Corona mechanism

Negative corona is considerably more complicated and depends more on the emission properties of the discharge surface and of the gas. White (W4) gives a detailed discussion of corona mechanisms. In general, the negative corona threshold is higher than the positive. 

Fig. 12. Comparison of actual and predicted charging rates for 0.3-pm particles in a corona field of 2.65 kV/cm (141). The finite approximation theory (173) which gives the closest approach to experimental data takes into account both field charging and diffusion charging mechanisms. The curve labeled White (141) predicts charging rate based only on field charging and that marked Arendt and Kallmann (174) shows charging rate based only on diffusion.

Corona discharge treatment results in the formation of high-polarity functional groups, such as carbonyl, at the polymer surface. Various mechanisms have been proposed for the improvement of the adhesive properties... 

The carotenoid pathway may also be regulated by feedback inhibition from the end products. Inhibition of lycopene cyclisation in leaves of tomato causes increase in the expression of Pds and Psy-1 (Giuliano et al, 1993 Corona et al, 1996). This hypothesis is supported by other studies using carotenoid biosynthesis inhibitors where treated photosynthetic tissues accumulated higher concentrations of carotenoids than untreated tissues (reviewed by Bramley, 1993). The mechanism of this regulation is unknown. A contrary view, however, comes from studies on the phytoene-accumulating immutans mutant of Arabidopsis, where there is no feedback inhibition of phytoene desaturase gene expression (Wetzel and Rodermel, 1998). 

The gas mixture containing the nitrogen oxides is very important as well. Experiments and modeling carried out for N2/NOx mixtures, or with addition of 02, H20, C02 and hydrocarbons will be discussed. Typical hydrocarbon additives investigated are ethane, propene, propane, 2-propene-l-ol, 2-propanol, etc. As compared to the case without hydrocarbons, NO oxidation occurs much faster when hydrocarbons are present. The reaction paths for NO removal change significantly, in fact the chemical mechanism itself is completely different from that of without hydrocarbon additives. Another additive investigated extensively is ammonia, used especially in corona radical shower systems. 

In addition to ELS, charged aerosol (CA) or corona detector has more recently been introduced as a very promising HPLC detection system [105] while the sensitivity of the two systems is quite close, CA detector offers the advantage of a nearly linear response factor, particularly crucial for the assessment of enantiomeric purities, whereas ELS provides a nonlinear response at very low or high levels of analytes, resulting from several light scattering mechanisms and particle size distribution. 

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