Electrochromic Properties of Sputtered Ti-Doped WO3 Films

Ti-doped WO3 films were prepared by the mid-frequency dual-target magnetron sputtering method. The structure and electrochromic properties of the Ti-doped WO3 films were analysed by X-Ray diffraction （XRD）, Raman spectroscopy, spectrophotometer, cyclic chronoam- perometry and atomic force microscopy （AFM）. The results indicate that the erystallinity decrease after the doping of titanium, the channels for ion injection and extraction increase, the responding speed with 5.1% titanium doped becomes faster, and its circle life increases more than four times compared with the undoped WO3 film. In the coloured state, the W-O-W bonds decrease, but the W = O bonds increase. Since the W-O-W bonds break down for Li＋ ions＇ injection and more W = O bonds form, it is more convenient to inject Li＋ ions into the Ti-doped film than undoped film because more W-O-W bonds break down in the coloured state.     

Sterilization of Cotton Fabrics Using Plasma Treatment

Microbial contamination induces surface deformations and strength degradation of cotton fabrics by invading deeply into the fibers.In this study,the sterilization effects of low pressure plasmas on bacteria-inoculated cotton fabrics were investigated.Oxygen plasma treatment completely sterilized the cotton fabrics inoculated with various concentrations of staphylococcus aureus.Also,the influence of plasma treatment on physical properties of fabrics was examined.It was found that the plasma treatment did not affect ultimate tensile strength and surface morphology of the fabrics because it took advantage of relatively low plasma temperature.     

Treatment of Bone Waste Using Thermal Plasma Technology

Daily meat consumption produces a lot of bone waste, and dumped bone waste without treatment would result in environmental hazards. Conventional treatment methods of waste bones have some disadvantages. Herein, an investigation of bone waste treated using thermal plasma technology is presented. A high-temperature plasma torch operated at 25.2 kW was used to treat bone waste for seven minutes. The bone waste was finally changed into vitric matter and lost 2/3 of its weight after the treatment. The process was highly efficient, economical, convenient, and fuel-free. This method could be used as an alternative for disposal of bone waste, small infectious animals, hazardous hospital waste, etc.     

Preliminary Study of Thermal Treatment of Coke Wastewater Sludge Using Plasma Torch

Thermal plasma was applied for the treatment of coke wastewater sludge derived from the steel industry in order to investigate the feasibility of the safe treatment and energy recovery of the sludge. A 30 k W plasma torch system was applied to study the vitrification and gas production of coke wastewater sludge. Toxicity leaching results indicated that the sludge treated via the thermal plasma process converted into a vitrified slag which resisted the leaching of heavy metals. CO2 was utilized as working gas to study the production and heat energy of the syngas. The heating value of the gas products by thermal plasma achieved 8.43 k J/L, indicating the further utilization of the gas products. Considering the utilization of the syngas and recovery heat from the gas products, the estimated treatment cost of coke wastewater sludge via plasma torch was about 0.98 CNY/kg sludge in the experiment. By preliminary economic analysis, the dehydration cost takes an important part of the total sludge treatment cost. The treatment cost of the coke wastewater sludge with 50 wt.% moisture was calculated to be about 1.45 CNY/kg sludge dry basis. The treatment cost of the coke wastewater sludge could be effectively controlled by decreasing the water content of the sludge. These findings suggest that an economic dewatering pretreatment method could be combined to cut the total treatment cost in an actual treatment process.     

Experiment and Analysis on the Treatment of Gaseous Benzene Using Pulsed Corona Discharge Plasma

An experiment and analysis on removal of gaseous benzene by pulse corona inducedplasma is presented in this article. Important parameters effecting removal efficiency have been investigated, such as pulse peak voltage, pulse frequency, gas inlet concentration, gas flow rate and reactor temperature. The result shows that the removal efficiency increases with the increase in pulse peak voltage, pulse frequency and reactor temperature, but decreases in the rise of gas inlet concentration and gas flow rate. On the condition of Vp = 36 kV, f = 80 Hz, C = 1440 mg/m^3 and Q = 640 ml/min, the largest removal efficiency is 98%. Finally, the reacted products are qualitatively analysed and the reaction processes are deduced in combination with plasma-chemistry theory.     

Surface Treatment of Polypropylene Powders Using a Plasma Reactor with a Stirrer

A radio frequency argon plasma reactor with a stirrer was employed for the surface treatment of polypropylene (PP) powders. The changes in the superficial contact angle and the superficial composition of the un-treated and treated PP powders were analyzed by means of water contact angle (WCA) measurement, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR). The water contact angle changed from the original value of 130.2° before plasma treatment to the value of 73.6° after treatment for 5 minutes. With the increase in plasma treating time, there were a decrease in the water contact angle and an increase in the content of oxygen containing polar functional groups (i.e., C-O, C=O and O-C=O). Both XPS and ATR-FTIR results indicated that the plasma treatment led to the formation of oxygen containing polar functional groups due to oxidation on the surface of the PP powders, and the trend of variation of the water contact angle with plasma treating time was related to the concentration of oxygen atom on the treated PP powders surface. Furthermore, the aging of the plasma-treated PP powders was investigated.     

Oyster Shell Recycling and Plasma Bone Waste Treatment Using Pyrolysis

Investigations on the recycling plasma pyrolysis technique are presented in 25 kW was employed for the experiments. of oyster shells and bone waste treatment using the this paper. A arc based plasma torch operated at Fresh oyster shells were recycled using the plasma torch to convert them to a useful product such as CaO. Bone waste was treated to remove the infectious organic part and to vitrify the inorganic part. The time required for treatment in both cases was significantly short. Significant reduction in the weight of the samples was observed in both cases.     

Plasma Density Influence on the Properties of a Plasma Filled Rod Pinch Diode

The rod pinch diode is perfect as a source of accelerators for flash X-ray radiography by virtue of a small and stable spot.But it is not suitable for intensive current drivers because of high diode impendence of 40~60Ω.However,by employing pre-filled plasma into diode prior to the driving current,the diode impendence can be efectively reduced.Plasma density plays an important role in this process,especially for sheath formation and space charge current in the diode.Analysis and simulation results show that a proper range of plasma density could be 1015~1016cm-3.     

Effect of Internal Antenna Coil Power on the Plasma Parameters in13.56 MHz/60 MHz Dual-Frequency Sputtering

The plasma property of a hybrid ICP/sputtering discharge driven by 13.56 MHz/60 MHz power sources was investigated by Langmuir probe measurement. For the pure sputtering discharge, the low electron density and ion flux, the rise of floating potential and plasma potential with increasing power, as well as the bi-Maxwellian distribution of electron en- ergy distributions （EEDFs） were obtained. The assistance of ICP discharge led to the effective increases of electron density and ion flux, the suppression of rise of floating potential and plasma potential, as well as the change of EEDFs from bi-Maxwellian distribution into Maxwellian dis- tribution. The increase of electron density and ion flux, and the EEDFs evolution were related to the effective electron heating by the induced electric field.     

Treatment of Invasive Marine Species on Board by Using Micro-gap Discharge Plasma

A pilot-scale experiment of 20t/h for the treatment of ship＇s ballast water is reported in this paper. When the concentration of the dissolved OH. was 0.68 mg/L during the experiment, the rate of destroying bacteria, mono-algae, protozoan reached 100% within 2.67 s. The effect of hydroxyl radicals on biochemical processes was also studied. The attenuation rate of photosynthesis pigment was 100%. And the main reason for the cells＇ death was the strong destruction of the monose, amylose, protein, DNA and RNA in the cells. As an advanced oxidation method, the procedure can destroy invasive marine species when a ship is in the process of discharging its ballast water.     

Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of CrN Films Deposited by Inductively Coupled Plasma Enhanced Radio Frequency Magnetron Sputtering

CrN films have been synthesized on Si（100） wafer by inductively coupled plasma （ICP）-enhanced radio frequency （RF） magnetron sputtering. The effects of ICP power on microstructure, crystal orientation, nanohardness and stress of the CrN films have been investigated. With the increase of ICP power, the current density at substrate increases and the films exhibit denser structure, while the DC self-bias of target and the deposition rate of films decrease. The films change from crystal structure to amorphous structure with the increase of ICP power. The measured nanohardness and the compressive stress of films reach the topmost at ICP power of 150 W and 200 W, respectively. The mechanical properties of films show strong dependence on the crystalline structure and the density influenced by the ICP power.     

Polymer Surface Treatment by Atmospheric Pressure Low Temperature Surface Discharge Plasma： Its Characteristics and Comparison with Low Pressure Oxygen Plasma Treatment

The polymer treatment with a low-temperature plasma jet generated on the atmospheric pressure surface discharge （SD） plasma is performed. The change of the surface property over time, in comparison with low pressure oxygen （O2） plasma treatment, is examined. As one compares the treatment by atmospheric pressure plasma to that by the low pressure O2 plasma of PS （polystyrene） the treatment effects were almost in complete agreement. However, when the atmospheric pressure plasma was used for PP（polypropylene）, it produced remarkable hydrophilic effects.     

Influence of Chemical Precleaning on the Plasma Treatment Efficiency of Aluminum by RF Plasma Pencil

This paper is aimed to show the influence of initial chemical pretreatment prior to subsequent plasma activation of aluminum surfaces.The results of our study showed that the state of the topmost surface layer（i.e.the surface morphology and chemical groups）of plasma modified aluminum significantly depends on the chemical precleaning.Commonly used chemicals（isopropanol,trichlorethane,solution of Na OH in deionized water）were used as precleaning agents.The plasma treatments were done using a radio frequency driven atmospheric pressure plasma pencil developed at Masaryk University,which operates in Ar,Ar/O₂ gas mixtures.The effectiveness of the plasma treatment was estimated by the wettability measurements,showing high wettability improvement already after 0.3 s treatment.The effects of surface cleaning（hydrocarbon removal）,surface oxidation and activation（generation of OH groups）were estimated using infrared spectroscopy.The changes in the surface morphology were measured using scanning electron microscopy.Optical emission spectroscopy measurements in the near-to-surface region with temperature calculations showed that plasma itself depends on the sample precleaning procedure.     

Cleaning of HT-7 Tokamak Exposed First Mirrors by Radio Frequency Magnetron Sputtering Plasma

The stainless steel （SS） first mirror pre-exposed in the deposition-dominated envi- ronment of the HT-7 tokamak was cleaned in the newly built radio frequency （RF） magnetron sputtering plasma device. The deposition layer on the FM surface formed during the exposure was successfully removed by argon plasma with a RF power of about 80 W and a gas pressure of 0.087 Pa for 30 min. The total reflectivity of the mirrors was recovered up to 90% in the wavelength range of 300-800 nm, while the diffuse reflectivity showed a little increase, which was attributed to the increase of surface roughness in sputtering, and residual contaminants. The FMs made from single crystal materials could help to achieve a desired recovery of specular reflectivity in the future.     

Propagation Properties of Electromagnetic Wave in a Plasma Slab

In this paper, the calculated results about the propagation properties of electromag-netic wave in a plasma slab are described. The relationship of the propagation properties with frequencies of electromagnetic wave, and parameters of plasma (electron temperature, electron density, dimensionless collision frequency and the size of the plasma slab) is analyzed.     

Inactivation of Escherichia Coli Using Remote Low Temperature Glow Discharge Plasma

Low-temperature plasma is distinguished as a developing approach for sterilization which can deal with and overcome those problems such as thermal sensitivity and destruction by heat, formation of toxic by-products, higher costs and inefficiency in performances, caused by conventional methods. In this study, an experimental investigation was undertaken to characterize the effects of the operational parameters, such as treating time, discharge power and gas flow rate, of remote glow discharge air plasma. The results show that the inactivation of Escherichia coli can reach above 99.99% in less than 60 seconds and the optimal operational conditions for treating time, discharge power and gas flow rate were： 40 s, 80 W and 60 cm^3/min, respectively. The contribution of UV radiation during plasma germ deactivation is very limited.     

Application of CCD Cameras to Investigations of Mixing on Boundaries of a Thermal Plasma Jet

Mixing of a thermal plasma jet with the surrounding atmosphere was studied using two CCD cameras （PCO SensiCam） situated detecting simultaneously the radiation of argon and nitrogen. The evaluation of image differences between two records showed that the location of regions on plasma jet boundaries characterised by stronger nitrogen radiation changes with the plasma flow rate. Close-to-laminar flow results in a small mixing rate and consequently low nitrogen optical emission on plasma jet boundaries. The increase of the flow rate leads to the formation of a relatively thick and stable layer on the boundaries characterised by strong nitrogen radiation. Further enhancement of the flow rate results in the formation of unstable regions of excited nitrogen molecules moving along the jet.     

Decomposition of Nitrogen Trifluoride Using Low Power Arc Plasma

The low power arc plasma is characterized by extremely high enthalpy and temperature and it is easy to generate and control,and thus thermal decomposition process based on the plasma torch is receiving a great attention for decomposing non-degradable greenhouse gases.In order to elevate the economic feasibility,the efects of input power,waste gas flow rate and additive gases on the destruction and removal efciency(DRE) of NF3 are examined.Specific energy density(SED) deceases as the flow rate increases,and accordingly,the DRE is reduced.The DRE is basically determined by the specific energy density.The highest DRE of NF3 was 97% for the waste gas flow rate of 100 L/min at a low input power level of 2 kW with the help of hydrogen additional gas.The inlet and outlet concentration of NF3 was analyzed using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy(FT-IR) for DRE of NF3 evaluation.As a result,large amount of NF3 can be efciently decomposed by low power arc plasma systems.     

Investigations of the Sheath Effect on the Resultant Magnetic Field of a Cylindrical Monopole Plasma Antenna

The functionality of the plasma antenna has been narrowed to types and brand names only.The physics of its operation has been neglected and has stagnated technological innovations.The magnetic field in the sheath and plasma were investigated.Notable specifications were worked out in the proposed improved cylindrical monopole plasma antenna.The occurrence of femto spin demagnetization was discovered between the duration of switch on and switch off of the antenna.This phenomenon seems transient because magnetization is highest at the switch on/off point.     

Plasma Treatment of Aluminum Using a Surface Barrier Discharge Operated in Air and Nitrogen: Parameter Optimization and Related Effects

This paper presents the results of aluminum surface treatment by diffuse coplanar surface barrier discharge. The goals are to study the effectiveness of the plasma treatment and the dependence of its efficiency on operation parameters, such as sample-to-electrode distance, treatment time or gas atmosphere. Three types of aluminum materials (bricks, sheets and thin films) were tested to ensure the reliability of the treatment. The changes in the surface properties were characterized by the surface free energy, atomic force microscopy, attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR FTIR) and X-ray photoelectron spec- troscopy (XPS). The influence of aging effect on the treatment was also measured and discussed.