Fatigue resistance and damage mechanisms of 2D woven SiC/SiC composites at high temperatures

Fatigue resistance and damage mechanisms of 2D woven SiC/SiC composites at high temperatures were investigated in this research. Fatigue behavior tests were performed at 1200℃ and 1000°C at 10 Hz and stress ratio of 0.1 for maximum stresses ranging from 80 to 120 MPa, and the fatigue run-out could be defined as 10⁶ cycles. Evolution of the cumulative displacement and normalized modulus with cycles was analyzed for each fatigue condition. Fatigue run-out was achieved at 80 MPa and 1000°C. It could be found that the cycle lifetimes of the composites decreased sharply with the increasing maximum stress and temperature conditions significantly affected the fatigue performance under matrix cracking stress. The cumulative displacement showed no noticeable increase before 1000 cycles and the modulus of the failed specimens decreased before fracture. The retained properties of composites that achieved fatigue run-out, as well as the microstructures, were characterized in order to understand the fatigue behavior and failure mechanisms. The composites exhibited similar fracture morphology with matrix crack extension and glass phase oxidation formation under different conditions. In general, the high-temperature fatigue damage and failure of composites could be affected by combination of stress damage and oxidative embrittlement.     

The capillary and thermal performance of the porous silicon nitride ceramics with nearly spherical pore structure

The capillary and thermal performance of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics with nearly spherical pore structure has been investigated by altering the addition and diameter of pore-forming agent polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) in this work. An exponential model is used to evaluate the liquid uptake capacity of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics. Porous Si₃N₄ ceramics fabricated by 5 μm PMMA with 40 wt.% addition possess the lowest capillary time constant and show the best capillary performance owing to the perfect balance between friction resistance and capillary force. The thermal conductivity of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics is significantly impacted by their porosity. Alexander model with an exponent of .96 is suitable for predicting the thermal conductivity of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics due to its R-squared up to .99. Moreover, with the addition and diameter of PMMA decrease, the flexural strength of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics increases. These results support the application of porous Si₃N₄ ceramics in the field of mass and heat transfer.     

Preparation of oil-water separation network based on the novel strategies of SiO2 ceramic micro-nano structure and PDMS modification

In this study, we adopted the novel strategies of the soot template method to construct SiO₂ ceramic micro-nano structure surface and polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) modification to reduce the surface energy. We fabricated a superhydrophobic/superoleophilic NS-PDMS oil–water separation screen by depositing coarse nano-SiO₂ ceramic on the surface of 100-mesh stainless-steel screen used as a substrate under the soot template method, which reduced the surface energy with PDMS. The fabricated NS-PDMS screen exhibited excellent superhydrophobic and self-cleaning properties. In particular, the superhydrophobic properties were stably maintained under various harsh conditions. Overall, the screen manifested self-cleaning ability for various water-containing stains, for example, coffee, milk, beer, and soy sauce. The mechanically damaged screen surface still retained its high roughness, and re-modification with PDMS could recover the superhydrophobic surface and oil–water separation performance. This suggests the re-use potential of the damaged NS-PDMS screen, which is vital for cost reduction and resource recycling. We believe that our study makes a significant contribution to the literature, because the fabricated NS-PDMS screen is superhydrophobic, superoleophilic, resistant toward several water-based solutions, chemically and mechanically stable under certain conditions, and can be reused with modification and repair after damage. Therefore, this screen can be broadly used as an oil–water separator.     

Adsorption thermodynamics of CO2 on nitrogen-doped biochar synthesized with moderate temperature ionic liquid

The purpose of this work was to investigate the thermodynamic characteristics of carbon dioxide (CO₂) adsorption on a promising nitrogen-doped biochar at constant temperature and isopiestic pressure. The biochar was prepared as a CO₂ adsorbent based on catalytic pyrolysis of pristine coconut shells using urea as the nitrogen source and moderate temperature ionic liquid as a catalyst. The results showed that CO₂ adsorption on the biochar was a spontaneous, dominantly physical, exothermic, and entropy decrement process that could be well described by the slip model and the dual-site Langmuir model. Those thermodynamic parameters, including interface potential, exhibited a series of interesting tendencies with the changes in adsorption temperature and pressure. Under the conditions of 273 K and 100 kPa, the adsorption capacity and the interface potential were 4.6 mmol/g and −16.7 J/g, respectively. And the site energy ranged from 2.57 to 5.13 kJ/mol in the test conditions, which became narrow with increasing temperature. The temperature exhibited positive effects on interface potential, enthalpy change, entropy change, enthalpy change, internal energy change but negative effects on adsorption capacity, Gibbs free energy change, and Helmholtz free energy change. Interestingly, the pressure exhibited the opposite effect trends. The peak pressure with maximum temperature effect at a given temperature and the peak temperature with maximum pressure effect at a given pressure were found to exist for some thermodynamic parameters. These exhibited a different but significantly beneficial perspective to understand the mass and energy transfer during CO₂ adsorption on the biochar at constant temperature and isopiestic pressure, which have rarely been reported before.     

Effects of mechanical recycling on optical properties and microstructure of recycled high-density polyethylene pellets and bottles

The demand for recycling high-density polyethylene (HDPE) utilizing mechanical recycling technologies is currently felt strongly by both society and industry. However, thermal oxidation of the polymer during the recycling process may lead to irreversible changes in the material properties of recycled high-density polyethylene (rHDPE). The effects of mechanical recycling on the optical characteristics and microstructure of rHDPE pellets and bottles were investigated in this study. The results revealed that the apparent color of the rHDPE became more yellow and gray compared to the virgin HDPE (vHDPE), and showed a signal at 670–680 nm in the solar reflectance spectrum. The thermal oxidation of rHDPE considerably raised the absorption intensities of carbonyl, ester, and hydroxyl groups in attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectrum. In addition, the presence of carbonyl and hydroxyl unsaturated chemicals might make it challenging to recognize the distinctive peaks of vHDPE in the ultraviolet–visible diffuse reflectance (UV–Vis-DIR) spectra at wavelengths less than 400 nm. Thermal oxidation of rHDPE was also confirmed in the C OH, CO, and O CO valence structures of C1s and O1s. A characteristic valence band (VB) profile at 25 eV can be used as the recognizable information for the oxidation of rHDPE. The microstructure of the surface of rHDPE pellets exhibited rough and uneven morphological defects. The higher recycled content made rHDPE bottles' surface morphology rougher and their cross-section microstructure thinner and more porous than vHDPE bottles.     

Random forest models to predict the densities and surface tensions of deep eutectic solvents

The use of machine learning in physicochemical properties modeling has great potential to accelerate the application of emerging materials. Deep eutectic solvents (DESs), an emerging class of solvents, are promising for applications as inexpensive “designer” solvents. Due to the unique structure of DESs, the hydrogen bond donor and hydrogen bond acceptor can be varied to create a mixture with specific physical properties. In this work, we proposed random forest (RF) models to predict the densities and the surface tensions of DESs, which are essential for the separation process. In the proposed models, the structural information and the calculated critical properties were used as two different types of features, respectively. The results demonstrate that the RF models predict the densities and surface tensions of DESs with high accuracy, with absolute average relative deviation (AARD%) less than 1% in the prediction of density and 3% in the prediction of surface tension.     

Colour and tolerance of preferred skin colours on digital photographic images

Skin‐tone has been an active research subject in photographic colour reproduction. There is a consistent conclusion that preferred skin colours are different from actual skin colours. However, preferred skin colours found from different studies are somewhat different. To have a solid understanding of skin colour preference of digital photographic images, psychophysical experiments were conducted to determine a preferred skin colour region and to study inter‐observer variation and tolerance of preferred skin colours. In the first experiment, a preferred skin colour region is searched on the entire skin colour region. A set of nine predetermined colour centers uniformly sampled within the skin colour ellipse in CIELAB a*b* diagram is used to morph skin colours of test images. Preferred skin colour centers are found through the experiment. In a second experiment, a twice denser sampling of nine skin colour centers around the preferred skin colour center determined in the first experiment are generated to repeat the experiment using a different set of test images and judged by a different panel of observers. The results from both experiments are compared and final preferred skin colour centers are obtained. Variations and hue and chroma tolerances of the observer skin colour preference are also analysed. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 2013     

Direct stamping and capillary flow patterning of solution processable piezoelectric polyvinylidene fluoride films

It is well known that the potential applications of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) mainly come from the piezoelectricity and ferroelectricity of its polar β phase. Thus, we have investigated the effect of different preparation conditions namely evaporation temperature, type of solvent and additive to enhance the β crystal structures of PVDF thin film. Subsequently, facile and direct soft lithography technique; direct stamping and capillary flow were employed to demonstrate good pattern transfer of PVDF thin films. The piezoelectricity of the microstructure was characterized using piezoresponse force microscopy (PFM) where fairly good piezoresponse was obtained without further processing procedures i.e., annealing or applied pressure/electric field. As such, our solution processable and direct patterning of PVDF techniques offer facile and promising route to produce arrays of isolated microstructures with improved piezoelectric functionality.     

Hydrodynamics and Transport Processes during Centrifugal Short‐Path Distillation

To simulate the centrifugal short‐path distillation process, both two phases and interfacial transport are taken into account simultaneously for the first time. A new computational fluid dynamics model based on the volume‐of‐fluid and species transport methods is built up to analyze the detailed flow and transfer characteristics. A binary system with dibutyl phthalate‐dibutyl sebacate (DBP‐DBS) is used as an example for the investigation with both numerical and experimental methods. The residence time and the effects of operating parameters such as evaporator temperature and feed flow rate are explored comparatively. The simulation result for the liquid‐film thickness shows a satisfactory agreement with literature data. On the basis of the simulation results, we may also obtain detailed characteristics of the heat and mass transfer such as gradients in temperature and concentration and the liquid overall mass transfer coefficient.     

Simulation study of the morphologies of energetic block copolymers based on glycidyl azide polymer

The morphologies of energetic block copolymers based on glycidyl azide polymer (GAP) were investigated by dissipative particle dynamics simulation. The results show that the morphologies could be used to qualitatively explain the variation in the mechanical properties of poly(azidomethyl ethylene oxide‐b‐butadiene) diblock copolymers (DBCs) and that bicontinuous (B) phases could effectively improve the mechanical properties. Among our designed DBCs, only GAP–acrylic acid, GAP–acrylonitrile, and GAP–vinyl amide could form B phases at very narrow regions of GAP contents. The triblock copolymers with their linear topologies could maintain the B phases in the broader region of GAP contents. We hope these results can provide help in the design and synthesis of new energetic block copolymers. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci., 2013