Matched thermochemical diagram for vacuum decarburization of ferroalloys

The carbon content of high carbon ferroalloy melts can be reduced by a vacuum treatment. Carbon and oxygen dissolved in the melt react to form CO. Although this process has been suggested in the literature, no comprehensive analysis of the equilibrium partial pressure of CO over an alloy melt with a given carbon and oxygen content has been reported. In this paper, a new type of matched thermochemical diagram is introduced, from which the feasibility of decarburization at reduced CO pressure and the minimum achievable carbon level can be graphically evaluated for any alloy composition and temperature. Carbon and oxygen potentials of different alloys are plotted as functions of temperature on two terminal diagrams. By projecting information from these plots onto a central diagram, containing data on the Gibbs' energy of mixing for the C-O system, equilibrium partial pressures of CO and CO2 are obtained. Nomograms on the central diagram give a direct indication of the equilibrium partial pressures at any given temperature. The carbon and oxygen activities in ferrochromium alloys have been assessed and the results are presented to illustrate the construction and use of the matched thermochemical diagrams.

Purification and Partial Characterization of Microsomal NADH-Cytochrome b5 Reductase from Higher Plant Catharanthus roseus

A simple three step procedure was used to purify microsomal NADH-cytochrome b5 (ferricyanide) reductase to homogeneity from the higher plant C. roseus. The microsomal bound reductase was solubilized using zwitterionic detergent-CHAPS. The solubilized reductase was subjected to affinity chromatography on octylamino Sepharose 4B, blue 2-Sepharose CL-6B and NAD+-Agarose. The homogeneous enzyme has an apparent molecular weight of 33,000 as estimated by SDS-PAGE. The purified enzyme catalyzes the reduction of purified cytochrome b5 from C. roseus in the presence of NADH. The reductase also readily transfers electrons from NADH to ferricyanide (Km 56 μM), 2,6-dichlorophenolindophenol (Km 65 μM) and cytochrome Image via cytochrome b5 but not to menadione.

Solubility of sulfur dioxide at low partial pressures in dilute sulfuric acid solutions

Equilibrium of dissolution of sulfur dioxide at ppm levels in aqueous solutions of dilute sulfuric acid is analyzed, and a general expression is derived relating the total concentration of sulfur dioxide in the liquid phase to the partial pressure of SO2 in the gas and to the concentration of sulfuric acid in the solution. The equation is simplified for zero and high concentrations of the acid. Experiments at high concentrations of sulfuric acid have enabled the direct determination of Henry’s constant and its dependency on temperature. Heat of dissolution is -31.47 kJ/mol. Experiments in the absence of sulfuric acid and the related simplified expression have led to the determination of the equilibrium constant of the hydrolysis of aqueous sulfur dioxide and its temperature dependency.The heat of hydrolysis is 15.69 kJ/mol. The model equation with these parameters predicts the experimental data of the present work as well as the reported data very well.

Structure of Sesbania Mosaic Virus at 4·7 Å Resolution and Partial Sequence of the Coat Protein

Sesbania mosaic virus (SMV) is a plant virus infecting Sesbania grandiflora plants in Andhra Pradesh, India. Amino acid sequence of the tryptic peptides of SMV coat protein were determined using a gas phase sequenator. These sequences showed identical amino acids at 69% of the positions when aligned with the corresponding residues of southern bean mosaic virus (SBMV).Crystals diffracting to better than 3 Å resolution were obtained by precipitating the virus with ammonium sulphate. The crystals belonged to rhombohedral space group R3 with α = 291·4 Å and α = 61·9°. Three-dimensional X-ray diffraction data on these crystals were collected to a resolution of 4·7 Å, using a Siemens-Nicolet area detector system. Self-rotation function studies revealed the icosahedral symmetry of the virus particles, as well as their precise orientation in the unit cell. Cross-rotation function and modelling studies with SBMV showed that it is a valid starting model for SMV structure determination. Low resolution phases computed using a polyalanine model of SBMV were subjected to refinement and extension by real-space electron density averaging and solvent flattening. The final electron density map revealed a polypeptide fold similar to SBMV. The single disulphide bridge of SBMV coat protein is retained in SMV. Four icosahedrally independent cation binding sites have been tentatively identified. Three of these sites, related by a quasi threefold axis, are also found in SBMV. The fourth site is situated on the quasi threefold axis. Aspartic acid residues, which replace Ile218 of SBMV from the quasi threefold-related subunits are suitable ligands to the cation at this site

Synthesis of Novel Oxide Pyrochlores, A2BB?O7 (A = La, Nd; BB? = Pb, Sn, Bi), by Alkali Melt Route

Oxide pyrochlores of the formula A2BB? O7 (A = La, Nd; BB? = Pb, Sn, Bi) have been synthesized by a low-temperature ambient-pressure route employing KOH melts. All the compositions, including La2Bi2O7 and its strontium-substituted derivatives, La2-xSrxBi2O7-?, are deeply colored insulators, confirming that a metallic ground state is not achieved for Pb(IV) and Bi(IV/V) oxides with the pyrochlore structure.

Exact-Solutions Of Linear Partial-Differential Equations With Variable-Coefficients

Backlund transformations relating the solutions of linear PDE with variable coefficients to those of PDE with constant coefficients are found, generalizing the study of Varley and Seymour [2]. Auto-Backlund transformations are also determined. To facilitate the generation of new solutions via Backlund transformation, explicit solutions of both classes of the PDE just mentioned are found using invariance properties of these equations and other methods. Some of these solutions are new.

Electrochemical preparation of few layer-graphene nanosheets via reduction of oriented exfoliated graphene oxide thin films in acetamide-urea-ammonium nitrate melt under ambient conditions

Electrochemical reduction of exfoliated graphene oxide, prepared from pre-exfoliated graphite, in acetamide-urea-ammonium nitrate ternary eutectic melt results in few layer-graphene thin films. Negatively charged exfoliated graphene oxide is attached to positively charged cystamine monolyer self-assembled on a gold surface. Electrochemical reduction of the oriented graphene oxide film is carried out in a room temperature, ternary molten electrolyte. The reduced film is characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM), conductive AFM, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy and Raman spectroscopy. Ternary eutectic melt is found to be a suitable medium for the regulated reduction of graphene oxide to reduced graphene oxide-based sheets on conducting surfaces. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Partial Discharge Resistant Characteristics of Epoxy Nanocomposites

Epoxy nanocomposite samples with a good dispersion of alumina nanoparticles in epoxy matrix were prepared and experiments were performed to measure their partial discharge resistant characteristics. Epoxy alumina nanocomposites with 0.1, 1, 5, 10 and 15 wt% nanofillers were prepared in the laboratory and partial discharge (PD) experiments were conducted at a voltage of 10 kV for different durations using IEC (b) type electrodes. The degradation of the sample surfaces were analyzed using SEM techniques, surface profile studies, FTIR spectroscopy as well as PD studies. An attempt was made to understand the interaction dynamics between the nanoparticle and the epoxy chain by measuring the glass transition temperature of the nanocomposites. The partial discharge resistance obtained for the nanocomposites are compared with those of unfilled epoxy and epoxy microcomposites. It was observed that even with 0.1 wt% of nanofiller added to the epoxy matrix, the partial discharge resistance to degradation gets improved considerably. It was also observed that the inter particle distance has a significant effect on the discharge resistance to degradation. The improvement in the degradation resistance is attributed to the interactions between the nanoparticle and the epoxy chain. A possible mechanism for the surface degradation of nanocomposites has been proposed.

Parts based representation for pedestrian using NMF with robustness to partial occlusion

Computer Vision has seen a resurgence in the parts-based representation for objects over the past few years. The parts are usually annotated beforehand for training. We present an annotation free parts-based representation for the pedestrian using Non-Negative Matrix Factorization (NMF). We show that NMF is able to capture the wide range of pose and clothing of the pedestrians. We use a modified form of NMF i.e. NMF with sparsity constraints on the factored matrices. We also make use of Riemannian distance metric for similarity measurements in NMF space as the basis vectors generated by NMF aren't orthogonal. We show that for 1% drop in accuracy as compared to the Histogram of Oriented Gradients (HOG) representation we can achieve robustness to partial occlusion.

Metastable extension of the fluorite phase field in Y2O3---ZrO2 and its effect on grain growth

Pure Y2O3 and Y2O3---ZrO2 solid solutions have been prepared by melt atomization and by pyrolysis of nitrate solutions. Extended solubility is readily achieved in both techniques for the entire composition range investigated: melts with 0–30% ZrO2 and precursors with 0–50% ZrO2. However, solidification of under cooled droplets yields almost exclusively single phase powders with the structure of cubic yttria (D53). In contrast, the pyrolysis route leads to a sequence of metastable microstructures beginning with a nanocrystalline disordered fluorite-based (C1) solid solution. Further heating leads to the evolution of much larger (micron size) flake crystals with a {001} texture, concurrent with partial ordering of the oxygen ions to the sites occupied in the D53 structure. The driving force for ordering and the rate of grain growth decrease with increasing ZrO2 addition. Abrupt heating to high temperatures or electron irradiation can induce ordering without substantial grain growth. There is no significant reduction in porosity during the recrystallization, which with the other observations suggests that grain growth is driven by the free energy available for the ordering transformation from fluorite to the yttria structure. This route offers opportunities for single crystal thin film development at relatively low processing temperatures.

Metastable extension of the fluorite phase field in Y2O3---ZrO2 and its effect on grain growth

Pure Y2O3 and Y2O3-ZrO2 solid solutions have been prepared by melt atomization and by pyrolysis of nitrate solutions. Extended solubility is readily achieved in both techniques for the entire composition range investigated: melts with 0-30% ZrO2 and precursors with 0-50% ZrO2. However, solidification of under cooled droplets yields almost exclusively single phase powders with the structure of cubic yttria (D5(3)). In contrast, the pyrolysis route leads to a sequence of metastable microstructures beginning with a nanocrystalline disordered fluorite-based (C1) solid solution. Further heating leads to the evolution of much larger (micron size) flake crystals with a {001} texture, concurrent with partial ordering of the oxygen ions to the sites occupied in the D5(3) structure. The driving force for ordering and the rate of grain growth decrease with increasing ZrO2 addition. Abrupt heating to high temperatures or electron irradiation can induce ordering without substantial grain growth. There is no significant reduction in porosity during the recrystallization, which with the other observations suggests that grain growth is driven by the free energy available for the ordering transformation from fluorite to the yttria structure. This route offers opportunities for single crystal thin film development at relatively low processing temperatures.

Theoretical estimation of the effect of minor elements on the solubility of oxygen in silicon melt

The effect of fourteen minor elements (Al, As, B, Bi, C, Ga, Ge, In, N, P, Pb, S, Sb and Sn) on the solubility of oxygen in silicon melt has been estimated using a recently developed theoretical equation, with only fundamental physical parameters such as hard sphere diameter, atomic volume and molar heat of solution at infinite dilution as inputs. The results are expressed in the form of interaction parameters. Although only limited experimental data are available for comparison, the theoretical approach appears to predict the correct sign, but underestimates the magnitude of the interaction between oxygen and alloying elements. The present theoretical approach is useful in making qualitative predications on the effect of minor elements on the solubility of oxygen in silicon melt, when direct measurements are not available.

A study of partial discharge characteristics in oil impregnated pressboard insulation

An attempt has been made to study the effect of time and test procedure on the behaviour of partial discharge (PD) pulses causing failure of oil-pressboard system under power frequency voltages using circular disc shaped samples and uniform field electrodes. Weibull statistics have been used to handle the large amount of PD data. The PD phenomena has been found to be stress and time dependent. On the basis of stress level, three different regions are identified and in one of the regions, the rate of deterioration of the sample is at a maximum. The work presents some interesting features of Weibull parameters as related to the condition of insulation studied in addition to its usual PD characteristics

Effect of dynamical asymmetry on the viscosity of a random copolymer melt

The variation of the viscosity as a function of the sequence distribution in an A-B random copolymer melt is determined. The parameters that characterize the random copolymer are the fraction of A monomers f, the parameter lambda which determines the correlation in the monomer identities along a chain and the Flory chi parameter chi(F) which determines the strength of the enthalpic repulsion between monomers of type A and B. For lambda>0, there is a greater probability of finding like monomers at adjacent positions along the chain, and for lambda<0 unlike monomers are more likely to be adjacent to each other. The traditional Markov model for the random copolymer melt is altered to remove ultraviolet divergences in the equations for the renormalized viscosity, and the phase diagram for the modified model has a binary fluid type transition for lambda>0 and does not exhibit a phase transition for lambda<0. A mode coupling analysis is used to determine the renormalization of the viscosity due to the dependence of the bare viscosity on the local concentration field. Due to the dissipative nature of the coupling. there are nonlinearities both in the transport equation and in the noise correlation. The concentration dependence of the transport coefficient presents additional difficulties in the formulation due to the Ito-Stratonovich dilemma, and there is some ambiguity about the choice of the concentration to be used while calculating the noise correlation. In the Appendix, it is shown using a diagrammatic perturbation analysis that the Ito prescription for the calculation of the transport coefficient, when coupled with a causal discretization scheme, provides a consistent formulation that satisfies stationarity and the fluctuation dissipation theorem. This functional integral formalism is used in the present analysis, and consistency is verified for the present problem as well. The upper critical dimension for this type of renormaliaation is 2, and so there is no divergence in the viscosity in the vicinity of a critical point. The results indicate that there is a systematic dependence of the viscosity on lambda and chi(F). The fluctuations tend to increase the viscosity for lambda<0, and decrease the viscosity for lambda>0, and an increase in chi(F) tends to decrease the viscosity. (C) 1996 American Institute of Physics.