This study focuses on the physicochemical fuel characteristics and engine performance-emission features of three prospective alternative transportation fuels: Alexandrian laurel biodiesel (ALBD), jatropha biodiesel (JBD) and GTL fuel at high idling conditions. The blends of GTL fuel (G10, G20), JBD (J10, J20) and ALBD (AL10, AL20) with diesel had been investigated in a multi-cylinder diesel eng...

Gas-to-liquid (GTL) fuel is regarded as a promising alternative diesel fuel. It can be used either directly as a diesel fuel or in blends with petroleum-derived diesel or biodiesel. This study investigated the fuel properties, engine performance and exhaust emissions of B5 diesel, GTL fuel and their blends. The main fuel properties of the blended fuels showed a linear variation with the fractio...

An investigation has been made of the effects from a compatibilizer, viz. carboxylated nitrile rubber (XNBR), on several properties of nitrile rubber (NBR) and acrylic rubber (ACM) blends, including curing characteristics, mechanical, dynamic mechanical and dielectric properties. The presence of XNBR until 10 phr resulted in an improvement of the ultimate tensile properties, especially elongati...

Local chain structure and local environment play an important role in the dynamics of polymer chains in miscible blends. In general, the friction coefficients that describe the segmental dynamics of the two components in a blend differ from each other and from those of the pure melts. In this work, we investigate polymer blend dynamics with Monte Carlo simulations of a generalized bond fluctuat...

Emergent effects (McCarthy & Prince 1994) are the result of phonological constraints or rankings that only reveal themselves in a specific context. That is, they have no discernable effect in the regular phonology of a language but become apparent when speakers perform particular tasks. Crucially, they reveal knowledge that was not learned directly from ambient language data. Emergent effects h...

Milkfat has the highest price among all the edible oils and fats and plays a significant role in the economics, nutrition and physicochemical properties of milk and milk products. It can be admixed or replaced with less expensive oils and fats of vegetable or animal origins notably palm oils. Blending of edible fat with vegetable oils is a common practice in many countries to improve the physic...

Many parasitic wasps (parasitoids) exploit volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted by herbivore-infested plants in order to locate their hosts, but it remains largely unknown which specific compounds within the volatile blends elicit the attractiveness to parasitoids. One way of studying the importance of specific VOCs is to test the attractiveness of odor blends from which certain compounds ...

Three different apple-carrot juice blends (60:40, 75:25 and 90:10, v/v) were prepared and treated with ultrasound with comparison to the conventional thermal pasteurization. Total aerobic viable count (TAC) were significantly lower in juice blends with lower pH (apple-carrot ratio of 90:10, v/v) than the blends with higher pH after one month storage at 4 ̊C. TAC were similar in ultrasound-treate...

Biodiesel is a green fuel produced from renewable resources. It is a clean-burning alternative fuel, which has drawn the attention of energy researchers for the last two decades. This paper presents an experimental investigation on Alexandrian laurel oil as a potential feedstock for biodiesel development. Biodiesel was produced using a two-step esterification–transesterification process. Analys...

The thermomechanical degradation of blends made from polypropylene and polystyrene, with or without compatibilizer, was studied using an internal mixer coupled to a torque rheometer. The blends processed without compatibilizer presented regular and expected results regarding torque reduction, with evidence of chain scission. The blends processed with the block copolymer of styrene and butadiene...