Problem identification, researchable questions

In view of the wide application of Py—GC in industry and research, the development of techniques and equipment for automatic analysis by this method is of great practical interest. An automatic Py—GC system was developed by Coulter and Thompson [69] for Curie-type cells with a filament for specific application in the tyre industry. A typical analysis involves the identification and determination of polymers in a tyre material sample. The material of a tyre is essentially a mixture of polymers, most often natural rubber (polyisoprene), synthetic polyisoprene, polybutadiene and butadiene-styrene copolymer. A tube is normally made of a material based on butyl rubber and a copolymer of isobutylene with small amounts of isoprene. In addition to the above ingredients, the material contains another ten to twelve, such as sulphur, zinc oxide, carbon black, mineral oil, pine pitch, resins, antioxidants, accelerators and stearic acid. In analysing very small samples of the tyre material, the chemist must usually answer the following question on the basis of which polymers is the tyre made and what is their ratio The problem is not made easier by the fact that cured rubber is not soluble in any solvent. 

In these researches, a mainly purpose is to acquire EPHs of cell or half-cell reactions. The EPH could be considered as a basic issue of TEC. Before the identification of this problem there had been two puzzled questions, one is that the heat effects for a reversible reaction, Q can be calculated by the formula Q = TAS where AS is the entropy change of this reaction and T temperature in Kelvin. However, this formula that is valid for most reactions is not viable at least for a reversible single electrode reaction in aqueous solution. For a reversible single electrode reaction, the experimental value of the heat effect is not in agreement with that calculated on the current thermodynamic databank of ions, that is, with which, the product of the calculated entropy change and the temperature of the electrode reaction always differs from the experimental measurements [2]. For example, for the electrode reaction at the standard state ... 

The technique of mid-IR microspectroscopy and imaging has great potential for the rapid and reliable identification of tissue structures not only for scientific research purposes but also in a real clinical set-up. The standardisation of the data acquisition and the assessment of the quality of the spectra constitute key factors for the successful transfer to elinical application. Furthermore the problem of overfitting and the role of independent validation have been discussed. In this chapter we also exemplified the question of standardisation of the hyperspectral image acquisition protocol and demonstrated how the... 

The vast material is presented in eight volumes and nearly hundred chapters and is stmctured according to increasing complexity of the systems in question. Each chapter is written by experts of the respective subject and is supposed to start with an introduction of the basic phenomenon, to develop the problem from simple to more specific examples, and to end wherever appropriate with the identification of open questions and challenges for future research. 

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