We have produced hollow copper-containing precipitate tubes using a flow-injection technique, and characterized their linear and volume growth. It is shown that the ratio of the volume increase rate to that of pumping is constant independent of the chemical composition. It is also found that osmosis significantly contributes to the tube growth, since the inward flux of chemical species dominates during the precipitate pattern formation. The asymmetric hydrodynamic field coupled with the inherent concentration and pH gradients results in different particle morphology on the two sides of the precipitate membrane. While the tubes have a smooth outer surface, the inner walls are covered with nanoflowers for copper phosphate and with nanoballs for copper silicate.

The thiosulfate-periodate reaction has been studied spectrophotometrically in a slightly acidic medium at 25.0 ± 0.1 °C in an acetate/acetic acid buffer by monitoring the absorbance in the 250-600 nm wavelength range at a constant ionic strength adjusted by the buffer component sodium acetate. In agreement with a previous study, we found that the reaction cannot be described by a single stoichiometric equation, tetrathionate and sulfate are simultaneously formed, and its ratio strongly depends on the pH. As expected at certain initial concentration ratios of the reactants, the reaction behaves as a clock reaction, but after its appearance, iodine is slowly consumed mainly because of the moderate tetrathionate-iodine reaction. It is also enlightened that the initial rate of the reaction is completely independent of the pH, which apparently contradicts a previous study, which postulates a "supercatalytic" behavior of the hydrogen ion on the title reaction. Significant buffer assistance that may change the absorbance-time profiles was also observed. On the basis of the kinetic data, a robust 28-step kinetic model with 22 fitted parameters is proposed and discussed to explain adequately all of the important characteristics of the kinetic curves.

The trithionate-hypochlorous acid reaction has been studied by the stopped-flow technique and conventional spectrophotometry between pH = 6.59-12.2 monitoring absorbance-time profiles at 285 and 225 nm. We showed that the formal kinetic order of Cl(I) is nearly 2; however, those of hydrogen ion and trithionate are significantly lower than unity, suggesting complex kinetics. It was also demonstrated that both forms of Cl(I) are kinetically active within the concentration range studied. Simultaneous evaluation of the kinetic curves revealed that the reaction was initiated by a formal Cl(+) transfer to the partially negatively charged β-sulfur of trithionate. S3O6Cl(-) formed in the first step was also found to be equilibrating with S3O6OH(-) via a simple chlorine-OH exchange reaction followed by their subsequent oxidation of hypochlorite and hypochlorous acid, respectively. A six-step kinetic model is proposed and discussed with having four fitted and four fixed parameters.