Concentration-gradient

Plug-flow reactors have a decreasing concentration gradient from inlet to outlet, which means that toxic compounds in the feed remain undiluted during their passage along the reactor, and this may inhibit or kill many of the microorganisms within the... 

Diffusivity measures the tendency for a concentration gradient to dissipate to form a molar flux. The proportionality constant between the flux and the potential is called the diffusivity and is expressed in m /s. If a binary mixture of components A and B is considered, the molar flux of component A with respect to a reference plane through which the exchange is equimolar, is expressed as a function of the diffusivity and of the concentration gradient with respect to aji axis Ox perpendicular to the reference plane by the fpllqvving relatipn 6 /... 

The assumption (frequently unstated) underlying equations (A2.1.19) and equation (A2.1.20) for the measurement of irreversible work and heat is this in the surroundings, which will be called subsystem p, internal equilibrium (unifomi T, p and //f diroughout the subsystem i.e. no temperature, pressure or concentration gradients) is maintained tliroughout the period of time in which the irreversible changes are... 

The coefficients, L., are characteristic of the phenomenon of thermal diffusion, i.e. the flow of matter caused by a temperature gradient. In liquids, this is called the Soret effect [12]. A reciprocal effect associated with the coefficient L. is called the Dufour effect [12] and describes heat flow caused by concentration gradients. The... 

Diflfiisive processes nonnally operate in chemical systems so as to disperse concentration gradients. In a paper in 1952, the mathematician Alan Turing produced a remarkable prediction [37] that if selective diffiision were coupled with chemical feedback, the opposite situation may arise, with a spontaneous development of sustained spatial distributions of species concentrations from initially unifonn systems. Turmg s paper was set in the context of the development of fonn (morphogenesis) in embryos, and has been adopted in some studies of animal coat markings. With the subsequent theoretical work at Brussels [1], it became clear that oscillatory chemical systems should provide a fertile ground for the search for experimental examples of these Turing patterns. 

Diffusion may be defined as the movement of a species due to a concentration gradient, which seeks to maximize entropy by overcoming inhomogeneities within a system. The rate of diffusion of a species, the flux, at a given point in solution is dependent upon the concentration gradient at that particular point and was first described by Pick in 1855, who considered the simple case of linear difflision to a planar surface ... 

O, a large current is detected, which decays steadily with time. The change in potential from will initiate the very rapid reduction of all the oxidized species at the electrode surface and consequently of all the electroactive species diffrising to the surface. It is effectively an instruction to the electrode to instantaneously change the concentration of O at its surface from the bulk value to zero. The chemical change will lead to concentration gradients, which will decrease with time, ultimately to zero, as the diffrision-layer thickness increases. At time t = 0, on the other hand, dc-Jdx) r. will tend to infinity. The linearity of a plot of i versus r... 

Most of our ideas about carrier transport in semiconductors are based on tire assumption of diffusive motion. Wlren tire electron concentration in a semiconductor is not unifonn, tire electrons move diffuse) under tire influence of concentration gradients, giving rise to an additional contribution to tire current. In tliis motion, electrons also undergo collisions and tlieir temporal and spatial distributions are described by the diffusion equation. The... 

Consider a spatially homogeneous reacting mixture where concentration gradients are removed by stirring or rapid... 

Transporter. A transporter is a protein transporting molecules or ions through the cell membrane against a concentration gradient. 

In general, therefore, the surface flux of each substance is linearly related Co all the concentration gradients in the adjacent bulk phase. The coefficients in this linear relation depend on the bulk phase concentrations,... 

Though a porous medium may be described adequately under non-reactive conditions by a smooth field type of diffusion model, such as one of the Feng and Stewart models, it does not necessarily follow that this will still be the case when a chemical reaction is catalysed at the solid surface. In these circumstances the smooth field assumption may not lead to appropriate expressions for concentration gradients, particularly in the smaller pores. Though the reason for this is quite simple, it appears to have been largely overlooked,... 

Dead-end micropores are excluded here, of course, since they carry no concentration gradients in steady non-reactive conditions. 

It arises solely because we continue Co describe micropore diffusion in terms of smooch macropore concentration fields and their gradients, even under reactive conditions where these no longer adequately describe Che actual concentration gradients in the micropores. 

We have used the fact that the concentration gradient grad c, or equivalently the pressure gradient, tends to zero as the permedility tends to infinity. Nevertheless, these vanishingly small pressure gradients continue to exert a nonvanishing influence on the flux vectors, and the course of Che above calculation Indicates explicitly how this comes about. 

Concentration gradients for the analyte in the absence of convection, showing the time-dependent change in diffusion as a method of mass transport. 

Concentration gradient for the analyte showing the effects of diffusion and convection as methods of mass transport. 

When a sample is injected into the carrier stream it has the rectangular flow profile (of width w) shown in Figure 13.17a. As the sample is carried through the mixing and reaction zone, the width of the flow profile increases as the sample disperses into the carrier stream. Dispersion results from two processes convection due to the flow of the carrier stream and diffusion due to a concentration gradient between the sample and the carrier stream. Convection of the sample occurs by laminar flow, in which the linear velocity of the sample at the tube s walls is zero, while the sample at the center of the tube moves with a linear velocity twice that of the carrier stream. The result is the parabolic flow profile shown in Figure 13.7b. Convection is the primary means of dispersion in the first 100 ms following the sample s injection. 

This shows that Schlieren optics provide a means for directly monitoring concentration gradients. The value of the diffusion coefficient which is consistent with the variation of dn/dx with x and t can be determined from the normal distribution function. Methods that avoid the difficulty associated with locating the inflection point have been developed, and it can be shown that the area under a Schlieren peak divided by its maximum height equals (47rDt). Since there are no unknown proportionality factors in this expression, D can be determined from Schlieren spectra measured at known times. 

If a sedimentation experiment is carried out long enough, a state of equilibrium is eventually reached between sedimentation and diffusion. Under these conditions material will pass through a cross section perpendicular to the radius in both directions at equal rates downward owing to the centrifugal field, and upward owing to the concentration gradient. It is easy to write expressions for the two fluxes which describe this situation ... 

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