No abstract

Soy protein polymers recently have been considered as alternatives to petroleum polymers to ease environmental pollution. The use of soy proteins as adhesives for plywood has been limited because of their low water resistance. The objective of this research was to test the water resistance of adhesives containing modified soy proteins in walnut, maple, poplar, and pine plywood applications. Gluing strength and water resistance of wood were tested by using two ASTM standard methods. Glues with modified soy proteins had stronger bond strength than those containing unmodified soy proteins. Plywood made with glue containing urea-modified proteins had higher water resistance than those bonded with glues containing alkali-modified and heat-treated proteins. After three 48-h cycles of water-soaking, followed by 48 h of air-drying, no delamination was observed for either walnut or pine specimens glued with the urea-modified soy protein adhesives. Gluing strength for wood species with smooth and oriented surface structure was lower than for those with rough, randomly oriented, surface structures. Wood species with greater expansion of dimensions during water-soaking had a higher delamination rate than those showing less expansion.Paper no. J9083 in JAOCS 76, 977-980 (August 1999).

A one-pot solvothermal process has been developed for direct preparation of PdCu nanocapsules (with a size of ca. 10 nm) on three-dimensional (3D) graphene. Due to the 3D pore-rich network of graphene and the unique hollow structure of PdCu nanocapsules with a wall thickness of ca. 3 nm, the newly-prepared PdCu/3D graphene hybrids activated electrochemically have great electrocatalytic activity towards ethanol oxidation in alkaline media, much better than single-phase Pd and commercial E-TEK 20% Pt/C catalysts promising for application in direct ethanol fuel cells.

No abstract

Wheat flour was ground in an ultrafine pulveriser to obtain different levels of damaged starch (DS). The effect of DS content on physicochemical properties of flour and quality attributes of Chinese noodles and northern-style Chinese steamed bread were investigated. Results showed that the degree of starch damage raised from 6.54% to 12.06% as grinding intensity increased from 0 to 130 Hz (P < 0.05). The falling number, sedimentation value, starch pastes' viscosity, dough proofing stability were negatively, while water absorption, pastes thermal stability, the degree of starch pastes and dough level were positively correlated with DS content, respectively (P < 0.05). The increase in DS content from 6.54% to 8.86% did not lead to a deterioration of texture characteristic, which might be attributed to the slight declining in hardness while enhancing in springiness and cohesiveness. The flour with DS content of 6.54-9.66% was suitable for steamed bread making.