To understand the detail structure of the pulverized coal flame, it is necessary to apply the carefully controlled optical diagnostics because the significant signal disturbance from the fuel particles would reduce the accuracy of data. In this paper, the highlight results obtained by applying shadow Doppler particle analyzer (SDPA) and laser induced incandescence (LII) and time-resolved LII (TiRe-LII) to the pulverized coal flame were summarized.

This study aims to evaluate granules and tablets properties prepared by twin-screw continuous granulation (TSG) by comparing with those by fluidized-bed granulation (FBG) and high shear granulation (HSG). During FBG, mass median diameter increased in proportional to moisture content of wet granules. In HSG and TSG, granules growth was observed with an increase in mass ratio of liquid to solid. The mass median diameter was affected by the blade rotation speed at higher level of water content in HSG. By contrast, granule growth was less affected by the screw rotation speed in TSG. Friability and density of granules prepared by TSG remained between FBG and HSG. Scanning electron microscopy and cross-sectional 3D X-ray tomography images suggested that granules prepared by TSG did not receive high shear force as HSG during the granulation. The tablet strength and the percentage of dissolution were similar with those by FBG. It was because granules prepared by TSG had relatively porous structure as FBG. Under practical operation conditions, the tablet properties were comparable with those by FBG and HSG.

The method to improve the properties of dry granules was investigated by introducing pre-coating process with an active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) and a submicron-sized binder prior to conventional roller compaction. Hydroxypropylcellulose (HPC) and acetaminophen (APAP) were used as models of a binder and a low-compactible API, respectively. The submicron-sized HPC (HPC-subMP) was obtained by a lab-scale spray dryer. The APAP particles were pre-coated with 5–10% of the HPC-subMP by a high shear mixer, formed into granules using a lab-scale roller compactor, mixed with other excipients and then compressed to make them tablets containing 50% APAP. The tablets prepared with the HPC-subMP showed a high tensile strength without significant retardation of the disintegration time in comparison to those with a raw HPC particle, indicating that the use of API particles pre-coated with submicron-sized binder particles in roller compaction was effective to prepare granules suitable for tableting without any fundamental changes of materials and manufacturing processes.

Recently, ferroelectrics with relatively small bandgap energy have been receiving much attention because of the characteristic photoinduced electrical responses under visible light irradiation. However, such photoresponsive materials have serious problems such as poor photoelectric conversion properties, especially low photocurrent. It revealed that incorporation of silver (Ag) nanoparticles in the film as a surface plasmon excitation agent is effective to enhance photocurrent of narrow bandgap ferroelectric (such as BiFeO₃) thin films. The synthesized BiFeO₃ and Ag nanoparticle/BiFeO₃ thin films demonstrated rapid on/off responses of photocurrent to visible light. The Ag nanoparticle-embedded BiFeO₃ film exhibited a several times higher photocurrent than the BiFeO₃ film.

In this study, a novel reversible control method for particle dispersion/flocculation was developed. We found that the conformation of a polymer with solubility pressure dependencies on the side chain changed from random coil to fibril-like with ambient pressure. On the contrary, as we reported in our previous paper, the dispersion state of slurry changes with changes in the conformation of adsorbed polymers. Based on these results, we hypothesized that the dispersion state of the slurry can be reversibly controlled by ambient pressure. The sample used was aqueous slurry of alumina with a sodium salt of sulfonic acid copolymer with a relative molecular mass of 10000. The results showed that the dispersion state of slurry at atmospheric pressure was flocculated with a specific additive amount of polymer. On the contrary, after pressurization, the dispersion state was changed into a well dispersion state. Therefore, it was confirmed that the slurry was responsible for the pressure; thereby, a novel reversible control method for particle dispersion state was successfully developed.