Search results for "force"
showing 10 items of 3423 documents
Influence of the Richardson number on EM force driven flow structures in square-shaped crucible
2014
Abstract This study is devoted to the experimental investigation of the turbulent melt motion in a square crucible where the flow is created by Lorentz forces generated by an external AC magnetic field. As a strong vertical thermal gradient is present in melt during a directional solidification process, a stratification effect takes place and motion in the vertical direction is damped by buoyancy forces. Such a situation arises if density of fluid layers decreases with height. Experimental velocity and temperature measurements are conducted. Transient effects, like collapse of stratification, are observed experimentally. The significance of stratification in the directional solidification m…
Chemical Identification at the Solid–Liquid Interface
2017
Solid-liquid interfaces are decisive for a wide range of natural and technological processes, including fields as diverse as geochemistry and environmental science as well as catalysis and corrosion protection. Dynamic atomic force microscopy nowadays provides unparalleled structural insights into solid-liquid interfaces, including the solvation structure above the surface. In contrast, chemical identification of individual interfacial atoms still remains a considerable challenge. So far, an identification of chemically alike atoms in a surface alloy has only been demonstrated under well-controlled ultrahigh vacuum conditions. In liquids, the recent advent of three-dimensional force mapping…
Effect of stiffness on the phase behavior of cubic lattice chains
2005
Gran canonica Monte Carlo (GCMC) simulazioni assistite da tecniche di riponderazione istogramma sono stati utilizzati per studiare l'effetto della flessibilità catena sul comportamento di soluzione fase di cubi catene reticolari corti con 4-32 segmenti. Ciò è stato fatto variando un parametro di rigidità gradualmente fino alla media calcolata end-to-end distanza avvicinato la lunghezza totale. Per entrambe le catene flessibili e rigide si è riscontrato che la temperatura critica, ottenuta tramite mista analisi dei campi di dimensioni finite, aumentata lunghezza della catena e la densità critica trasferisce a valori più bassi, in accordo con le osservazioni sperimentali. Il estrapolato lungh…
Spirometric criteria to diagnose airway obstruction in the elderly: fixed ratio vs. lower limit of normal.
2015
COPD is the most common chronic lung disease. It becomes more prevalent with increasing age but remains under-diagnosed in the elderly. A heated debate concerns the most suitable way to diagnose airway obstruction in this age group. Most COPD guidelines recommend to use a FEV1/FVC of 0.70 as threshold to define an obstructive ventilatory defect. While the use of a 0.70 ratio may be simple, it may result in under-diagnosis of airflow obstruction in young people and over-diagnosis in the elderly due to an age-related decline in pulmonary volumes, especially in FEV1. This might lead to unnecessary use of medications and increased risk of adverse effects. A proposed strategy for reducing the mi…
Who should get COVID-19 vaccine first? A survey to evaluate hospital workers’ opinion
2021
Prospective planning of COVID-19 vaccines allocation will be essential to maximize public health and societal benefits while preserving equity. Decisions about how to allocate limited supplies of vaccines need to be clear about the criteria used in setting priorities, with a specific commitment to transparency and communication. The aim of our study was to think through these competing demands, focusing on the opinion of healthcare workers (HCWs). The primary endpoint of the study was to assess the opinion of all the HCWs in a University based Italian Hospital about the fairest priority order to COVID 19 vaccines and to understand on which criteria the prioritization preferences of HCWs are…
Where Is the Most Hydrophobic Region? Benzopurpurine Self-Assembly at the Calcite–Water Interface
2017
Control of molecular self-assembly at solid–liquid interfaces is challenging due to the complex interplay between molecule–molecule, molecule–surface, molecule–solvent, surface–solvent, and solvent–solvent interactions. Here, we use in-situ dynamic atomic force microscopy to study the self-assembly of Benzopurpurine 4B into oblong islands with a highly ordered inner structure yet incommensurate with the underlying calcite (10.4) surface. Molecular dynamics and free energy calculations provide insights by showing that Benzopurpurine 4B molecules do not anchor to the surface directly but instead assemble on top of the second hydration layer. This seemingly peculiar behavior was then rationali…
Stabilization of Polar Step Edges on Calcite (10.4) by the Adsorption of Congo Red
2015
In this work, we present the stabilization of polar step edges along the [010] direction of calcite (10.4) by the presence of a water-soluble organic molecule, namely Congo Red. While characteristic etch pits are observed on the surface in the absence of the additive, no etch pits can be found in the presence of the additive. Using atomic force microscopy, we can directly follow the restructuring of the surface. Upon addition of Congo Red, the charge-neutral step edges confining the characteristic etch pits vanish, while polar step edges along the [010] direction appear on the surface, which are entirely decorated by well-ordered molecular islands of the additive. After the restructuring ha…
Structure-Dependent Dissolution and Restructuring of Calcite Surfaces by Organophosphonates
2017
Organophosphonates are well-known to strongly interact with the surfaces of various minerals, such as brucite, gypsum, and barite. In this work, we study the influence of six systematically varied organophosphonate molecules (tetraphosphonates and diphosphonates) on the dissolution process of the (10.4) surface of calcite. In order to pursue a systematic study, we have selected organophosphonates that exhibit similar structural features, but also systematic architectural differences. The effect of this class of additives on the dissolution process of the calcite (10.4) surface is evaluated using in situ dynamic atomic force microscopy. For all of the six organophosphonate derivatives, we ob…
Deposition order controls the first stages of a metal-organic coordination network on an insulator surface
2016
| openaire: EC/FP7/610446/EU//PAMS We report on first stages toward the formation of a surface-confined metal-organic coordination network (MOCN) by sequential deposition of biphenyl-4,4′-dicarboxylic acid and iron atoms on the surface of a bulk insulator, calcite (10.4). The influence of the deposition order on the structure formation is studied by noncontact atomic force microscopy operated in ultrahigh vacuum at room temperature. It is found that sequential deposition facilitates MOCN formation when the organic linker molecules are first adsorbed on the surface, followed by iron deposition. This observation is explained by first-principles computations, indicating that the metal-molecule…
Clear signature of the (2 x 1) reconstruction of calcite (1014).
2010
Calcite is a mineral of fundamental importance that plays a crucial role in many fields of research such as biomineralization, biomolecule adsorption, and reactivity as well as industrial and daily life applications. Consequently, the most stable cleavage plane of calcite has been studied extensively using both direct imaging techniques such as atomic force microscopy as well as spectroscopic and diffraction techniques. Several surface structures have been reported for the (10 (1) over bar4) cleavage plane of calcite differing from the simple bulk-truncated structure and an ongoing controversy exists in literature whether the cleavage plane exhibits a (2 x 1) reconstruction or not. We study…