The interface energy theory developed by Huang et al. is further extended to incorporate the effect of the residual interface stresses on the effective specific heats of multiphase thermoelastic nanocomposites. First, a micromechanics-based method is employed to derive the expressions of the effective specific heats at constant-strain and constant-stress of the composites. Second, in order to take into account the influence of the interface stresses on the overall properties of the nanocomposites, a thermoelastic interface constitutive relation expressed in terms of the first Piola-Kirchhoff interface stresses and the Lagrangian description of the generalized Young-Laplace equations are presented. Finally, by means of the Helmholtz free energy of the "equivalent inclusion" (the inclusion together with its interface), analytical expressions of the size-dependent effective specific heats of the nanocomposites are obtained. The model is illustrated by an example of a "three-phase thermoelastic composite" showing that the overall properties of the nanocomposites are influenced by the "residual interface stresses," which was sometimes ignored in the literature.
The interface energy theory developed by Huang et al. is further extended to incorporate the effect of the residual interface stresses on the effective specific heats of multiphase thermoelastic nanocomposites. First, a micromechanics-based method is employed to derive the expressions of the effective specific heats at constant-strain and constant-stress of the composites. Second, in order to take into account the influence of the interface stresses on the overall properties of the nanocomposites, a thermoelastic interface constitutive relation expressed in terms of the first Piola-Kirchhoff interface stresses and the Lagrangian description of the generalized Young-Laplace equations are presented. Finally, by means of the Helmholtz free energy of the "equivalent inclusion" (the inclusion together with its interface), analytical expressions of the size-dependent effective specific heats of the nanocomposites are obtained. The model is illustrated by an example of a "three-phase thermoelastic composite" showing that the overall properties of the nanocomposites are influenced by the "residual interface stresses," which was sometimes ignored in the literature.
Human activities usually leave footprints in the environment. By using 454 pyrosequencing, the impact of effluent from an industrial park on the coastal microecology in Hangzhou Bay, China, was interpreted by analysing the microbial communities of the activated sludge from three wastewater treatment plants and the sediment from the effluent receiving area. Based on richness and biodiversity, the sediments were more diversified than the activated sludge, although the seawater environment was highly contaminated. Both bacterial and archaeal communities were niche-determined. The bacterial phylum Proteobacteria dominated in all samples; and certain pollutant-resistant genera, such as Thauera and Truepera, were found in all samples. Archaeal phyla Euryarchaeota and Thaumarchaeota dominated the activated sludge and sediment samples, respectively. According to the analysis of shared operational taxonomic units (OTUs) and reads among different samples, more bacterial OTUs and reads were shared between two samples from sites with a direct effluent connection, showing a clear correlation between the wastewater treatment plants and the effluent receiving bay area. The impact of second-hand pollution can be evaluated by comparing the bacterial community in different eco-environments with a direct effluent connection, especially when pristine samples are not available.
Traditional chemical disinfectants are becoming increasingly defective due to the generation of carcinogenic disinfection byproducts and the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains. Functionalized magnetic nanoparticles yet have shown great application potentials in water treatment processes especially for bacterial removal. In this study, three types of amino acids (arginine, lysine, and poly-l-lysine) functionalized Fe3O4 nanoparticles (Fe3O4@Arg, Fe3O4@Lys, and Fe3O4@PLL) were prepared through a facile and inexpensive two-step process. The amino acid modified Fe3O4 nanoparticles (Fe3O4@AA) showed rapid and efficient capture and removal properties for both Gram-positive Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) and Gram-negative Escherichia coli 15597 (E. coli). For both strains, more than 97% of bacteria (initial concentration of 1.5 × 107 CFU mL−1) could be captured by all three types of magnetic nanoparticles within 20 min. With E. coli as a model strain, Fe3O4@AA could remove more than 94% of cells from solutions over a broad pH range (from 4 to 10). Solution ionic strength did not affect cell capture efficiency. The co-presence of sulfate and nitrate in solutions did not affect the capture efficiency, whereas, the presence of phosphate and silicate slightly decreased the removal rate. However, around 90% and 80% of cells could be captured by Fe3O4@AA even at 10 mM of silicate and phosphate, respectively. Bacterial capture efficiencies were over 90% and 82% even in the present of 10 mg L−1 of humic acid and alginate, respectively. Moreover, Fe3O4@AA nanoparticles exhibited good reusability, and greater than 90% of E. coli cells could be captured even in the fifth regeneration cycle. The results showed Fe3O4@AA fabricated in this study have great application potential for bacteria removal from water.
We present experimental studies on the conversion efficiency of fusion neutrons generated from Coulomb explosion of cryogenically cooled heteronuclear deuterated methane (CD 4 ) clusters irradiated by intense femtosecond laser pulses. A stronger nonlinear relationship between the cluster size and the stagnation temperature for CD 4 clusters than that for monoatomic or diatomic clusters is revealed, resulting in marked increases in the average kinetic energy of deuterons and the fusion neutron yield. Finally, a significantly enhanced conversion efficiency of 1.9 × 10 7 neutrons/J of incident laser energy is achieved by lowering the stagnation temperature to 217 K under a backing pressure of 80 bars.
A highly efficient recognition phenomenon was observed between alkoxylated arylene-ethynylene macrocycles bearing identical side chains but different core size, which is based on van der Waals interactions between alkoxy chains. The ratio of both molecules and the environment of each molecule have been statistically analyzed to quantify the recognition efficiency.