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WO 3 supported on zeolite-Y (WO 3 -ZY) was successfully synthesized by a facile impregnation method and well characterized by various techniques. The photocatalytic activity of the prepared catalysts was investigated for the degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) under visible, UV and solar light irradiation. The enhanced photocatalytic activity was observed for the catalyst WO 3 -ZY, which may be due to the presence of more active sites that can adsorb a greater number of dye molecules. The TEM, FESEM and adsorption studies confirm that the WO 3 supported on zeolite-Y has a very small particle size of about 8 nm compared with the bare WO 3 at 97 nm. The efficient electron-hole pair separation and the role of active species were investigated by photoluminescence spectroscopy and the test of the effect of scavengers, respectively. The mechanism for the photocatalytic degradation of RhB was proposed and the pathway of RhB degradation was illustrated schematically.

Enzymatic substrate promiscuity is more ubiquitous than previously thought, with significant consequences for understanding metabolism and its application to biocatalysis. This realization has given rise to the need for efficient characterization of enzyme promiscuity. Enzyme promiscuity is currently characterized with a limited number of human-selected compounds that may not be representative of the enzyme's versatility. While testing large numbers of compounds may be impractical, computational approaches can exploit existing data to determine the most informative substrates to test next, thereby more thoroughly exploring an enzyme's versatility. To demonstrate this, we used existing studies and tested compounds for four different enzymes, developed support vector machine (SVM) models using these datasets, and selected additional compounds for experiments using an active learning approach. SVMs trained on a chemically diverse set of compounds were discovered to achieve maximum accuracies of ~80% using ~33% fewer compounds than datasets based on all compounds tested in existing studies. Active learning-selected compounds for testing resolved apparent conflicts in the existing training data, while adding diversity to the dataset. The application of these algorithms to wide arrays of metabolic enzymes would result in a library of SVMs that can predict high-probability promiscuous enzymatic reactions and could prove a valuable resource for the design of novel metabolic pathways.

The paper investigates the exceptional antiwear and extreme pressure properties of multiwalled carbon nanotube based mineral oil. Different samples of oil containing varying proportions of MWNT (MWNT) and graphite were prepared. The samples were tested for their antiwear and load bearing capacity according to ASTM G99 and ASTM D-2783 standards. After pass load test in four ball tester the rubbed surfaces were investigated with Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images. The wear test results show a decrease wear by 70-75% in case of multiwalled nanotube based mineral oil as compared with pure mineral oil. Furthermore, it has been observed that the load bearing capacity in case of multiwalled carbon nanotube based mineral oil increases by 20% as compared to pure mineral oil. A comparison in the antiwear and load bearing capacity properties of graphite and nanotube based mineral oil was studied which showed the inefficiency of graphite based lubricant over MWNT based oil. Thus, the finding would be helpful in developing new nanoparticle based lubricants.

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Titania has been studied to be one of the best photocatalysts for the decomposition of many organic pollutants present in aqueous medium. Because of the wide band gap energy of TiO2 (3.2 eV) it can be activated only under UV light region which is present 4 % in the solar light spectrum. The photocatalytic activity of TiO2 was enhanced by means of several methods. TiO2 coupled with other semiconductor has gained additional importance, owing to improving the efficient charge separation by trapping the photogenerated electrons. WO3 is a better semiconductor having relatively lower band gap energy (2.8 eV) and absorb broad solar light spectrum. The formation of WOx monolayer on TiO2 notably increases the surface acidity of TiO2. This increasing the surface acidity of WO3/TiO2 photocatalyst facilitates the adsorption of the more hydroxyl group in addition to more organic reactants on its surface which obviously facilitate the enhancement of photocatalytic activity. In this review, the synthesis methods and photocatalytic activity of some selected and unique results related to WO3/TiO2 photocatalyst were discussed. The efficient charge separation, increased absorption of the reactants by increasing the surface acidity and high aspect ratio structures of WO3/TiO2 are also reviewed.

Nano surface finish has become an important parameter in the semiconductor, optical, electrical and mechanical industries. The materials used in these industries are classified as difficult to machine materials such as ceramics, glasses and silicon wafers. Machining of these materials up to nano accuracy is a great challenge in the manufacturing industry. Finishing of micro components such as micro-moulds, micro-lenses and micro-holes need different processing techniques. Conventional finishing methods used so far become almost impossible or cumbersome. In this paper, a nano material especially multi wall carbon nano tube is used in the machining process like grinding to improve the surface characteristics from micro to nano level.