Ag nanoparticles-polypyrrole-carbon black/mesoporous TiO2 novel nanocomposite as ultrafast visible-light-driven photocatalyst

Effective design and fabrication of novel visible light-oriented photocatalysts is an existing challenging task that requires further dedicated efforts, and it has been always a main concern among the scientific community. This study deals with the design and fabrication of an extremely active and ultrafast ternary photocatalyst based on Ag nanoparticles, polypyrrole doped carbon black (PPy-C) and mesoporous TiO₂ (m-TiO₂). Sol-gel methodology along with sonication and photodeposition routes have been employed for the successful creation of the ternary framework. Ternary photocatalyst composed of uniform spherical titania nanoparticles (10–15 nm in size) perfectly intermingled with the polymeric linkage of PPy-C. Fruitful creation of unique trio photocatalyst between AgNPs, PPy-C and m-TiO₂ was confirmed by XPS and XRD. FTIR analysis further supports the development of nanocomposite photocatalyst. TEM analysis showed uniform spherical m-TiO₂ nanoparticles (10–15 nm in size) covered by PPy-C with compact nodes like appearance interlocked very well among each other. The newly developed Ag@PPy-C/m-TiO₂ ternary photocatalyst exhibited band gap energy in desired visible range of spectra. The photocatalytic efficiency for all created photocatalysts has been evaluated taking Imidacloprid (insecticide derivative) and methylene blue (MB) dye as target pollutants. The novel Ag@PPy-C/m-TiO₂ photocatalyst produced astonishing results with ultrafast removal of both Imidacloprid as well MB dye under visible light irradiation. The newly created ultrafast Ag@PPy-C/m-TiO₂ photocatalyst has removed 96.0% of the insecticide Imidacloprid in only 25 min with almost ? 2.65 times more efficient than bare m-TiO₂ towards the removal of insecticide derivative. The present report offers a highly encouraging and vastly talented Ag@PPy-C/m-TiO₂ ternary photocatalyst, enabling the ideal management of extremely lethal and notorious chemicals.     

The suppression of dark current for achieving high-performance Ga2O3 nanorod array ultraviolet photodetector

Gallium oxide (Ga₂O₃) is a promising candidate for next-generation solar-blind photodetectors (PDs) because of its large bandgap of 4.9 eV. Its single-crystal nanorod structure improves its photoelectric performance, which promotes carrier transformation and separation. However, Ga₂O₃ nanorods fabricated by the hydrothermal method have many oxygen vacancies, which largely enhance the dark current and reduce the on/off ratio of PDs, restricting application of such devices. Therefore, in this paper, dual strategies are applied to reduce the dark current of a metal–semiconductor–metal-structured Ga₂O₃ nanorod PD fabricated by the hydrothermal method. Through these dual strategies, which include annealing treatment and the application of a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) coating, the dark current of the PD is reduced from 1.34 × 10^?7 to 2.04 × 10^?9 A at 1 V, resulting in the on/off ratio of the PD reaching as high as 3.24 × 10⁴. Besides, the responsivity and detectivity of the device reach 1.73 A/W and 2.53 × 10¹² Jones respectively, which represents better performance than those of other reported Ga₂O₃ nanorod array PDs. Results have shown that the new strategy adopted can greatly improve the performance of Ga₂O₃-based ultraviolet photodetectors.     

Electrical polarization and ionic conduction properties of β-tricalcium phosphate bioceramics with controlled vacancies by sodium ion substitution

With the aim to understand electric polarization mechanisms of β-tricalcium phosphate as an advanced biomaterial, Na ion-substituted β-Ca₃(PO₄)₂ (Na-β-TCPs) ceramics with controlled lattice vacancies were synthesized and structural refinement was performed by the Rietveld method. The Rietveld analysis revealed that Ca and vacancies at Ca(4) sites in the β-TCP structure decreased with an increase in Na substitution. Electrical measurements by the complex impedance method revealed that the conductivity and the activation energy calculated from Cole-Cole plots rapidly decreased to a constant value with an increase in Na substitution and decrease in vacancies. The thermally stimulated depolarization current (TSDC) curve of the electrically polarized Na-β-TCP showed one large peak at 530–610 °C. However, the accumulated charge decreased with an increase in Na ions and decrease in vacancies up to 2.37 mol%, after which it became constant. These results are consistent with the presumed formation of a dipole moment between aligned Ca²⁺ ions and their vacancies along the direction of the external polarization field applied at high temperature. We conclude that the large amount of stored charge in β-TCP caused by electrical polarization is due to the low site occupancy of calcium ions and vacancies at Ca(4) sites in the β-TCP structure, which is not the case for hydroxyapatite (HAp), as previously reported.     

Unique CNTs-chained Li4Ti5O12 nanoparticles as excellent high rate anode materials for Li-ion capacitors

Composite anode materials with a unique architecture of carbon nanotubes (CNTs)-chained spinel lithium titanate (Li₄Ti₅O₁₂, LTO) nanoparticles are prepared for lithium ion capacitors (LICs). The CNTs networks derived from commercial conductive slurry not only bring out a steric hindrance effect to restrict the growth of Li₄Ti₅O₁₂ particles but greatly enhance the electronic conductivity of the CNTs/LTO composites, both have contributed to the excellent rate capability and cycle stability. The capacity retention at 30 C (1 C = 175 mA g^?1) is as high as 89.7% of that at 0.2 C with a CNTs content of 11 wt%. Meanwhile, there is not any capacity degradation after 500 cycles at 5 C. The LIC assembled with activated carbon (AC) cathode and such a CNTs/LTO composite anode displays excellent energy storage properties, including a high energy density of 35 Wh kg^?1 at 7434 W kg^?1, and a high capacity retention of 87.8% after 2200 cycles at 1 A g^?1. These electrochemical performances outperform the reported data achieved on other LTO anode-based LICs. Considering the facile and scalable preparation process proposed herein, the CNTs/LTO composites can be very potential anode materials for hybrid capacitors towards high power-energy outputs.     

Measurement of residual stresses in dissimilar friction stir-welded aluminium and copper plates using the contour method

The longitudinal residual stresses in the friction stir-welded plates of 5A06 aluminium and pure copper were determined using the contour method. The results revealed the presence of high tensile and compressive residual stresses on the aluminium and copper sides, respectively. The residual stresses were detected on the weld zone as well as the thermo-mechanically affected zone (TMAZ) of the aluminium plate. In contrast, the compressive residual stresses in the copper plate had a much narrower width along the weld line. Peak tensile stresses up to 240?MPa were found in the TMAZ of the aluminium plate.     

Elemental analysis of cemented carbides by calibration-free portable laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy

The process of cemented carbides manufacturing requires rapid and field elemental analytical techniques to control and evaluate the properties of products. Calibration-free laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (CF-LIBS) is such a potential elemental analytical technique. In this work, a portable LIBS instrument combined with a CF method was developed for the analysis of cemented carbides. Three batches of cemented compact carbides without reference samples were analyzed. Qualitative and quantitative analysis of the samples were achieved by using the portable LIBS instrument combined with CF method. To validate the analysis results, X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF) was used to analyze the samples as well. The results of CF-LIBS agreed well with the results of XRF, with relative errors between ?29.53 and 24.70%. The results demonstrated that the portable LIBS instrument combined with CF method was capable for direct and rapid analysis without any need of standard measurements. Notably, with the portable LIBS instrument combined with CF method, acceptable accuracy could be obtained, which is promising for practical field applications.     

Implication of Size-Controlled Graphite Nanosheets as Building Blocks for Thermal Conductive Three-Dimensional Framework Architecture of Nanocarbons

Preparation of three-dimensional (3D) networks has received significant attention as an effective approach for applications involving transport phenomena, such as thermal management materials, and several nanomaterials have been examined as potential building blocks of 3D networks for the improvement of heat conduction in polymer nanocomposites. For that purpose, nanocarbons such as graphene and graphite nanoplatelets have been spotlighted as suitable filler materials because of their excellent thermal conductivities (ca. 10²–10³ W·(m·K)^?1 along their lateral axes) and morphological merits. However, the implications of morphological features such as the lateral length and thickness of graphene or graphene-like materials have not yet been identified. In this study, a controlled dissociation of bulk graphite to graphite nanosheets (GNSs) using a low-cost, ecofriendly bead mill process was extensively examined and, when configured in a 3D framework architecture formation, the size-controlled GNSs demonstrated that the thermal conductivities of a 3D interconnected framework of GNSs and the corresponding polymer nanocomposite were intimately correlated with the size of the GNSs, thus demonstrating the successful preparation of an efficient thermal management material without highly sophisticated efforts. The capability of controlling the lateral size and thickness of the GNSs as well as the use of a 3D interconnected framework architecture should greatly assist the commercialization of high-quality graphene-based thermal management materials in a scalable production process.     

Generalized linear model based monitoring methods for high-yield processes

Emerge in technology brought well-organized manufacturing systems to produce high-quality items. Therefore, monitoring and control of products have become a challenging task for quality inspectors. From these highly efficient processes, produced items are mostly zero-defect and modeled based on zero-inflated distributions. The zero-inflated Poisson (ZIP) and zero-inflated Negative Binomial (ZINB) distributions are the most common distributions, used to model the high-yield and rare health-related processes. Therefore, data-based control charts under ZIP and ZINB distributions (i.e., Y-ZIP and Y-ZINB) are proposed for the monitoring of high-quality processes. Usually, with the defect counts, few covariates are also measured in the process, and the generalized linear model based on the ZIP and ZINB distributions are used to estimate their parameters. In this study, we have designed monitoring structures (i.e., PR-ZIP and PR-ZINB) based on the ZIP and ZINB regression models which will provide the monitoring of defect counts by accounting the single covariate. Further, proposed model-based charts are compared with the existing data-based charts. The simulation study is designed to access the performance of monitoring methods in terms of run length properties and a case study on the number of flight delays between Atlanta and Orlando during 2012–2014 is also provided to highlight the importance of the stated research.     

基于混合模式快速电荷平衡的神经刺激器

设计实现了一种可用于脊髓神经刺激器的多通道大电流神经刺激器。提出将电极短接和插入短电流脉冲相结合的混合模式,在大电流下,能更加快速地实现电荷平衡。电路设计上,将ADC动态比较器的回踢噪声消除技术应用于神经刺激器,使得动态比较器在输入压差较小时能够输出正确的比较结果,从而将电极上残留电压保持在更安全的范围内。基于CSMC 0.25 μm BCD工艺进行设计与仿真,结果表明,在单向且最大刺激电流为4 mA、刺激脉宽为60 μs、刺激周期为750 μs的条件下,该15 V、16路神经刺激器能实现±50 mV安全电压的有源电荷平衡。