Intermittent Cathodic Protection for Steel Reinforced Concrete Bridges

Thermal-sprayed zinc anodes are used for impressed current cathodic protection (ICCP) systems on Oregon's reinforced concrete coastal bridges to prevent chloride-induced corrosion damage. Thermal-sprayed zinc performs well as an ICCP anode but the service life of the zinc anode is directly related to the average current density used to operate the systems. After a ICCP system is turned off, the rebar in the concrete remains passive and protected for a period of time. Intermittent operation of CP systems is possible when continuous corrosion rate monitoring is used to identify conditions when the CP system needs to be turned on to reestablish protection conditions for the rebar. This approach applies CP protection only when needed and reflects the fact that external protection may not be needed for a range of environmental conditions. In doing so, intermittent CP would lower the average current necessary to protect rebar, increase the anode service life, and reduce the lifetime costs for protecting reinforced concrete bridges

Femtosecond fluorescence upconversion investigations on the excited-state photophysics of curcumin

The demonstration of curcumin as a photodynamic therapy agent has generated a high level of interest in understanding the photoinduced chemical and physical properties of this naturally occurring, yellow-orange medicinal compound. Important photophysical processes that may be related to photodynamic therapy effects including excited-state intramolecular hydrogen atom transfer (ESIHT) occur within the femtosecond to picosecond time scales. Femtosecond fluorescence upconversion spectroscopy has sufficient time resolution to resolve and investigate these important photophysical processes. In this review, recent advances in using femtosecond fluorescence upconversion to reveal ultrafast salvation and ESIHT of curcumin are presented. The excited-state photophysics of curcumin has been investigated in alcohols and micellar solutions. The results of curcumin in methanol and ethylene glycol reveal the presence of two decay components in the excited-state kinetics with time scales of 12–20 ps and ,100 ps. Similarly, in a micellar solution, biphasic kinetics are present with the fast decay component having a time constant of 3–8 ps, the slow decay component 50–80 ps. Deuteration of curcumin in bothmedia leads to a pronounced isotope effect in the slow decay component, which suggests that ESIHT is an important photophysical process on this time scale. The results of multiwavelength fluorescence upconversion studies show that the fast component in the excited-state kinetics is due to ultrafast solvation. These advances forma part of the continuing efforts to elucidate the photodynamic therapy properties of curcumin.Tak W. Kee, Ramkrishna Adhikary, Philip J. Carlson, Prasun Mukherjee and Jacob W. Petric