Competition between vitrification and crystallization of methanol at high pressure

Competition between vitrification and crystallization of methanol at high pressure Brugmans, M.J.P.; Vos, W.L. General rights It is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible. We have studied methanol at high pressure up to 33 GPa at room temperature with x-ray diffraction, optical ͑polarization͒ microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and detection of hydrostaticity. A competition between crystallization and vitrification is observed when methanol is superpressed beyond the freezing pressure of 3.5 GPa: between 5.0 and 10.5 GPa crystals can nucleate, but if this region is surpassed quickly enough ͑within a few seconds͒, methanol remains amorphous. For the first time the nucleation rate and the crystal growth velocity have been studied as a function of pressure. These kinetic properties can be described by classical nucleation theory in agreement with, respectively, Turnbull-Fisher and Wilson-Frenkel type behavior using one and the same activated hard-sphere diffusion coefficient. The experimental nucleation rate and the crystal growth velocity are both effectively reduced to zero above 10.5 GPa, because the diffusion is suppressed. At these pressures methanol is compressed into a glass

Fast energy delocalization upon vibrational relaxation of a deuterated zeolite surface hydroxyl

In this time-resolved study of vibrational dynamics of deuterated surface hydroxyls at acid sites in the zeolite Mordenite, we investigate the O¿D T1 vibrational lifetime and transient band shifts. It is shown that after infrared excitation of the stretching mode of a surface hydroxyl, the excess energy is rapidly distributed over delocalized low-energy lattice modes upon de-excitation. This is asserted from the observation that nonexcited hydroxyls are perturbed by the relaxation of their excited counterparts immediately after this relaxation. This observation can be made owing to better resolution in transient transmission spectroscopy obtained by deuteration of the surface hydroxyls. This assignment allows for accurate estimates of lattice temperatures after relaxation of the vibration. Further, from the observation that the vibrational lifetime is dependent on frequency (increasing from 25 to 70 ps with increasing frequency), it is concluded that the deuterated acidic protons are hydrogen bonded to lattice oxygen atoms in the zeolite

Interinstitutional variations of sensitometric curves of radiographic dosimetric films

Depth and field size dependence of the sensitometric curves of radiographic films have been studied by various groups. Limited information is, however, available on the magnitude of the variations in sensitometric curves applied in clinical practice in different institutions. In this study we assessed in a systematic way the effect of the various parameters influencing the shape of the sensitometric curve: batch composition, irradiation conditions, film processing, and film scanning. Two types of film, Kodak X-Omat V and CEA TVS, were irradiated, processed, and analyzed in three different institutions. The interinstitutional variation of the sensitometric curves, expressed as the OD variation at 50 cGy, can be up to 32% and is mainly caused by differences in film processing and to a lesser degree to differences in batch composition, film scanning, and irradiation conditions. For the Kodak films, the average OD difference at 50 cGy between the three institutions is 17% as a result of differences in batch composition and 25% due to differences in processing conditions. For the CEA films these data are 6% and 24%, respectively. The long-term variation of the sensitometric curves of KODAK films in one institution was smaller than the differences in batch composition between the three institutions. The sensitometric curves of CEA films showed in one institution a large variation with time; the shape gradually varied from sigmoidal to quasilinear. By using relative OD values rather than absolute OD values, variations in sensitometric curves of KODAK films can be reduced to 2%. Consequently, one sensitometric curve is sufficient to derive relative dose values. If processing conditions are well controlled, it might therefore be advantageous to determine the absolute OD only at one or two dose values, in combination with a "universal" relative sensitometric curv