Sharif Digital Repository

Wettability alteration analysis form gas-repellent to gas-wet with the aid of chemical agents has been subjected of numerous studies. However, fundamental understanding of the effect of surface tension of liquid on repellency strength, the change in the intermolecular forces due to the adsorption of nanoparticles onto the rock surfaces, and exposure of treated rock in brine are not well discussed in the available literature. In this study, X-ray diffraction, Atomic Force Microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy were applied to characterize the treated and fresh samples. Dynamic and static contact angle measurements were then combined with six methods... 

For the first time, the UIO-66, NH2-UIO, and NH2-UIO particles covalently functionalized by Glycidyl Methacrylate (GMA@NH2-UIO), were utilized as the novel functional anti-corrosive fillers. The functionality, high surface area, phase composition, excellent thermal properties as well as chemical stability of the Zr-MOFs were proved by FT-IR, BET, XRD, TGA, and water stability tests, respectively. The smart pH-sensitive controlled-release activity of the corrosion inhibitors (i.e., Zr ions and organic compounds) from the prepared Zr-MOFs was proved by the water stability test of the Zr-MOFs particles in the acidic (pH = 2), neutral (pH = 7.5), and alkaline (pH = 12) solutions containing 3.5... 

In this study, water-soluble terpolymers containing highly hydrophilic monomers of acrylamide and maleic anhydride and highly hydrophobic monomers of styrene were synthesized (ASM) through the one-step inverse emulsion polymerization. Proton nuclear magnetic resonance (1H NMR), fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), and X-ray diffraction pattern (XRD) were performed to investigate the chemical structures and structural transformations of ASM. Thermal stability and thermal decomposition steps of ASM were studied by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). An Ubbelhode capillary viscometer and a rheological mechanical spectrometer (RMS) were employed to obtain the specific, relative, and... 

In this work, synthesis of CuIn0.75Ga0.25S2 (CIGS) nanoparticles, the formation of stable dispersion, deposition of high-quality films and, fabrication of thin-film Perovskite solar cells are reported. The stability of nanoparticle ink is crucial in the formation of device-quality films. The chalcogenide-based materials are widely used in thin-film solar cells; in particular, Cu(In,Ga)S2 are used as an absorber and hole transporting layer. In the present study, the nanoparticles of about 20 nm size and bandgap of 1.5 eV are synthesized using a heat-up method. A variety of solvents are used as dispersing media and the stability of the inks is evaluated by precise optical monitoring. We... 

Solid-phase microextraction (SPME) is a fast, solvent-free technique, which, since its introduction in the 1990s, has been increasingly applied to sample preparation in analytical chemistry. Conventional SPME fibers are fabricated by making a physical bond between the usual silica substrate and the polymeric coatings. However, some applications are limited, as the lifetime and the stability of conventional SPME fibers cannot meet the demands of analyzing relatively non-volatile compounds with more polar moieties. There have been attempts to analyze less volatile compounds by increasing the thermal, physical and chemical stability of the fibers. In this review, we present some new... 

The gas chromatography retention indices of 100 different components of essential oils, on three columns with stationary phases of different polarities, were used to develop robust quantitative structure-retention relationship (QSRR) models. Two linear models with only one variable, i.e. solvation entropy, were developed, which explain 95 and 94% of variances of the test set for dimethyl silicone and dimethyl silicone with 5% phenyl group columns, respectively. These models are extremely simple and easy to interpret, but they show higher errors compared with more robust models such as partial least square (PLS) and ridge regressions. For the third column (polyethylene glycol (PEG)), 24... 

The electrochemical oxidation of sumatriptan on the surface of carbon paste electrode modified with multi-walled carbon nanotube and cobalt methyl-salophen complex is studied by using cyclic voltammetry and polarization studies. The results indicate that the drug is irreversibly oxidized in a one electron oxidation mechanism. It was found that the peak potential shifted negatively with increasing pH, confirms that H + participate in the oxidation process. The electrode is shown to be very effective for the detection of sumatriptan in the presence of other biological reductant compounds. The prepared modified electrode exhibits a very good resolution between the voltammetric peaks of... 

This review aims to propose the integrative implementation of microfluidic devices, biomaterials, and computational methods that can lead to a significant progress in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine researches. Simultaneous implementation of multiple techniques can be very helpful in addressing biological processes. Providing controllable biochemical and biomechanical cues within artificial extracellular matrix similar to in vivo conditions is crucial in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine researches. Microfluidic devices provide precise spatial and temporal control over cell microenvironment. Moreover, generation of accurate and controllable spatial and temporal... 

Calcite is among the most abundant minerals organizing the oil reservoir formation and therefore its surface properties play a central role in the increase of the oil recovery efficiency. The effect of low-salinity water in carbonate rocks reveals that brine composition and salinity can improve the oil recovery in carbonates through wettability alteration. However, the specific mechanism for wettability changes that leads to improved oil recovery in calcite is not well understood. To obtain deeper insights at atomic level into the understanding the characteristics of the calcite-water interface, we performed classical molecular dynamics simulations in the presence of different ions in brine... 

Polystyrene is one of the best candidates as the extracting medium due to its high stability in different media and acceptable extraction capability. However, the hydrophobic nature and low wettability of polystyrene limits its application to non–polar analytes. To resolve this limitation, in this project, amine groups were chemically attached to the surface of magnetic polystyrene. The resulting hydrophilic magnetic particles were expected to be capable of extracting both polar and non–polar analytes. Non–steroidal anti–inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) were chosen for testing the applicability of modified magnetic polystyrene according to the importance of their analysis and also their wide... 

TiO 2 -rGO nanocomposite coatings were obtained by electrophoretic deposition (EPD) technique of TiO 2 nanoparticles and graphene oxide (GO) on stainless steel substrate. First, GO particles were synthesized using a modified Hummers' method. GO was reduced electrochemically to form a coating in the presence of nano-sized TiO 2 particles. The influences of different parameters such as GO concentration, coupling co-electro-deposition parameters (electrophoretic duration and voltage) on thickness, surface morphology and, corrosion behavior of the as-synthesized TiO 2 -rGO nanocomposite coatings were systematically surveyed. The morphology and microstructure were investigated by field emission... 

To evaluate the selectivity and efficiency of solid phase microextraction (SPME) fiber coatings, synthesized by sol-gel technology, roles of precursors and coating polymers were extensively investigated. An on-line combination of capillary microextraction (CME) technique and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) was set up to perform the investigation. Ten different fiber coatings were synthesized in which five of them contained only the precursor and the rests were prepared using both the precursor and coating polymer. All the coatings were chemically bonded to the inner surface of copper tubes, intended to be used as the CME device and already functionalized by self-assembly... 

A method based on solid-phase microextraction (SPME) followed by on-fiber derivatization and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry detection (GC-MS) for determination of phenol in air was developed. Three different types of SPME fibers, polar and non-polar poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) were synthesized using sol-gel technology and their feasibility to the sampling of phenol were investigated. Different derivatization reagents for post on-fiber derivatization of phenol were studied. Important parameters influencing the extraction and derivatization process such as type of fiber coating, type and volume of derivatizing reagent, derivatization time and temperature,... 

In this paper, a novel nonlinear joint dynamical model is presented, which is based on a set of coupled ordinary differential equations of motion and a Gaussian mixture model representation of pulsatile cardiovascular (CV) signals. In the proposed framework, the joint interdependences of CV signals are incorporated by assuming a unique angular frequency that controls the limit cycle of the heart rate. Moreover, the time consequence of CV signals is controlled by the same phase parameter that results in the space dimensionality reduction. These joint equations together with linear assignments to observation are further used in the Kalman filter structure for estimation and tracking. Moreover,... 

Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were immobilised with cobalt nanoparticles and analyzed by transmission electron microscopy. This modification procedure substantially improved colloidal dispersion of the immobilised MWCNTs in water and organic solvents, yielding uniform and stable thin films for modification of the glassy carbon electrode surface. The modified electrode showed an efficient catalytic role for the electrochemical oxidation of thioridazine (TR), leading to remarkable decrease in its oxidation overpotential of approximately 100 mV and enhancement of the kinetics of the electrode reaction, which can be confirmed by increasing in the peak current and sharpness of the peak.... 

Sample preparation for non-target analysis is challenging due to the difficulty in the extraction of polar and non-polar analytes simultaneously. Most commercial solid sorbents lack the proper comprehensiveness for extraction of analytes with different physiochemical properties. A possible key is the combination of hydrophobic polymer and hydrophilic surface functional groups in solid based extraction methods in order to generate the susceptibility for retaining both polar and non-polar analytes. To pursue this goal, in this study, four polar groups including [sbnd]NH 2 , [sbnd]NO 2 , [sbnd]COOH, and [sbnd]COCH 3 were chemically bound to Amberlite XAD-4 substrate in order to prepare a... 

In this study, antibacterial activity, biocompatibility, and corrosion resistance of 316 LVM implants were improved using the development of HAp/GO/Ag nanocomposite coatings by the dip-coating method. The XRD and FTIR results confirmed the synthesis of HAp/GO/Ag nanocomposites. HAp/Ag nanoparticles (68 nm) bound to epoxy, hydroxyl, and carboxyl functional groups on GO sheets (size of GO sheets varies from 255 to 1480 nm) by electrostatic interaction. FESEM images showed that HAp/GO/Ag coatings had higher density and fewer micro-cracks than pure HAp coatings. In addition, HAp/GO/Ag coatings showed optimized nano-hardness (4.5 GPa) and elasticity modulus (123 GPa). The results of...