Entropy Production Associated with Aggregation into Granules in a Subdiffusive Environment

We study the entropy production that is associated with the growing or shrinking of a small granule in, for instance, a colloidal suspension or in an aggregating polymer chain. A granule will fluctuate in size when the energy of binding is comparable to k B T , which is the “quantum” of Brownian energy. Especially for polymers, the conformational energy landscape is often rough and has been commonly modeled as being self-similar in its structure. The subdiffusion that emerges in such a high-dimensional, fractal environment leads to a Fokker–Planck Equation with a fractional time derivative. We set up such a so-called fractional Fokker–Planck Equation for the aggregation into granules. From that Fokker–Planck Equation, we derive an expression for the entropy production of a growing granule.

Study on Intermolecular Forces of Corn Gluten with the Chemical Reagent Treatment

Corn gluten were steeped with different chemical reagents, 2%urea, 5%tween80, 5% NaCl, 2%L - cysteine, using distilled water as control. Intermolecular forces in corn gluten under different reagents were analyzed using the amount of free starch measuring by iodine calorimetry. By the light microscope, intermolecular structure transformation in corn gluten was analyzed before the treatment and after. The results show that Urea, twain, NaCl, and L-cysteine all can make the starch that closely combined with protein migrate away, in which the effect of L-cysteine and NaCl were better, releasing more free starch. It is found through microscopic observation that the starch granule existing in corn gluten is small granule from cutin endosperm, and microscopic observation results consistent with the free starch results. By analysis of the amount of free starch and the microscopic structure change of corn gluten and the mechanism of measuring intermolecular forces with the chemical reagent, it is demonstrated that disulfide bond and electrostatic attraction were main intermolecular forces in corn gluten, which was the main reason for the search combining with the protein .The effect of intermolecular hydrogen bonds and hydrophobic interaction were weaker.