PROCESSING OF TRIGLYCERIDES TO DIESEL RANGE HYDROCARBON FUELS: EASILY PRACTICABLE SMALL SCALE APPROACH

Lipid fraction of biomass has been identified as carbon neutral substitution to fuels from fossil sources in the transportation sector. Although, the diesel engine, invented by Rudolph Diesel over a century ago first ran on peanut oil, the current combustion engines are designed to run on hydrocarbon fuels derived from petroleum. Therefore, a substitute for diesel fuel from renewable source will need to have identical or closely similar properties. The most popular of the existing technology for processing vegetable or animal oils is based on the conversion of the triglycerides constituents to fatty acids methyl esters (FAME). FAME technology does not produce diesel fuel with identical properties as petro-diesel. Other alternative processing routes are dilution of the vegetable oils, emulsification, pyrolysis and hydrotreating. These routes are discussed in this paper. Appropriate technologies for small scale production of diesel range hydrocarbon fuel from vegetable oil without the need for co-reactants such methanol or hydrogen as part of the feedstock is emphased. Also alternative catalyst systems in place of the expensive precious metal supported catalysts are suggested

Tunable morphological properties of silver enriched platinum allied nanoparticles and their catalysed reduction of p-nitrophenol

A robust polymer based and polyol mediated procedure to synthesize nanobimetallic particles has been modified to produce core–shell and alloy Ag/Pt nanoparticles with tunable properties. Novel three-dimensional (3D) quasi nanocubes entangled in nanowebs were produced by rapid solution phase transformation with hot addition of absolute ethanol. The optical characterization showed extinction of plasmon resonance band occurring with incremental feeding ratio of Pt source in all cases. Transmission electron microscope (TEM) and high resolution transmission electron microscope (HRTEM) images revealed that the shape, size and size distribution of asprepared silver platinum nanoparticles depended on the stabilizer or capping agent, mole ratio of metal ion sources, temperature and time of reaction. Meanwhile, catalytic activity was highest in the reduction of p-nitrophenol in the presence of polyvinylpyrrolidone/diethylene glycol stabilized Ag/Pt nanoparticles

Synthesis of polyol based Ag/Pd nanocomposites for applications in catalysis

The synthesis of polyvinylpyrrolidone seed mediated Ag/Pd allied nanobimetallic particles was successfully carried out by the simultaneous reduction of the metal ions in ethylene glycol, diethylene glycol, glycerol, pentaerythritol and sodium borohydride solution. The optical measurement revealed the existence of peak broadening that causes diffusion processes of the metal sols to decrease making it possible to monitor the changes spectrophotometrically. This, together with X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and high resolution TEM measurements strongly support the conclusion that intimately alloyed clusters were formed and the particle growth anisotropy is diffusion limited. Finally, the catalytic potential of the nanocomposites was investigated using 4-nitrophenol in the presence of sodium borohydride at 299 K; a good linear fitting of ln (A/A0) versus the reaction time was obtained, indicating pseudo-first-order kinetic

Physical characterisation of some honey samples from North-Central Nigeria

Some physicochemical properties (water content, sugar content, viscosity, pH and conductivity) were determined for honey samples from North-Central Nigeria to evaluate their global behaviour and comparison with other honey samples. The water content and sugar content varied within the range of (18.22 - 36.82%) and (63.82 - 80.25%) respectively. The pH increased with increase in water content and the conductivities of the samples had correlation with proportion of minor constituents in the honey samples. The relationship among water content (w), temperature (t) and viscosity (�) for different honey samples of may be represented as � = 17.678× 10 3 exp (-0.32w - 0.088t). The temperature dependence of viscosity was evaluated with Arrhenius model, the activation energy with value of 70.07 kJ/g is fairly unaffected by moisture content

Physical characterisation of some honey samples from North-Central Nigeria

Some physicochemical properties (water content, sugar content, viscosity, pH and conductivity) were determined for honey samples from North-Central Nigeria to evaluate their global behaviour and comparison with other honey samples. The water content and sugar content varied within the range of (18.22 - 36.82%) and (63.82 - 80.25%) respectively. The pH increased with increase in water content and the conductivities of the samples had correlation with proportion of minor constituents in the honey samples. The relationship among water content (w), temperature (t) and viscosity (�) for different honey samples of may be represented as � = 17.678× 10 3 exp (-0.32w - 0.088t). The temperature dependence of viscosity was evaluated with Arrhenius model, the activation energy with value of 70.07 kJ/g is fairly unaffected by moisture content

SYNTHESIS OF (E)-N'-(5-bromo-SYNTHESIS OF (E)-N'-(5-bromo-2-hydroxybenzylidene)nicotinohydrazide) AND ITS Pt(II), Zn(II), Mn(II), Ni(II) AND Mo(V) COMPLEXES AS POTENTIAL ANTI-TUBERCULAR AGENT AGENT

The cold condensation reaction of nicotinic acid hydrazide and 5-bromo-2-hydoxylbenzaldehyde to form a tridentate Schiff base hydrazone ligand {H2L3 ) was studied. The prepared ligand was characterized using CHN analyzer, ESI mass spectrometry, IR, 1H NMR, 13C NMR and 2D NMR such as COSY and HSQC. Thereafter, five novel metal complexes [Pt(Il), Zn(ll), Mn{ll), Ni(JJ) and Mo(V)] of the hydrazone ligand were synthesized and characterized based on conductivity measurements, CHN analysis, AAS, magnetic measurement, UV/ Vis, IR, ESR and TGAIDTA study. The proposed structures of the metal complexes were further supported with the use of powder X-ray analysis. Antitubercular activity study of the compounds was evaluated against Mycobac/erium Juberculosis H37Rv by using microdiluted method. The study revealed that H2L3 exhibited promising anti-tubercular activity with MlC value of 0.82 j.igfmL. Also, metal complexes {(Pt(H2L3)Cl]- 0.88 IJg/mL, [Mn{H2L3)(CH3C00)2]- 0.78 JJ.g/mL, [Zn(H2e)(CH3C00)2H20]- 0.62 J.Lg/mL and [Ni{H2L3)(CI)2]H20- 1.19 J.Lg/mL) exhibited significant inhibition as compared to the standard drug (isoniazid- 0.91 j.ig/mL). Complex 2 and 3 with coordinated acetates showed two folds inhibition than standard isoniazid drug. However, complex 5 with coordinated chlorine atom displayed lower inhibition when compared to isoniazid

Group 11 tris(pyrazolyl)methane complexes: structural features and catalytic applications

Tris(pyrazolyl)methane ligands (Tpmx) have been for years a step behind their highly popular boron-anionic analogues, the tris(pyrazolyl)borate ligands (Tpx). However, in the last decade the development of new members of this family of ligands has boosted a number of contributions albeit their use in coordination chemistry. This fact has also triggered the application of metal-Tpmx complexes as catalysts for a range of organic transformations, particularly with group 11 metals. The main structural features of complexes containing the TpmxM (M = Cu, Ag, Au) unit and their success as catalysts in a variety of reactions under homogeneous or heterogeneous conditions are presented.We thank MINECO for support with Grant CTQ2017-82893-C2-1-

Description of the Human Atrial Action Potential Derived From a Single, Congruent Data Source: Novel Computational Models for Integrated Experimental-Numerical Study of Atrial Arrhythmia Mechanisms

Introduction: The development of improved diagnosis, management, and treatment strategies for human atrial fibrillation (AF) is a significant and important challenge in order to improve quality of life for millions and reduce the substantial social-economic costs of the condition. As a complex condition demonstrating high variability and relation to other cardiac conditions, the study of AF requires approaches from multiple disciplines including single-cell experimental electrophysiology and computational modeling. Models of human atrial cells are less well parameterized than those of the human ventricle or other mammal species, largely due to the inherent challenges in patch clamping human atrial cells. Such challenges include, frequently, unphysiologically depolarized resting potentials and thus injection of a compensatory hyperpolarizing current, as well as detecting certain ion currents which may be disrupted by the cell isolation process. The aim of this study was to develop a laboratory specific model of human atrial electrophysiology which reproduces exactly the conditions of isolated-cell experiments, including testing of multiple experimental interventions. Methods: Formulations for the primary ion currents characterized by isolated-cell experiments in the Workman laboratory were fit directly to voltage-clamp data; the fast sodium-current was parameterized based on experiments relating resting membrane potential to maximal action potential upstroke velocity; compensatory hyperpolarizing current was included as a constant applied current. These formulations were integrated with three independent human atrial cell models to provide a family of novel models. Extrapolated intact-cell models were developed through removal of the hyperpolarizing current and introduction of terminal repolarization potassium currents. Results: The isolated-cell models quantitatively reproduced experimentally measured properties of excitation in both control and pharmacological and dynamic-clamp interventions. Comparison of isolated and intact-cell models highlighted the importance of reproducing this cellular environment when comparing experimental and simulation data. Conclusion: We have developed a laboratory specific model of the human atrial cell which directly reproduces the experimental isolated-cell conditions and captures human atrial excitation properties. The model may be particularly useful for directly relating model to experiment, and offers a complementary tool to the available set of human atrial cell models with specific advantages resulting from the congruent input data source