Introduction: NASA is developing strategies for several in-situ missions to Mars in the next few decades to explore and quantitatively assess potential habitability on Mars. Some of these missions will be designed to specifically search for biosignatures on Mars. Much of the present practice in the development of new detection technologies and instrumentation for astrobiology follows the model ...

The trans-lycopene content of fresh tomato homogenates was assessed by means of the laser photoacoustic spectroscopy, the laser optothermal window, micro-Raman spectroscopy, and colorimetry; none of these methods require the extraction from the product matrix prior to the analysis. The wet chemistry method (high-performance liquid chromatography) was used as the absolute quantitative method. An...

Biocide programs have become necessary in most fine paper manufacturing circuits, as drastic reduction of fresh water consumption in the industry enhances microbial development. Depending on their chemical nature, biocides may interfere with typical wet-end chemistry additives and furnish. A reference wet-end chemistry was set (including fixing aid, dry strength aid, sizing agent, and retention...

The melt-phase synthesis of dioctyltin (IV) and triphenyltin (IV) benzoates were carried outusing stoichiometric amounts of benzoic acids and the corresponding organotin (IV) compounds.The reagents were ground together in a mortar and fed into a boiling glass tube. A cannula tubewas inserted into the boiling tube to discharge accumulated gaseous products. A syringe ensureda continuous flow of d...

Wet foams are used in many important technologies either as end or intermediate products. However, the thermodynamic instability of wet foams leads to undesired bubble coarsening over time. Foam stability can be drastically improved by using particles instead of surfactants as foam stabilizers, since particles tend to adsorb irreversibly at the air-water interface. Recently, we presented a nove...

A systematic investigation of sorbent-trap sampling, which is a method that uses paired sorbent traps to measure total vapor phase mercury (Hg), was carried out at two coal-fired power plants. The objective of the study was to evaluate the effects (if any) on data quality when the following aspects of the sorbent trap method are varied: (a) sorbent trap configuration; (b) sampling time; and (c)...