Ferromagnetic Switching of Knotted Vector Fields in Chiral Liquid Crystal Colloids

We experimentally realize polydomain and monodomain chiral ferromagnetic liquid crystal colloids that exhibit solitonic and knotted vector field configurations. Formed by dispersions of ferromagnetic nanoplatelets in chiral nematic liquid crystals, these soft colloidal ferro-magnets exhibit spontaneous long-range alignment of magnetic dipole moments of individual platelets, giving rise to a continuum of magnetization field M(r). Competing effects of surface confinement and chirality prompt spontaneous formation and enable optical generation of localized twisted solitonic structures with double twist tubes and torus knots of M(r), which exhibit a strong sensitivity to direction and magnitude of weak magnetic fields of ~10 G. Numerical modeling, implemented through free energy minimization to arrive at field-dependent three-dimensional structures of M(r), shows a good agreement with experiments and provides insights into the corresponding physical underpinnings

Perencanaan Sistem Pengelolaan Sampah Terpadu di Kawasan Pasar Flamboyan Kota Pontianak

Sampah merupakan konsekuensi kehidupan yang sering menimbulkan masalah, dan jumlahnya akan semakin meningkat seiring dengan peningkatan jumlah penduduk dan beragam aktivitasnya.Pasar Flamboyan adalah pasar terbesar di Kalimantan Barat.Pasar ini memiliki ± 1700 pedagang dan dibuka setiap hari.Disana terdapat ruko dengan jumlah 53 unit, kios sebanyak 203 unit dan los sebanyak 1498 unit.Saat ini Pasar Flamboyan belum mempunyai sistem pengelolaan sampah terpadu. Hal tersebut akan mengakibatkan banyaknya jumlah sampah yang dihasilkan dari setiap kegiatan. Sampah yang dihasilkan dari berbagai macam penjualan akan menghasilkan sampah yang beragam pula. Penanganan sampah setiap harinya di Pasar Flamboyan untuk saat ini masih menggunakan cara lama yaitu sampah dikumpulkan ke suatu tempat pembuangan sampah sementara lalu pada sore harinya sampah diangkut oleh pihak dari dinas kebersihan untuk dibawa ke TPA. Tujuan dari perencanaan ini yaitu untuk mengetahui total timbulan sampah dan komposisi sampah yang dihasilkan di kawasan Pasar Flamboyan serta untuk merencanakan sistem pengelolaan sampah terpadu di Kawasan Pasar Flamboyan. Perencanaan pengelolaan sampah di Kawasan meliputi perencanaan dari seluruh aspek operasional pengelolaan sampah yaitu perencanaan pewadahan sampah, pengumpulan dan pengangkutan sampah serta pengolahan sampah di Kawasan Pasar Flamboyan. Pengambilan data primer dilakukan dengan cara sampling timbulan dan komposisi sampah. Sampling dilakukan dengan menggunakan metode SNI 19-3694-1994 yaitu pengukuran sampah dengan menggunakan sampling box selama delapan hari berturut-turut yang kemudian akan menghasilkan data volume, berat jenis dan komposisi sampah. Digunakan juga kuisioner untuk mengumpulkan data dari pedagang yang berupa daftar pertanyaan yang disampaikan kepada responden untuk dijawab secara tertulis.Sampel sampah yang diambil masing-masing 3 sampel untuk setiap jenis los, kios dan ruko.Pengambilan sampel dilakukan setiap hari pada pukul 10.00 WIB selama delapan hari berturut-turut ke setiap sumber sampah yang telah ditentukan. Dari hasil perhitungan didapatkan bahwa total timbulan sampah di Kawasan Pasar Flamboyan adalah sebanyak 9,0370 m3/hari sampah organik dan sebanyak 1,0503 m3/hari sampah anorganik. Jumlah pewadahan di tiap sumber sampah ditentukan dari perhitungan rata-rata volume sampah perhari dibagi dengan ukuran tong sampah yang akan digunakan pada sumber tersebut. Jumlah pewadahan yang dibutuhkan untuk tiap sumber sampah Pasar Flamboyan untuk kios dan ruko yaitu sebanyak 79 buah tong sampah ukuran 10 liter dan 95 buah tong sampah ukuran 20 liter. Jumlah alat angkut sampah yang dibutuhkan untuk Pasar Flamboyan yaitu sebanyak 3 buah gerobak.TPST di Kawasan Pasar Flamboyan direncanakan akan berlokasi di bagian belakang Pasar Flamboyan. Jumlah lahan yang dibutuhkan untuk pembangunan TPST Pasar Flamboyan adalah seluas 207,27 m2. Rencana anggaran biaya untuk biaya investasi yaitu sebesar Rp 960.642.206,00. Laba yang diperoleh dari hasil pengolahan sampah yaitu Rp 39.600.000,00/tahun. Biaya hasil retribusi kebersihan dari pedagang yaitu Rp 505.152.000,00/tahun. Dana yang akan dikeluarkan Pasar Flamboyan untuk operasional dan pemeliharaan yaitu Rp 254.760.000,00/tahun

Investigation of Binding of Volatile Flavor Compounds by Soy Proteins in Low -Moisture Food Systems by Inverse Gas Chromatography (Igc)

123 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2005.IGC provided rapid and precise measurements of thermodynamic and sorption data. Flavor compound chemical structure greatly determined its binding potential to SPI. Weak binding of hydrocarbons to SPI was attributed to nonspecific van der Walls dispersion forces only, while stronger binding exhibited on those more polar compounds (ester, ketone, aldehyde, alcohol) might be ascribed to both specific and non-specific interactions (hydrogen bonding, dipole and van der Walls dispersion forces). Interaction potential of polar flavor compounds with SPI was greatly impaired by adsorbed water in the extremely low humidity region (approaching 0% RH); while their binding strengths with SPI were not significantly affected by further water uptake in the 30∼50% RH region. Stronger interactions with the crackers at 15% RH were observed for gamma-butyrolactone and butyric acid, possibly due to the involvement of stronger hydrogen bonding and/or ionic forces, than for diacetyl and hexanal. Presence of soy proteins did not affect binding of diacetyl and hexanal, but increased binding of gamma-butyrolactone and butyric acid. Solvent extraction data agreed with IGC results in that retention/binding of butyric acid was higher in the soy cracker, while binding of diacetyl to the two crackers did not differ. However, sensory results showed that headspace diacetyl or butyric acid aroma intensities of the two crackers were not significantly different.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

Ecological Niche Modeling Identifies Fine-Scale Areas at High Risk of Dengue Fever in the Pearl River Delta, China

Dengue fever (DF) is one of the most common and rapidly spreading mosquito-borne viral diseases in tropical and subtropical regions. In recent years, this imported disease has posed a serious threat to public health in China, especially in the Pearl River Delta (PRD). Although the severity of DF outbreaks in the PRD is generally associated with known risk factors, fine scale assessments of areas at high risk for DF outbreaks are limited. We built five ecological niche models to identify such areas including a variety of climatic, environmental, and socioeconomic variables, as well as, in some models, extracted principal components. All the models we tested accurately identified the risk of DF, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) were greater than 0.8, but the model using all original variables was the most accurate (AUC = 0.906). Socioeconomic variables had a greater impact on this model (total contribution 55.27%) than climatic and environmental variables (total contribution 44.93%). We found the highest risk of DF outbreaks on the border of Guangzhou and Foshan (in the central PRD), and in northern Zhongshan (in the southern PRD). Our fine-scale results may help health agencies to focus epidemic monitoring tightly on the areas at highest risk of DF outbreaks

Investigation of Binding of Volatile Flavor Compounds by Soy Proteins in Low -Moisture Food Systems by Inverse Gas Chromatography (Igc)

123 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2005.IGC provided rapid and precise measurements of thermodynamic and sorption data. Flavor compound chemical structure greatly determined its binding potential to SPI. Weak binding of hydrocarbons to SPI was attributed to nonspecific van der Walls dispersion forces only, while stronger binding exhibited on those more polar compounds (ester, ketone, aldehyde, alcohol) might be ascribed to both specific and non-specific interactions (hydrogen bonding, dipole and van der Walls dispersion forces). Interaction potential of polar flavor compounds with SPI was greatly impaired by adsorbed water in the extremely low humidity region (approaching 0% RH); while their binding strengths with SPI were not significantly affected by further water uptake in the 30∼50% RH region. Stronger interactions with the crackers at 15% RH were observed for gamma-butyrolactone and butyric acid, possibly due to the involvement of stronger hydrogen bonding and/or ionic forces, than for diacetyl and hexanal. Presence of soy proteins did not affect binding of diacetyl and hexanal, but increased binding of gamma-butyrolactone and butyric acid. Solvent extraction data agreed with IGC results in that retention/binding of butyric acid was higher in the soy cracker, while binding of diacetyl to the two crackers did not differ. However, sensory results showed that headspace diacetyl or butyric acid aroma intensities of the two crackers were not significantly different.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

Preparation of a beta-cyclodextrin functionalized monolith via a novel and simple one-pot approach and application to enantioseparations.

A novel and facile one-pot copolymerization approach was developed for the preparation of a beta-cyclodextrin (beta-CD) functionalized organic polymer monolith. The proposed one-pot process involved two major reactions occurring in sequence in the same vial: (1) the ring opening reaction between the epoxy groups of glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) and the primary amino groups of ethylenediamine-beta-CD (EDA-beta-CD); (2) the copolymerization of glycidyl methacrylate-ethylenediamine-beta-CD (GMA-EDA-beta-CD) and ethylene dimethacrylate (EDMA) using 2,2'-azobisisobutyronitrile (AIBN) as the polymerization initiator. This approach avoids the time-consuming post-polymerization derivatization of the traditional two-step strategy. Compared to the previously reported two-step strategy, the monolith prepared by this one-pot method exhibited higher beta-CD ligand density and better column efficiency in HPLC. Satisfactory column permeability and separation selectivity were also obtained on the optimized poly(GMA-EDA-beta-CD-co-EDMA) monolithic column. Additionally, the column was also applied to the enantioseparation of some racemic acidic compounds with promising results

Comparative evaluation of a one-pot strategy for the preparation of beta-cyclodextrin-functionalized monoliths: Effect of the degree of amino substitution of beta-cyclodextrin on the column performance.

To further evaluate the feasibility and applicability of the one-pot strategy in monolithic column preparation, two novel beta-cyclodextrin-functionalized organic polymeric monoliths were prepared using two beta-cyclodextrin derivatives, i.e. mono(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin and heptakis(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin. In this improved method, mono(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin or heptakis(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin reacted with glycidyl methacrylate to generate the corresponding functional monomers and were subsequently copolymerized with ethylene dimethacrylate. The polymerization conditions for both monoliths were carefully optimized to obtain satisfactory column performance with respect to column efficiency, reproducibility, permeability, and stability. The obtained poly(glycidyl methacrylate-mono(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin-co-ethylene dimethacrylate) and poly(glycidyl methacrylate-heptakis(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin-co-ethylene dimethacrylate) monoliths exhibited a uniform structure, good permeability, and mechanical stability as indicated by scanning electron microscopy and micro-high-performance liquid chromatography experimental results. Because of the probable existence of multi-glycidyl methacrylate linking spacers on the poly(glycidyl methacrylate-heptakis(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin-co-ethylene dimethacrylate) monolith, the effect of the ratio of glycidyl methacrylate/heptakis(6-amino-6-deoxy)-beta-cyclodextrin was especially studied, and satisfactory reproducibility could still be achieved by strictly controlling the composition of the polymerization mixture. To investigate the effect of the degree of amino substitution of beta-cyclodextrin on column performance, a detailed comparison of the two monoliths was also carried out using series of analytes including small peptides and chiral acids. It was found that the beta-cyclodextrin-functionalized monolith with mono-glycidyl methacrylate linking spacers demonstrated better chiral separation performance than that with multi-glycidyl methacrylate linking spacers