2,636 research outputs found
Mass transfer characteristics in structured packing for CO2 emission reduction processes
Acid gas treating and CO2 capture from flue gas by absorption have gained wide importance over the past few decades. With the implementation of more stringent environmental regulations and the awareness of the greenhouse effect, the need for efficient removal of acid gases such as CO2 (carbon dioxide) has increased significantly. Therefore, additional effort for research in this field is inevitable. For flue gas processes the ratio of absorption solvent to gas throughput is very different compared to acid gas treating processes owing to the atmospheric pressures and the dilution effect of combustion air. Moreover, in flue gas applications pressure drop is a very important process parameter. Packing types are required that allow for low pressure drop in combination with high interfacial areas at low liquid loading per square meter. The determination of interfacial areas in gas-liquid contactors by means of the chemical method (Danckwerts, P. V. Gas-liquid reactions; McGraw-Hill: London, 1970) has been very frequently applied. Unfortunately, many of the model systems proposed in the literature are reversible and therefore this condition possibly is not met. Versteeg et al. (Versteeg, G. F.; Kuipers, J. A. M.; Beckum, F. P. H.; van Swaaij, W. P. M. Chem. Eng. Sci. 1989, 44, 2292) have demonstrated that for reversible reactions the conditions for the determination of the interfacial area by means of the chemical method are much more severe. In a study by Raynal et al. (Raynal, L.; Ballaguet, J. P.; Berrere-Tricca, C. Chem. Eng. Sci. 2004, 59, 5395), it has been shown that there is a dependency of the interfacial area on the packing height. Unfortunately, most model systems used, e.g., CO2-caustic soda (as used by Raynal et al.), are much more complex and consist of (a set of) reversible reaction(s). The natures of these systems make the conditions at which the interfacial area can be determined much more severe and put more limitations on the process conditions and experimental equipment than a priori can be expected. Therefore, an extended absorption model is required to determine the conditions at which the interfacial area can be measured without detailed knowledge of the values of the liquid-side mass transfer coefficient, k1, beforehand.
Strong coupling of magnons in a YIG sphere to photons in a planar superconducting resonator in the quantum limit
We report measurements of a superconducting coplanar waveguide resonator
(CPWR) coupled to a sphere of yttrium-iron garnet. The non-uniform CPWR field
allows us to excite various magnon modes in the sphere. Mode frequencies and
relative coupling strengths are consistent with theory. Strong coupling is
observed to several modes even with, on average, less than one excitation
present in the CPWR. The time response to square pulses shows oscillations at
the mode splitting frequency. These results indicate the feasibility of
combining magnonic and planar superconducting quantum devices.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Preparation of Subradiant States using Local Qubit Control in Circuit QED
Transitions between quantum states by photon absorption or emission are
intimately related to symmetries of the system which lead to selection rules
and the formation of dark states. In a circuit quantum electrodynamics setup,
in which two resonant superconducting qubits are coupled through an on-chip
cavity and driven via the common cavity field, one single-excitation state
remains dark. Here, we demonstrate that this dark state can be excited using
local phase control of individual qubit drives to change the symmetry of the
driving field. We observe that the dark state decay via spontaneous emission
into the cavity is suppressed, a characteristic signature of subradiance. This
local control technique could be used to prepare and study highly correlated
quantum states of cavity-coupled qubits.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Adaptation of Bordetella pertussis to vaccination: a cause for its reemergence?
In the Netherlands, as in many other western countries, pertussis vaccines have been used extensively for more than 40 years. Therefore, it is conceivable that vaccine-induced immunity has affected the evolution of Bordetella pertussis. Consistent with this notion, pertussis has reemerged in the Netherlands, despite high vaccination coverage. Further, a notable change in the population structure of B. pertussis was observed in the Netherlands subsequent to the introduction of vaccination in the 1950s. Finally, we observed antigenic divergence between clinical isolates and vaccine strains, in particular with respect to the surface-associated proteins pertactin and pertussis toxin. Adaptation may have allowed B. pertussis to remain endemic despite widespread vaccination and may have contributed to the reemergence of pertussis in the Netherlands
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