scholarly journals Role of Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunch-Derived Cellulose in Improving the Sonocatalytic Activity of Silver-Doped Titanium Dioxide

Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (20) ◽  
pp. 3530
Author(s):  
Yi Ding Chai ◽  
Yean Ling Pang ◽  
Steven Lim ◽  
Woon Chan Chong ◽  
Chin Wei Lai ◽  
...  

In this study, a novel cellulose/Ag/TiO2 nanocomposite was successfully synthesized via the hydrothermal method. The cellulose extracted from oil palm empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) could address the disposal issue created by OPEFB biomass. Characterization studies such as FESEM, EDX, HRTEM, XRD, FTIR, UV–Vis DRS, PL, XPS, and surface analysis were conducted. It was observed that the incorporation of cellulose could hinder the agglomeration, reduce the band gap energy to 3 eV, increase the specific surface area to 150.22 m3/g, and lower the recombination rate of the generated electron-hole pairs compared to Ag/TiO2 nanoparticles. The excellent properties enhance the sonocatalytic degradation efficiency of 10 mg/L Congo red (up to 81.3% after 10 min ultrasonic irradiation) in the presence of 0.5 g/L cellulose/Ag/TiO2 at 24 kHz and 280 W. The improvement of catalytic activity was due to the surface plasmon resonance effect of Ag and numerous hydroxyl groups on cellulose that capture the holes, which delay the recombination rate of the charge carriers in TiO2. This study demonstrated an alternative approach in the development of an efficient sonocatalyst for the sonocatalytic degradation of Congo red.

2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 298-309
Author(s):  
Fredy Surahmanto ◽  
Harwin Saptoadi ◽  
Hary Sulistyo ◽  
Tri A Rohmat

The pyrolysis kinetics of oil-palm solid waste was investigated by performing experiments on its individual components, including empty fruit bunch, fibre, shell, as well as the blends by using a simultaneous thermogravimetric analyser at a heating rate of 10°C/min under nitrogen atmosphere and setting up from initial temperature of 30°C to a final temperature of 550°C. The results revealed that the activation energy and frequency factor values of empty fruit bunch, fibre, and shell are 7.58–63.25 kJ/mol and 8.045E-02–4.054E + 04 s−1, 10.45–50.76 kJ/mol and 3.639E-01–5.129E + 03 s−1, 9.46–55.64 kJ/mol and 2.753E-01–9.268E + 03, respectively. Whereas, the corresponding values for empty fruit bunch–fibre, empty fruit bunch–shell, fibre–shell, empty fruit bunch–fibre–shell are 2.97–38.35 kJ/mol and 1.123E-02–1.326E + 02 s−1, 7.95–40.12 kJ/mol and 9.26E-02–2.101E + 02 s−1, 9.14–50.17 kJ/mol and 1.249E-01–2.25E + 03 s−1, 8.35–45.69 kJ/mol and 1.344E + 01–4.23E + 05 s−1, respectively. It was found that the activation energy and frequency factor values of the blends were dominantly due to the role of the components with a synergistic effect occurred during pyrolysis.


2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (Suppl. 1) ◽  
pp. 171-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Ngikoh ◽  
◽  
Noor Adila Abdul Karim ◽  
Jamaliah Jahim ◽  
Farah Diba Abu Bakar ◽  
...  

1980 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 427-434 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kveta Heinrichová ◽  
Rudolf Kohn

The effect of exo-D-galacturonanase from carrot on O-acetyl derivatives of pectic acid of variousacetylation degree was studied. Substitution of hydroxyl groups at C(2) and C(3) of D-galactopyranuronic acid units influences the initial rate of degradation, degree of degradation and its maximum rate, the differences being found also in the time of limit degradations of the individual O-acetyl derivatives. Value of the apparent Michaelis constant increases with increase of substitution and value of Vmax changes. O-Acetyl derivatives act as a competitive inhibitor of degradation of D-galacturonan. The extent of the inhibition effect depends on the degree of substitution. The only product of enzymic reaction is D-galactopyranuronic acid, what indicates that no degradation of the terminal substituted unit of O-acetyl derivative of pectic acid takes place. Substitution of hydroxyl groups influences the affinity of the enzyme towards the modified substrate. The results let us presume that hydroxyl groups at C(2) and C(3) of galacturonic unit of pectic acid are essential for formation of the enzyme-substrate complex.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 100449
Author(s):  
Rahmi ◽  
Muhammad Iqhrammullah ◽  
Ulfa Audina ◽  
Husni Husin ◽  
Haya Fathana

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Precisvalle ◽  
A. Martucci ◽  
L. Gigli ◽  
J. R. Plaisier ◽  
T. C. Hansen ◽  
...  

AbstractTopaz [Al2SiO4(F,OH)2] is one of the main fluorine-bearing silicates occurring in environments where variably acidic (F)/aqueous (OH) fluids saturate the silicate system. In this work we fully characterized blue topaz from Padre Paraíso (Minas Gerais, Brazil) by means of in situ synchrotron X-Ray and neutron powder diffraction measurements (temperature range 298–1273 K) combined with EDS microanalyses. Understanding the role of OH/F substitution in topaz is important in order to determine the hydrophilicity and the exchange reactions of fluorine by hydroxyl groups, and ultimately to characterize the environmental redox conditions (H2O/F) required for mineral formation. The fluorine content estimated from neutron diffraction data is ~ 1.03 a.f.u (10.34 wt%), in agreement with the chemical data (on average 10.0 wt%). The XOH [OH/(OH + F)] (0.484) is close to the maximum XOH value (0.5), and represents the OH- richest topaz composition so far analysed in the Minas Gerais district. Topaz crystallinity and fluorine content sharply decrease at 1170 K, while mullite phase starts growing. On the basis of this behaviour, we suggest that this temperature may represent the potential initial topaz’s crystallization temperature from supercritical fluids in a pegmatite system. The log(fH2O/fHF)fluid (1.27 (0.06)) is coherent with the fluorine activity calculated for hydrothermal fluids (pegmatitic stage) in equilibrium with the forming mineral (log(fH2O/fHF)fluid = 1.2–6.5) and clearly different from pure magmatic (granitic) residual melts [log(fH2O/fHF)fluid < 1]. The modelled H2O saturated fluids with the F content not exceeding 1 wt% may represent an anomalous water-dominant / fluorine-poor pegmatite lens of the Padre Paraíso Pegmatite Field.


Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (6) ◽  
pp. 773
Author(s):  
Amichai Painsky ◽  
Meir Feder

Learning and making inference from a finite set of samples are among the fundamental problems in science. In most popular applications, the paradigmatic approach is to seek a model that best explains the data. This approach has many desirable properties when the number of samples is large. However, in many practical setups, data acquisition is costly and only a limited number of samples is available. In this work, we study an alternative approach for this challenging setup. Our framework suggests that the role of the train-set is not to provide a single estimated model, which may be inaccurate due to the limited number of samples. Instead, we define a class of “reasonable” models. Then, the worst-case performance in the class is controlled by a minimax estimator with respect to it. Further, we introduce a robust estimation scheme that provides minimax guarantees, also for the case where the true model is not a member of the model class. Our results draw important connections to universal prediction, the redundancy-capacity theorem, and channel capacity theory. We demonstrate our suggested scheme in different setups, showing a significant improvement in worst-case performance over currently known alternatives.


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