest in the performance of supercapacitors (SCs) based on Transition Metal Oxides (TMOs). It has recently been included in...     

Bioactive and Physicochemical Properties of Persimmon as Affected by Drying Methods

In this study, the effects of three different drying methods (freeze drying, oven drying, and vacuum oven drying) on bioactive (total phenolics, total flavonoids, condensed tannin and total hydrolyzable tannin contents, antiradical activity, and antidiabetic activity) and some physicochemical (dry matter, ash, water activity (a _w ), color, protein, hydroxymethylfurfural, glucose and fructose content) properties of persimmon fruit were investigated. Simplex lattice mixture design methodology was applied to determine the best solvent mixture for the extraction of phenolics from the samples. It was found that the mixture of acetone:water at the ratio of 50:50 % (v/v) was the best solvent mixture for the extraction. The persimmon powder sample obtained from freeze drying showed significantly (p <0.05) higher bioactivity values than oven- and vacuum-oven-dried samples. Antiradical activity changed significantly depending on the drying method employed and it was superior in freeze-dried samples than that of the other drying methods.     

Measuring the Resilience of the Trans-Oceanic Telecommunication Cable System

Resilience is the ability of the system to both absorb shock as well as to recover rapidly from a disruption so that it can return back to its original service delivery levels or close to it. The trans-oceanic telecommunication fiber-optics cable network that serves as the backbone of the internet is a particularly critical infrastructure system that is vulnerable to both natural and man-made disasters. In this paper, we propose a model to measure the base resiliency of this network, and explore the node to node and the overall resiliency of the network using existing data for demand, capacity and flow information. The submarine cable system is represented by a network model to which hypothetical disruptions can be introduced. The base resiliency of the system can be measured as the ratio of the value delivery of the system after a disruption to the value deliver of the system before a disruption. We further demonstrate how the resiliency of the trans-oceanic telecommunication cable infrastructure is enhanced through vulnerability reduction.