Search results for "nanotechnology"
showing 10 items of 9818 documents
Pleiotropic Role of Recombinant Silaffin-Like Cationic Polypeptide P5S3: Peptide-Induced Silicic Acid Stabilization, Silica Formation and Inhibition …
2016
Silica-mineralizing organisms such as diatoms manage several aspects of silica chemistry when polymerizing monomeric silicic acid into amorphous silica. Silicic acid is undersaturated in the diatoms’ habitats and mechanisms of enrichment and prevention of uncontrolled mineralization are not well understood. Diatom-biosilica is associated with organic compounds, including polycationic, post-translationally modified peptides termed silaffins, which induce the condensation of silicic acid under supersaturated conditions. Here, we report the pleiotropic action of the designed silaffin-like peptide P5S3, which (i) stabilizes 4–8x silicic acid (in supersaturated conditions of 8.3 mm), (ii) decele…
Anisotropic Stick-slip friction of highly oriented thin films of poly(tetrafluoroethylene) at the molecular level
1996
Lateral force microscopy (LFM) studies of poly(tetrafluoroethylene) (PTFE) films with molecular resolution are reported. Thin PTFE layers with a high degree of orientation were obtained by pressing and sliding a block of polymer on a clean, heated muscovite mica substrate. LFM nanographs obtained on these films by scanning at directions between ca. 40 and 90° with respect to the film orientation direction, i.e. with respect to the direction of the polymer chains, showed a “stick-slip” type frictional motion of the LFM probe tip at the molecular level. The friction force observed at constant load decreased with decreasing scan angles. Chain-chain packing distances obtained by LFM and contact…
Comparison of Water Adsorption Properties of Cellulose and Cellulose Nanocrystals Studied by Near-Infrared Spectroscopy and Gravimetry
2017
The adsorption properties of water molecules on cellulose and cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs), isolated from defatted rice bran (DRB) by 55% sulfuric acid hydrolysis under sonication were investigated. The powdered samples of cellulose and CNCs were analysed by using near infrared spectroscopy (NIR) and gravimetry at 38% and 55% humidities. Small amounts of samples were dried under vacuum at 120°C and the NIR spectra of the dry samples and their spectra during the adsorption water molecules were measured by using an NIR spectrometer equipped with a transflectance accessory and a DTGS detector. The quantitative adsorption of water molecules by the samples was determined by gravimetry. Second a…
Photoswitchable coordination compounds
2001
Photoswitchable compounds represent an attractive class of materials in coordination chemistry. Recent progress dealing with transition metal compounds involving photo-induced changes of the magnetic and/or optical properties to long-lived metastable states are covered in the present review article. The basic photophysical phenomena together with representative examples such as nitroprusside derivatives, relevant spin crossover complexes, stilbenoid complexes and finally Prussian blue analogues are discussed. Some possible applications regarding energy and information storage are suggested at the end.
Halo and Pseudohalo Cu(I)-Pyridinato Double Chains with Tunable Physical Properties
2015
The properties recently reported on the Cu(I)-iodide pyrimidine nonporous 1D-coordination polymer [CuI(ANP)] (ANP = 2-amino-5-nitropyridine) showing reversible physically and chemically driven electrical response have prompted us to carry a comparative study with the series of [CuX(ANP)] (X = Cl (1), X = Br (2), X = CN (4), and X = SCN (5)) in order to understand the potential influence of the halide and pseudohalide bridging ligands on the physical properties and their electrical response to vapors of these materials. The structural characterization of the series shows a common feature, the presence of -X-Cu(ANP)-X- (X = Cl, Br, I, SCN) double chain structure. Complex [Cu(ANP)(CN)] (4) pre…
Compressed Polymer Brushes under the Shear Flow
1998
The structure and dynamics of two compressed polymer brushes under the shear deformation were investigated by the methods of stochastic dynamics. The shear was created by the move-ment of grafting planes with the constant velo-cities in opposite directions along the planes.
Local dynamics in supramolecular polymer networks probed by magnetic particle nanorheology
2019
Transient supramolecular polymer networks are promising candidates as soft self-healing or stimuli-sensitive materials. In this paper, we employ a novel nanorheological approach, magnetic particle nanorheology (MPN), in order to better understand the local dynamic properties of model supramolecular networks from a molecular point of view. Hence, the bond strength between four-arm star-shaped polyethylene glycol (PEG) functionalized at the four extremities with terpyridine ligands is tuned by implementing different metal ions with variable complexation affinities for the ligand. We show that MNP allows for the evaluation of the strength and connectivity of the polymer networks by the estimat…
Mechanical Properties of Single Molecules and Polymer Aggregates
2013
This chapter deals with the mechanical properties of single polymer chains, aggregates, and supramolecular complexes. The topics discussed cover a broad range from fundamental statistical mechanics of the equilibrium elastic properties of single polymer chains to details of the behavior of binding pockets in biomolecular assemblies as observed by force spectroscopy. The first section treats the equilibrium mechanical properties of single polymer chains in various environments, investigated via extensive simulations employing coarse-grained models that have proven extremely successful in many branches of polymer physics, namely the bond-fluctuation model and the self-avoiding walk model. Apa…
Influence of chain stiffness on knottedness in single polymers.
2013
In the present article, we investigate and review the influence of chain stiffness on self-entanglements and knots in a single polymer chain with Monte Carlo simulations spanning good solvent, theta and globular phases. The last-named are of particular importance as a model system for DNA in viral capsids. Intriguingly, the dependence of knot occurrence and complexity with increasing stiffness is non-trivial, but can be understood with a few simple concepts outlined in the present article.
Static and dynamic scaling behavior of a polymer melt model with triple-well bending potential
2018
We perform molecular-dynamics simulations for polymer melts of the coarse-grained polyvinyl alcohol model that crystallizes upon slow cooling. To establish the properties of its high temperature liquid state as a reference point, we characterize in detail the structural features of equilibrated polymer melts with chain lengths $5\le N \le 1000$ at a temperature slightly above their crystallization temperature. We find that the conformations of sufficiently long polymers with $N >50$ obey essentially the Flory's ideality hypothesis. The chain length dependence of the end-to-end distance and the gyration radius follow the scaling predictions of ideal chains and the probability distributions o…