A scum adsorbing member provided in a twin roll continuous casting device to produce a slab by supplying a molten metal to a molten metal storage section formed by a pair of rotatable cooling rolls and a pair of side weirs, and forming and growing a solidified shell on each circumferential surface of the pair of cooling rolls, so that a part of the scum adsorbing member is immersed in the molten metal storage section includes a refractory containing a refractory metal oxide, wherein the scum adsorbing member has 15% by volume or more and 70% by volume or less of pores.

The present invention relates to a collection apparatus for collecting particulate matter generated due to friction between a rotor and a brake pad in a brake system of a transport facility, the collection apparatus including a first collector configured to surround a portion of an outer side surface of the rotor, an upper collector configured to surround a portion of an outer peripheral surface of the rotor, and a second collector configured to surround a portion of an inner side surface of the rotor, wherein the first collector and the second collector are made of porous ceramic foam. According to the present invention, particulate matter generated due to friction between a rotor and a brake pad in a brake system of a transport facility can be efficiently collected, and by reducing the amount of particulate matter generated when braking a transport facility, air pollution can be prevented.

A pillar shaped honeycomb structure includes: a porous partition wall that defines a plurality of cells, the cells forming flow paths for a fluid, the cells extending from an inflow end face to an outflow end face; and an outer peripheral wall located at the outermost circumference. The cells include: a plurality of cells A wherein a side of the inflow end face is opened and the outflow end face has a plugged portion; and a plurality of cells B wherein a side of the outflow end face is opened and the inflow end face has a plugged portion, the cells B being arranged alternately with the cells A. One or both of the plugged portion of the cells A and the plugged portions of the cells B contain a magnetic substance and glass.

A fired ceramic article including a screen printed layer of primer on a portion of the fired ceramic body. The thickness of the primer layer is less than 25 microns. A machine-readable code is laser marked onto the screen printed layer of primer. Methods of marking a ceramic article are also provided.

A ceramic honeycomb filter has (a) cross section areas of intake flow paths being larger than those of discharge flow paths; (b) the intake and discharge flow paths having octagonal cross section shapes with four-fold rotation symmetry each obtained by cutting off four corners from a square; (c) the intake and discharge flow paths being alternately arranged in a first direction and a second direction perpendicular to the first direction, such that their opposing sides are parallel; (d) the opening ratio of the intake flow paths being 45-60%; (e) the number of the flow paths per cm.sup.2 being 30-60; (f) the thickness t1 of a cell wall between an intake flow path and a discharge flow path adjacent to that intake flow path being 0.150-0.260 mm; and (g) the thickness t2 of a cell wall between adjacent intake flow paths meeting 1.175<t2/t1<1.6.

Porous, electrically conductive ceramic foams incorporating continuous self-assembled graphene networks are described. The disclosed approach uses interfacial trapping to spontaneously exfoliate and assemble pristine graphite, not graphite oxide, in a ceramic sol-gel. The composite foams display electrical conductivity and joule heating, with anticipated applications as, for example, catalyst supports, thermoelectrics, and porous electrodes.

A porous material includes an aggregate, and a binding material that binds the aggregate together in a state where pores are formed. The porous material contains 0.1 to 10.0 mass % of an MgO component, 0.5 to 25.0 mass % of an Al.sub.2O.sub.3 component, and 5.0 to 45.0 mass % of an SiO.sub.2 component with respect to the mass of the whole porous material, and further contains 0.01 to 5.5 mass % of an Sr component in terms of SrO.

A honeycomb structure has a plurality of cells formed by a plurality of partition walls. The partition walls are formed of a porous material composed predominantly of cordierite. Each partition wall includes surface layer portions having a porosity of 50% or more and an inside portion having a porosity of 50% or more, the surface layer portions being portions ranging respectively from opposite surfaces to a depth corresponding to 25% of the thickness of the partition wall, and the inside portion being the other portion. The surface layer portions and the inside portion both include pores having axial pore widths of less than 30 μm and pores having axial pore widths of 30 μm or more. A mean axial pore width in the surface layer portions is smaller than a mean axial pore width in the inside portion.

A spinel-reinforced magnesium oxide-based foam ceramic filter that is obtained by coating onto a polyurethane foam carrier a slurry of light calcined magnesium oxide-based ceramic comprising a nanometer lanthanum oxide sintering aid, and then drying and sintering. A method for preparing the foam ceramic filter comprising: 1) preparing a ceramic slurry having a solid content of 60%-70% by dosing 15%-25% by mass of a nanometer alumina sol, 0.8%-1.5% by mass of a rheological agent, and the balance magnesium oxide ceramic powder comprising a nanometer lanthanum oxide sintering aid, and then adding absolute ethanol and ball milling to mix until uniform; 2) soaking a polyurethane foam template into the ceramic slurry, squeezing by a roller press the polyurethane foam template to remove redundant slurry therein to make a biscuit, and then removing the ethanol solvent in a ventilation chamber at a temperature of 40° C.-50° C. to dry the biscuit; 3) putting the dried biscuit into a sintering furnace, elevating the temperature to 1350° C.-1550° C. and performing a high temperature sintering, cooling to the room temperature with the furnace to obtain the magnesium oxide-based ceramic foam filter.

A honeycomb filter includes a pillar-shaped honeycomb structure body having a porous partition wall disposed to surround a plurality of cells and a plugging portion provided at an open end on a first end face side or a second end face side of each of the cells, wherein the partition wall is composed of a material containing cordierite as a main component thereof, a number per unit area of pores which exist at a surface of the partition wall and which have equivalent circle diameters exceeding 3.0 μm is 1400 per mm.sup.2 or more, and, in a pore diameter distribution which indicates a cumulative pore volume of the partition wall, with a log pore diameter on a horizontal axis and a log differential pore volume (cm.sup.3/g) on a vertical axis, a half-value width of a first peak that includes a maximum value of the log differential pore volume is 0.30 or less.