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Elsevier Science

  • The Organic Chemistry of Museum Objects

    • 1st Edition
    • Stephen G Rees-Jones
    • English
    The Organic Chemistry of Museum Objects provides an account of the composition, chemistry, and analysis of the organic materials which enter into the structures of objects in museum collections. This book is not intended to duplicate the information available in existing handbooks on the materials and techniques of art and conservation but rather to convey the state of knowledge of the chemical composition of such materials and so provide a framework for a general understanding of their properties. The book begins with a review of basic organic chemistry, covering hydrocarbons and compounds with functional groups. It then describes spectrometry and separation methods. This is followed by discussions of the chemistry and composition of oils and fats, natural waxes, bituminous materials, carbohydrates, proteins, and natural resins and lacquers. Subsequent chapters deal with synthetic materials, i.e., high molecular weight polymers of a wholly synthetic nature; and natural and synthetic dyestuffs. Also discussed are the deterioration and other changes in organic materials resulting from both free radical and ionic reactions; and the application of analytical methods to identify the organic materials of actual museum objects. This book is intended for both chemists and nonchemists.
  • Mechanics of Agricultural Materials

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 8
    • G. Sitkei
    • English
    The importance of economical production of agricultural materials, especially crops and animal products serving as base materials for foodstuffs, and of their technological processing (mechanical operations, storage, handling etc.) is ever-increasing. During technological processes agricultural materials may be exposed to various mechanical, thermal, electrical, optical and acoustical (e.g. ultrasonic) effects. To ensure optimal design of such processes, the interactions between biological materials and the physical effects acting on them, as well as the general laws governing the same, must be known.The mechanics of agricultural materials, as a scientific discipline, is still being developed, and therefore has no exact methods as yet, in many cases. However, the methods developed so far can already be utilized successfully for designing and optimizing machines and technological processes.This present work is the first attempt to summarize the calculation methods developed in the main fields of agricultural mechanics, and to indicate the material laws involved on the basis of a unified approach, with all relevant physico-mechanical properties taken into account.The book deals with material properties, gives the necessary theoretical background for description of the mechanical behaviour of these materials including modern powerful calculation methods and finally discusses a large number of experimental results. Many of them can only be found in this book. Special attention is paid to the unified approach concerning theory and practice.The systematic treatment of the material makes the book useful to a wide circle of designers, researchers and students in the field of agricultural engineering. The book can also be used as a textbook at technical and agricultural universities.
  • Polymer Characterization by Liquid Chromatography

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 34
    • G. Glöckner
    • English
    The main subject of this book is the characterization of plastics. To a high degree the properties of these polymers depend on the distribution of the molar mass and of other structural features, and small deviations frequently have a great effect. Therefore the characterization of polymers cannot be restricted to the determination of mean values but must yield information on these distributions. Using classical methods, the analytical fractionation of polymer homologues and structurally isomeric polymers is extremely time-consuming. Therefore, efficient chromatographic techniques are being increasingly employed in modern polymer characterization.In the first place, high-performance liquid chromatography is applied, in the form of size exclusion chromatography. It is also possible, however, to use other separation modes. More space is devoted to these other possibilities in this volume than is merited by their current range of applications, as the author believes that many separation problems will be solved by separation techniques of the non-exclusion type. Nevertheless, much emphasis is placed on size exclusion chromatography. Not only because of its current wide range of applications, but also because its relative importance, as a complement to other chromatographic techniques may even increase in the forthcoming years.This book is the first to cover all phenomena related to the above considerations. Starting with an introduction to basic liquid chromatography and to polymer science, it deals with the adsorption behaviour of polymers, with gradient techniques, with the kinetic band broadening in liquid chromatography, with instrumental features and packing materials. The book consists of four balanced sections and related information from about 1800 references is compiled in the tables. Some 250 figures and 30 tables will help give the reader a clear insight of the topics discussed. The book is aimed at helping the analyst or polymer chemist who is looking for information about chromatographic methods for the characterization of polymers.
  • Reservoir Sedimentation

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 29
    • G.W. Annandale
    • English
    Research on reservoir sedimentation in recent years has been aimed mainly at water resources projects in developing countries. These countries, especially in Africa, often have to cope with long droughts, flash floods and severe erosion problems. Large reservoir capacities are required to capture water provided by flash floods so as to ensure the supply of water in periods of drought. The problem arising however is that these floods, due to their tremendous stream power, carry enormous volumes of sediment which, due to the size of reservoirs, are virtually deposited in toto in the reservoir basin, leading to fast deterioration of a costly investment. Accurate forecasting of reservoir behaviour is therefore of the utmost importance.This book fills a gap in current literature by providing in one volume comprehensive coverage of techniques required to practically investigate the effects sediment deposition in reservoirs has on the viability of water resources projects. Current techniques for practically estimating sediment yield from catchments, estimating the volume of sediment expected to deposit in reservoirs, predicting sediment distribution and calculating scour downstream of reservoirs are evaluated and presented. The liberal use of diagrams and graphs to explain the various techniques enhances understanding and makes practical application simple. A major feature of the book is the application of stream power theory to explain the process of reservoir sedimentation and to develop four new methods for predicting sediment distribution in reservoirs.The book is primarily directed at practising engineers involved in the planning and design of water resources projects and at post-graduate students interested in this field of study.
  • Application of Optimal Control Theory to Enhanced Oil Recovery

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 21
    • W. Fred Ramirez
    • English
    In recent years, enhanced oil recovery techniques have received much attention in the oil industry. Enhanced oil recovery methods can be divided into three major categories: thermal processes which include steam flooding, steam stimulation, and in-situ combustion; chemical processes which include surfactant-polymer injection, polymer flooding, and caustic flooding; and miscible displacement processes which include miscible hydrocarbon displacement, carbon dioxide injection of large amounts of rather expensive fluids into oil bearing reservoir formations. Commercial application of any enhanced oil recovery process relies upon economic projections that show a decent return on the investment. Because of high chemical costs, it is important to optimize enhanced oil recovery processes to provide the greatest recovery at the lowest chemical injection cost.The aim of this book is to develop an optimal control theory for the determination of operating strategies that maximize the economic attractiveness of enhanced oil recovery processes. The determination of optimal control histories or operating strategies is one of the key elements in the successful usage of new enhanced oil recovery techniques. The information contained in the book will therefore be both interesting and useful to all those working in petroleum engineering, petroleum management and chemical engineering.
  • Chromatography of Lipids in Biomedical Research and Clinical Diagnosis

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 37
    • A. Kuksis
    • English
    This multi-author volume provides an unprecedented in-depth coverage of the separation, identification and quantitation of simple and complex food and tissue fats and other lipids by chromatographic and mass spectrometric methods with emphasis on applications to biomedical research and clinical diagnosis. It contains a total of 13 chapters written by scientists who are internationally recognized in their specific fields. The volume covers analyses of molecular species of eicosanoids, sterols, and glycero and glycolipids in healthy and diseased human tissues and in appropriate animal models. The text complements the simpler group determinations of lipid classes commonly employed in clinical laboratories. The volume anticipates the discovery of the specific metabolism of molecular species of complex glycerolipids and provides the medical researcher and clinical investigator with the means for dealing with it.
  • Neural Regeneration

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 71
    • English
  • The Adaptive Brain I

    Cognition, Learning, Reinforcement, and Rhythm
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 42
    • English
  • Experimental Design

    A Chemometric Approach
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 3
    • S.N. Deming + 1 more
    • English
    Now available in a paperback edition is a book which has been described as ``...an exceptionally lucid, easy-to-read presentation... would be an excellent addition to the collection of every analytical chemist. I recommend it with great enthusiasm.'' (Analytical Chemistry). Unlike most current textbooks, it approaches experimental design from the point of view of the experimenter, rather than that of the statistician. As the reviewer in `Analytical Chemistry' went on to say: ``Deming and Morgan should be given high praise for bringing the principles of experimental design to the level of the practicing analytical chemist.''.The book first introduces the reader to the fundamentals of experimental design. Systems theory, response surface concepts, and basic statistics serve as a basis for the further development of matrix least squares and hypothesis testing. The effects of different experimental designs and different models on the variance-covariance matrix and on the analysis of variance (ANOVA) are extensively discussed. Applications and advanced topics (such as confidence bands, rotatability, and confounding) complete the text. Numerous worked examples are presented.The clear and practical approach adopted by the authors makes the book applicable to a wide audience. It will appeal particularly to those with a practical need (scientists, engineers, managers, research workers) who have completed their formal education but who still need to know efficient ways of carrying out experiments. It will also be an ideal text for advanced undergraduate and graduate students following courses in chemometrics, data acquisition and treatment, and design of experiments.