Nd: Bi4Ge3O12 crystal growth by czochralski method

Nd-doped Bi₄Ge₃O₁₂ (Nd:BGO) crystals were successfully grown in the auto-diameter control system equipped with a frequency weighing sensor with the Czochralski method. The Nd³⁺ ion doping level was varied from 0.25 to 2.5 at.%. The crystals were transparent and of light purple color, with a typical size of about 20 mm in diameter and 50 mm in length. The effective distribution coefficient (k_eff) of Nd³⁺ ion was about 0.957 irrespective of concentration, and the Nd³⁺ ions were distributed homogeneously throughout the crystal. The doping concentration (p_i) of active ion in Nd:BGO crystal was 2.54x10²⁰ ions/cm³, which is higher than that in the Nd:YAG crystal. Therefore, the Nd:BGO crystal was judged to be more suitable for the laser diode pumping microchip laser material where size reduction was desirable.     

Low operating currents of monolithically integrated 780 nm/650 nm-band self-sustained pulsating lasers with silicon nitride current blocking layers

The characteristics of monolithically integrated 780 nm/650 nm-band self-sustained pulsating (SSP) lasers with silicon nitride current blocking layers are reported. The record low operating current of 60 mA at 5 mW, 70/spl deg/C and a characteristic temperature of 90 K over 20 to 70/spl deg/C were obtained from the 650 nm-band SSP lasers. The attenuation factor of the visibility was observed to be as low as 0.3, which ensures SSP operations of the dual-mode lasers.     

Stretchable,Transparent Zinc Oxide Thin Film Transistors

Stretchable and transparent thin film transistors (TFTs) with intrisically brittle oxide semiconductors are built using a wavy structural configuration that can provide high flexibility and stretchability. After device fabrication procedures including high temperature annealing, the oxide semiconductor‐based TFT arrays can be transferred directly to plastic or rubber substrates, without an additional device process, using transfer printing methods. This procedure can avoid some of the thermal degradation problems associated with plastic or rubber substrates by separating them from the annealing procedure needed to improve the device performance. These design and fabrication methods offer the possibility of developing a new format of stretchable electronics.     

Thin film yttria-stabilized zirconia electrolyte for intermediate-temperature solid oxide fuel cells (IT-SOFCs) by chemical solution deposition

A 500 nm thick thin film YSZ (yttria-stabilized zirconia) electrolyte was successfully fabricated on a conventionally processed anode substrate by spin coating of chemical solution containing slow-sintering YSZ nanoparticles with the particle size of 20 nm and subsequent sintering at 1100 °C. Incorporation of YSZ nanoparticles was effective for suppressing the differential densification of ultrafine precursor powder by mitigating the prevailing bi-axial constraining stress of the rigid substrate with numerous local multi-axial stress fields around them. In particular, adding 5 vol% YSZ nanoparticles resulted in a dense and uniform thin film electrolyte with narrow grain size distribution, and fine residual pores in isolated state. The thin film YSZ electrolyte placed on a rigid anode substrate with the GDC (gadolinia-doped ceria) and LSC (La_0.6Sr_0.4CoO_3?δ) layers deposited by PLD (pulsed laser deposition) processes revealed that it had fairly good gas tightness relevant to a SOFC (solid oxide fuel cell) electrolyte and maintained its structural integrity during fabrication and operation processes. In fact, the open circuit voltage was 1.07 V and maximum power density was 425 mW/cm² at 600 °C, which demonstrates that the chemical solution route can be a viable means for reducing electrolyte thickness for low- to intermediate-temperature SOFCs.     

High temperature lifetime of polyimide/poly(silsesquioxane)-like hybrid films

Decomposition kinetics in thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and dynamic mechanical relaxation in dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) are used to study the high temperature lifetime of the new type of polyimide/poly(silsesquioxane)-like (PI/PSSQ-like) hybrid films, which are designed to form three-dimensional structures with linear polyimide blocks and a crosslinked PSSQ-like structure. Both TGA and DMA analysis reveal that the PI/PSSQ-like hybrid films have a longer lifetime (are more reliable) with regard to their thermal and mechanical characteristics than that of pure PI. Even just 2 wt% of p-aminophenyltrimethoxysilane (APTS) in a PI/PSSQ-like hybrid film can significantly improve the service lifetime by as much as at least four times in a TGA decomposition kinetic study. The dynamical relaxation data are well fitted to the calculated WLF (Williams-Landel-Ferry) master curves. In a series of X-PIS (PI modified with APTS) hybrid films, decreasing the PI block chain length increases the decomposition activation energy, lifetime (in both TGA and DMA) and relaxation modulus. In a series of X-PIS-y-PTS [PI modified with APTS and phenyltrimethoxysilane (PTS)] films, the decomposition activation energy and lifetime (in TGA) increase with the PTS content. Interestingly, the dynamic mechanical relaxation modulus of 10000-PIS-100-PTS film is lower than that of the corresponding 10000-PIS film at frequency > 10² rad/sec, but higher at frequency < 10² rad/sec. The 10000-PIS-100-PTS has a lower relaxation time than the 10000-PIS at the modulus 5×10⁸ Pa, but the relaxation time of the former becomes higher at 5×10⁷ Pa.     

Synchronous transmission technique for the reverse link in DS-CDMAterrestrial mobile systems

In this letter, a timing control algorithm is described, which realizes timing synchronization on the direct sequence code-division multiple-access reverse link. In addition, the uncoded bit-error probability is analytically derived. Numerical results, confirmed by simulation, show that our synchronous transmission technique can offer better performance than conventional asynchronous transmission, especially for an exponentially decaying multipath intensity profile with a large decay factor     

Effect of alkyl position of pyrrole on structures and properties of conjugated polysquaraines

Poly(1-octylpyrrolyl)squaraine and poly(3-octylpyrrolyl)squaraine were synthesized from squaric acid with 1-octylpyrrole and 3-octylpyrrole under identical conditions of condensation. Visible absorption spectra, photoluminescence spectra, TGA curves, and IR spectra were recorded to characterize the structures of these polymers as synthesized; the measured optical and thermal properties are consistent with backbone structures. The polysquaraine from 3-octylpyrrole possesses mostly zwitterionic repeating units (>97%), but the polymer from 1-octylpyrrole consists of zwitterionic and covalent repeating units in a ratio 2:1. Observations from the visible absorption and photoluminescence spectra in varied solvents, TGA curves, and thermal IR measurements for these two polymers reconciled to their structures. This result indicates that the position of the alkyl group in the pyrrole derivative affects the conformation in the condensation of poly(pyrrolyl)squaraine. These polysquaraines are stable below temperature 155 °C and their visible absorption and photoluminescence properties in hydrogen-bonding solvents exhibit negative solvatochromism.     

Two-dimensional specification of universal quantification in agraphical database query language

A technique is proposed for specifying universal quantification and existential quantification (combined with negation) in a two-dimensional (graphical) database query language. Unlike other approaches that provide set operators to simulate universal quantification, this technique allows a direct representation of universal quantification. Syntactic constructs for specifying universal and existential quantifications, two-dimensional translation of universal quantification to existential quantification (with negation), and translation of existentially quantified two-dimensional queries to relational queries are presented. The resulting relational queries can be processed directly by many existing database systems. The authors claim that this technique renders universal quantifications easy to understand. To substantiate this claim, they provide a simple, easy-to-follow guideline for constructing universally quantified queries