Perspectives on SnSe-based thin film solar cells: a comprehensive review

Currently, selenium (Se)-based compound semiconductors (CISe, CIGSe and CZTSe) are considered as the active materials in the photovoltaic world. However, these materials exhibit couple of issues related to stoichiometry maintenance and scarcity of their constituent elements (In, Ga), which limit their massive production for future energy demands. These issues could be rectified by introducing a non-toxic, inexpensive and earth-abundant binary material. One such material is a tin monoselenide (SnSe), which exhibits a high chemical stability along with attractive physical properties namely, suitable band gap (1.3 eV), high absorption coefficient (10⁵ cm^?1) and p-type conductivity. These properties indicate SnSe as a competitive substitute in place of conventional absorbers in thin film solar cells. Despite of its remarkable properties, only a few reports were published on the fabrication of SnSe-based solar cells with poor efficiency (≤1 %). This indicates a need to review on the physical properties of SnSe and its device structures in a deeper sense. In this context, the present review describes the different methods of preparation of SnSe films and their physical properties along with the details of photovoltaic device fabrication. We highlighted the different factors that are limiting the efficiency of SnSe solar cells, and a few suggestions were included to overcome these problems for further improvement of these cells. This review will enrich and stimulate the readers to further investigate the growth of SnSe thin films and their devices, for the development of >20 % efficient SnSe solar cells.     

Performance evaluation of an industrial solar dryer in Indian scenario: a techno-economic and environmental analysis

Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy - Food product drying is used to keep food products preserved for a long period and reduce post-harvest losses. Many industries dealing with food drying...     

Ecofriendly geopolymer concrete: a comprehensive review

Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy - After ordinary Portland cement (OPC) concrete, geopolymer concrete (GPC) is the most advanced form of concrete. GPC has many advantages including...     

Potential fabric-reinforced composites: a comprehensive review

Journal of Materials Science - Fabric-based laminated composites are used considerably for multifaceted applications in the automotive, transportation, defense, and structural construction sectors....     

Performance evaluation of a fluid temperature-compensated single sensor constant temperature anemometer

The performance of a hot-wire anemometer configuration is affected by variation in the fluid temperature. The classical temperature compensation techniques in such anemometers employ two sensors. The performance of a temperature-compensated hot-wire anemometer configuration, using a single sensor alternating between two operating temperatures, and proposed for constant fluid velocity, is investigated under conditions of time-varying fluid velocity. The measurement error introduced is quantified and can be practically eliminated using a low-pass digital filter.     

Performance evaluation of a hybrid linear ion trap/orbitrap mass spectrometer

Design and performance of a novel hybrid mass spectrometer is described. It couples a linear ion trap mass spectrometer to an orbitrap mass analyzer via an rf-only trapping quadrupole with a curved axis. The latter injects pulsed ion beams into a rapidly changing electric field in the orbitrap wherein they are trapped at high kinetic energies around an inner electrode. Image current detection is subsequently performed after a stable electrostatic field is achieved. Fourier transformation of the acquired transient allows wide mass range detection with high resolving power, mass accuracy, and dynamic range. The entire instrument operates in LC/MS mode (1 spectrum/s) with nominal mass resolving power of 60,000 and uses automatic gain control to provide high-accuracy mass measurements, within 2 ppm using internal standards and within 5 ppm with external calibration. The maximum resolving power exceeds 100,000 (fwhm). Rapid, automated data-dependent capabilities enable real-time acquisition of up to three high-mass accuracy MS/MS spectra per second.     

OR/MS journals evaluation based on a refined PageRank method: an updated and more comprehensive review

The purpose of this research is to furnish the OR/MS research community with an updated assessment of the discipline’s journals set with refinements that also highlight the various characteristics of OR/MS journals. More specifically, we apply a refined PageRank method initially proposed by Xu et al. (2011) to evaluate the top 31 OR/MS journals for 2010, and report our findings. We also report the shifts in the rankings that span 5 years, from 2006 to 2010. We observe that Manufacturing and Service Operations Management, indexed by the SCI only in 2008, is a specialized journal that is consistently highly regarded within the discipline. The rankings also suggest that Management Science is more established as a generalized journal as it has more external impact. In general, our ranking results correlate with expert opinions, and we also observe, report and discuss some interesting patterns that have emerged over the past 5 years from 2006 to 2010.     

基于模糊综合评价法的内蒙古达里诺尔湖水环境质量评价

采用模糊综合评价法对内蒙古达里诺尔湖水质现状进行评价,利用2008年达里诺尔湖水质实际监测数据,确定了评价因子和各因子的权重,建立了评价因子的隶属函数和模糊矩阵,最后对达里诺尔湖水质现状进行综合评价。评价结果符合实际情况,说明模糊综合评价法用于达里诺尔湖水质评价的合理性和可靠性,并对控制湖泊水质污染提供了一定的理论依据。     

Line-focusing concentrating solar collector-based power plants: a review

Concentrated solar power (CSP) plant is an emerging technology among different renewable energy sources. Parabolic trough collector (PTC)-based CSP plant, using synthetic or organic oil as a heat-transfer fluid, is the most advanced technology. About 87 % of the operational capacities of CSP plants worldwide are based on PTC technology. Direct steam-generating linear Fresnel reflector (LFR) systems have been developed as a cost-effective alternative to PTC systems. Line-focusing concentrating solar collectors (PTC and LFR), with single-axis tracking, are simple in design and easy to operate. Prior to the detailed design of a CSP plant, it is necessary to finalize type of the solar field, type of the power-generating cycle, overall plant configuration, sizing of the solar field and the power block, etc. The optimal design of a CSP plant minimizes the levelized cost of energy for a given site. In this paper, a detailed review of important design parameters which affect the design of line-focusing concentrating solar collector-based power plants is presented. This includes parameters for solar collector field design, receiver, heat-transfer fluid, thermal energy storage, power-generating cycle, sizing and configuration of the plant, etc. This review may provide a reference for designing CSP plants. Future research directions are also identified.     

Temperature-responsive hybrid microgels for catalytic applications: a review

Temperature-responsive hybrid microgels have been extensively used as catalyst for degradation of toxic chemicals in the last 10 years. Various architectures of such kind of hybrid microgels with tunable catalytic activity have been reported in literature. Recent research progress in synthesis, characterisation and catalytic applications of various hybrid microgels based on N-isopropylacrylamide has been described critically in this article. Mechanism of catalysis and factors affecting the rate of catalysis by hybrid microgels have been discussed in the light of research done in this area. Possible future studies for further development in this area have been also predicted in this article.     

All-optical control of a single plasmonic nanoantenna-ITO hybrid

We demonstrate experimentally picosecond all-optical control of a single plasmonic nanoantenna embedded in indium tin oxide (ITO). We identify a picosecond response of the antenna-ITO hybrid system, which is distinctly different from transient bleaching observed for gold antennas on a nonconducting SiO(2) substrate. Our experimental results can be explained by the large free-carrier nonlinearity of ITO, which is enhanced by plasmon-induced hot-electron injection from the gold nanoantenna into the conductive oxide. The combination of tunable antenna-ITO hybrids with nanoscale plasmonic energy transfer mechanisms, as demonstrated here, opens a path for new ultrafast devices to produce nanoplasmonic switching and control.     

Performance evaluation of single and multi-class production systems using an approximating queuing network

Performance evaluation, and in particular cycle time estimation, is critical to optimise production plans in high-tech manufacturing industries. This paper develops a new aggregation model based on queuing network, so-called queue-based aggregation (QAG) model, to estimate the cycle time in a production system. Multiple workstations in serial and job-shop configurations are aggregated into a single-step workstation. The parameters of the aggregated workstation are approximated based on the parameters of the original workstations. Numerical experiments indicate that the proposed QAG model is computationally efficient and yields fairly accurate results when compared to other aggregation approaches in the literature.     

Preparation and characteristics of hybrid ZnO-polymer solar cells

We demonstrate a hybrid solar cell which was made by blending nanocrystalline ZnO (nc-ZnO) and conjugated polymer regioregular poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) as the active layer of the solar cell. It can be seen that the efficiency of this new type of solar cells obviously varied as the size and morphology of ZnO nanostructures. The short-circuit photocurrent, fill factor, and power conversion efficiency were enhanced while the smaller nc-ZnO was utilized in such a device.     

Transcritical carbon dioxide microchannel heat pump water heaters: Part II - System simulation and optimization

This paper presents the development of a transcritical CO₂ heat pump water heating system model incorporating analytical heat exchanger models and an empirical compressor model. This study investigated the effects of a suction line heat exchanger (SLHX) and once-through versus recirculating water heating schemes. The once-through systems outperformed the recirculating systems by 10% for the system without an SLHX and 15% with an SLHX. However, a gas cooler twice as large is required. The SLHX was shown to benefit system performance at higher evaporator temperatures with improvements of 16.5% for the once-through and 4% for the recirculating systems. This study can be used to improve the design of microchannel based transcritical CO₂ heat pumps; evaluate the impact of varying water inlet temperature, desired outlet temperature and evaporation temperature on system performance; and quantify the effect of differential diurnal electricity rates on system operating costs for these different operation schemes.     

Performance and dye-degrading bacteria isolation of a hybrid membrane process

Textile dyeing wastewater contains harmful compounds, which are toxic to both marine organisms and human beings if it discharged into an aquatic environmental without suitable treatment. In this study, the wastewater containing the azo dye, Reactive Black 5 (RB5), was partially treated in an anaerobic sequencing batch reactor which was further treated either in an aerobic membrane bioreactors (AOMBR) or in combined aerobic membrane bioreactor/reverse osmosis (AOMBR/RO) process. The results showed that in the anaerobic sequencing batch reactor the RB5 dye was degraded to form aromatic amine intermediate metabolites, which were further mineralized in the AOMBR. It was also observed that although all effluents from the AOMBR and AOMBR/RO processes met the Taiwan EPA's effluent criteria, irrespective of which membranes were used in the aerobic tank, the effluent from the AOMBR/RO process met the criteria for reuse for toilet flushing, landscaping, irrigation, and cooling water purposes, where as the AOMBR effluent only met the criteria for cooling water due to incomplete color removal. Five anaerobic high dye-degrading bacteria were isolated, which were identified to be the same species of Lactococcus lactis by 16S rRNA sequencing. The L. lactis showed complete degradation of RB5 and further studies showed that it can also able to degrade Reactive Red 120 and Reactive Yellow 84 efficiently within 6 h.     

Cyclic scheduling of a single hoist in extended electroplating lines: a comprehensive integer programming solution

This paper studies the single-hoist cyclic scheduling problem in electroplating systems with two extended features. One extension is that the products must visit some processing tanks more than once (multi-function tanks). Another is that more than one identical tank is used at some stages. These extensions are common in practical electroplating lines and can increase the lines' processing capacity. However, they make the hoist scheduling problem more complicated and little research has been done to optimize the hoist moves in such extended practical systems. In this paper, we develop a comprehensive mixed integer linear programming model to find optimal solutions to the single-hoist cyclic scheduling problem for electroplating lines with these extensions. Examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the model in different types of problems.     

室内环境舒适度综合评价理论研究及测评系统设计

从分析室内环境的具体含义出发,建立了室内环境与室内舒适度之间的桥梁。从人因工程学和心理学的角度,归纳分析了涉及室内环境的人机环境系统所包含的重要因素的来源、危害以及对室内人员的直接影响,进而将改进的韦伯费希纳定律评价模型、层次分析模型和属性识别模型相结合,从室内环境的分级标准、室内环境舒适度各级评价指标的权重以及综合评价机制三个方面,构建了一套较为完善的室内环境舒适度综合评价理论。在此基础上,利用STM8S207单片机、稳压电源、液晶显示屏、气体传感器等硬件及相关软件,设计了一套能够实时检测、评价、显示、报警、存储室内环境各要素指标的舒适度测评系统,该系统在实测中取得了预期效果。