Alkanes

Summary:
This chapter presents a descriptive and illustrative account of phase behavior in the seven naturally occurring petroleum fluids and ties all the known eleven phase-transition concepts in a unified narrative. The figures and tables contained in this report are designed so that they could effectively support the discussion about molecular make-up of petroleum fluids, P- and T-effects on phase behavior and phase transition points.
      Seven naturally occurring hydrocarbon fluids are known as petroleum fluids. They include, in the order of their fluidity, natural gas, gas condensate (or NGL), light crude, intermediate crude, heavy oil, tar sand and oil shale.  In this report we present a generalized description of the various phase transitions, which may occur in petroleum fluids with emphasis on heavy organics deposition. 
      At first the nature of every petroleum fluid is presented.  Their constituents including their so-called impurities are identified and categorized. Heavy fractions in petroleum fluids are discussed and their main families of constituents are presented including petroleum wax, diamondoids, asphaltenes and petroleum resins.  Then the generalized petroleum fluids phase behavior is discussed in light of the known theory of phase transitions. The effects of variations of composition, temperature and pressure on the phase behavior of petroleum fluids are introduced.  Finally eleven distinct phase-transition points of petroleum fluids are presented and their relation with state variables and constituents of petroleum fluids are identified.  This report is to generalize and relate phase behaviors of all the seven naturally occurring petroleum fluids into a unified perspective.  This work is the basis to develop a comprehensive computational model for phase behavior prediction of all the petroleum fluids, which is of major interest in the petroleum industry

Biosurfactants containing rhamnose and β-hydroxydecanoic acid and called rhamnolipids are reviewed with respect to microbial producers, their physiological role, biosynthesis and genetics, and especially their microbial overproduction, physicochemical properties and potential applications. With Pseudomonas species, more than 100 g l−1 rhamnolipids were produced from 160 g l−1 soybean oil at a volumetric productivity of 0.4 g l−1 h−1. The individual rhamnolipids are able to lower the surface tension of water from 72 mN m−1 to 25–30 mN m−1 at concentrations of 10–200 mg l−1. After initial testing, rhamnolipids seem to have potential applications in combating marine oil pollution, removing oil from sand and in combating zoosporic phytopathogens. Rhamnolipids are also a source of l-rhamnose, which is already used for the industrial production of high-quality flavor components.

A generalized cubic equation of state which can represent all the cubic equations is introduced and thermodynamic property relations for it are presented. Five cubic equations of states with respective mixing rules are used to predict molar volumes and vapor pressures of pure alkanes (from methane till n-tritriacontane) and solubilities of solid wax components (high molecular weight alkanes) in supercritical solvents. They are the RK (Redlich-Kwong), MMM (Mohsennia-Modarress-Mansoori), RM (Riazi-Mansoori), PR (Peng-Robinson), and SRK (Soave-Redlich-Kwon) equations of state. The experimental data necessary to compare the equations of state are taken from the literature. It is demonstrated that the SRK equation of state is more accurate for predicting vapor pressures of alkanes. The RM equation of state is shown to be more accurate for predicting molar volumes of saturated and sub-cooled liquid alkanes as well as molar volumes of alkanes in their supercritical condition. For the solubility of wax components in supercritical solvents it is shown that the MMM equation of state gives the least AAD% for the 270 data points of 10 binary systems studied consisting of a high molecular weight alkane and supercritical ethane and carbon dioxide.

A role of indices of oxidative stress, oxidative injury, and abnormal membrane phospholipid, specifically the phospholipid essential polyunsaturated fatty acids (EPUFAs) metabolism has been suggested based on studies in separate groups of patients with or without medication. The current study investigated the relationship between these biochemical measures in first-episode psychotic patients (N=16) at baseline and after 6 months of antipsychotic treatment (N=5 each with risperidone and olanzapine) and compared them to matched normal subjects. The indices of oxidative stress included: antioxidant enzymes; superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase and catalase; and the oxidative injury as the levels of plasma lipid peroxides. The key membrane EPUFA's been; linolenic acid, arachidonic acid, nervonic acid, docosapentaenoic acid and docosahexaenoic acid. Furthermore, the changes in these biochemical measures were correlated with clinical symptomatology. Data indicated that, at bas...

About 15% of the epidermal wax on Hordeum vulgare cv. Bonus barley spikes is n-alkanes. Longer homologues are greatly reduced in the eceriferum mutants, cer-a(6), cer-e(8), cer-n(26), cer-n(53), cer-n(985), cer-x(60), cer-yc(135) and cer-yl(187). Simultaneously hydrocarbons accounting for only traces in the wild-type become prominent in the mutants, although their chain-length distributions remain unchanged. Accordingly several new hydrocarbon series were identified. The two major ones were C(23)-C(35)cis monoenoic alkenes (the major 9-ene isomer was part of a homologous series including 11, 13 and 15-enes), and the novel C(27)-C(31) cyclopropanes (the ring carbons of major isomers were 9,10 and 11,12 with lesser amounts of 13,14). Three minor series included 2- and 3-methylalkanes plus C(25)-C(33) internally branched alkanes (methyls on carbons 9, 11, 13, 15 or 17; shorter homologues dominated by the 9 isomer, longer homologues by 11, 13 or 15 isomers). Acyl chains destined for spi...