The Influence of Iron on Ammonium Ion Generation from Nitrate Ion in Liquid Phase

Flue gas cleaning in discharge plasma process has been Studied intensively and we have tried to remove the NOx and S02 using the wet-type plasma reactor. In this system, NO is oxidized to NO2 and absorbed as NO3^-, and SO2 is absorbed as SO3^2- and oxidized in the liquid to SO4^2-. But the concentration of NO3^- was saturated and the absorption of NOx and SO2 was inhibited. Then, the reduction of NO3^- in the liquid is required. We examined the reductive reaction of NO3^- to NH4^ using discharge above the liquid surface then the pH value of the liquid was changed to alkaline slightly. When the Fe plate was used as a ground electrode in the liquid, NH4^ was generated. Then, the relation between the generation of NH4^ and Fe ions (Fe^2 and Fe^3 ) was studied. When Fe^2 was presented in the liquid, NH4^ was generated and Fe^2 was oxidized to Fe^3 . Fe^2 is required to generate NH4^ from NO3^-. When NH4^ was generated from NO3^-, both the calculated pH value from NH4^ concentration and the measured pH value indicated a similar value. From these results, the discharge above the liquid surface was effective to convert NO3^- to NH4^ and the reductive reaction leads to more absorption of NO3^-. These results showed that the wet-type plasma reactor is effective for NOx and SO2 removal system.     

A highly threshold Voltage-controllable 4T FinFET with an 8.5-nm-thick Si-fin channel

Highly threshold voltage (V/sub th/)-controllable four-terminal (4T) FinFETs with an aggressively thinned Si-fin thickness down to 8.5-nm have successfully been fabricated by using an orientation-dependent wet-etching technique, and the V/sub th/ controllability by gate biasing has systematically been confirmed. The V/sub th/ shift rate (/spl gamma/=-/spl delta/V/sub th///spl delta/V/sub g2/) dramatically increases with reducing Si-fin thickness (T/sub Si/), and the extremely high /spl gamma/=0.79 V/V is obtained at the static control gate bias mode for the 8.5-nm-thick Si-fin channel device with the 1.7-nm-thick gate oxide. By the synchronized control gate driving mode, /spl gamma/=0.46 V/V and almost ideal S-slope are achieved for the same device. These experimental results indicate that the optimum V/sub th/ tuning for the high performance and low-power consumption very large-scale integrations can be realized by a small gate bias voltage in the ultrathin Si-fin channel device and the orientation-dependent wet etching is the promising fabrication technique for the 4T FinFETs.     

Systematic electrical characteristics of ideal rectangular cross section Si-Fin channel double-gate MOSFETs fabricated by a wet process

The electrical characteristics of ideal rectangular cross section Si-Fin channel double-gate MOSFETs (FXMOSFETs) fabricated by a wet process have experimentally and systematically been investigated. The almost ideal S-slope of 64 mV/decade was obtained for the fabricated 20 nm Si-Fin and 125 nm gate-length FXMOSFET. This excellent subthreshold characteristic shows that the quality of the rectangular Si-Fin channel with (111)-oriented sidewall is good enough to realize high-performance FXMOSFETs. The current and transconductance multiplication accurately proportional to a number of 30 nm Si-Fin channels was confirmed in the fabricated multi-fin FXMOSFETs. The systematic investigation of the electrical characteristics of the fabricated FXMOSFETs in the 20-110-nm Si-Fin and 2.3-5.2-nm gate oxide regimes reveals that short-channel effects can be effectively suppressed by reducing the Si-Fin thickness to 20 nm or less. The developed processes are quite attractive for fabrication of ultranarrow Si-Fin channel double-gate MOSFETs.     

Cerebral white matter lesions in sudden infant death syndrome

In 21.6% of infants who died of sudden infant death syndrome, the cerebral white matter showed areas of leukomalacia. Of those infants with congenital heart disease, 24.8% had lesions, whereas 4.4% of infants who died from known acute causes had lesions. The sites of the cerebral white matter lesions, subcortical or periventricular, seem to be related to the age of the infant.     

Effects of solar spectrum and module temperature on outdoor performance of photovoltaic modules in round‐robin measurements in Japan

The performance of six photovoltaic (PV) modules composed of polycrystalline silicon (pc‐Si), amorphous silicon (a‐Si), and hydrogenated amorphous silicon/crystalline silicon (a‐Si:H/c‐Si) modules was investigated at eight locations in Japan from August 2007 to December 2008. In addition, solar irradiance, solar spectrum, and module temperature were simultaneously measured in these round‐robin measurements. In this study, we evaluate quantitatively the effects of module temperature and solar spectrum on the performance of the PV modules as thermal factor (TF) and spectral factor (SF), respectively. Furthermore, we investigate the variation in module performance, which is converted into module performance under standard test conditions (STC) using the TF and SF. In the case of the pc‐Si modules, the variations in performance ratio under STC (PR_STC) for these modules range from 0.056 to 0.074 through the round‐robin measurements. The TF indicates that the contribution of module temperature to the variation in performance is large, between about 15 and 20%. However, the SF suggests that the contribution of solar spectrum is quite small, less than 3%. In the case of the a‐Si modules, the contribution of module temperature is about 8%. The performance is largely influenced by solar spectrum, more than 12% at its maximum. Consequently, the variations in the corrected PR_STC of the a‐Si modules are between 0.117 and 0.141. These large variations may result from the effects of thermal annealing and light soaking. The variation in PR_STC of the a‐Si:H/c‐Si module is similar to that of the pc‐Si modules. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Solar spectral influence on the performance of photovoltaic (PV) modules under fine weather and cloudy weather conditions

The performance of photovoltaic modules is influenced by solar spectrum even under the same solar irradiance conditions. Spectral factor (SF) is a useful index indicating the ratio of available solar irradiance between actual solar spectrums and the standard AM1·5‐G spectrum. In this study, the influence of solar spectrum on photovoltaic performance in cloudy weather as well as in fine weather is quantitatively evaluated as the reciprocal of SF (SF⁻¹). In the cases of fine weather, the SF⁻¹ suggests that solar spectrum has little influence (within a few %) on the performance of pc‐Si, a‐Si:H/sc‐Si, and copper indium gallium (di)selenide modules, because of the “offset effect”. The performance of a‐Si:H modules and the top layers of a‐Si:H/µc‐Si:H modules can vary by more than ± 10% under the extreme conditions in Japan. The seasonal and locational variations in the SF⁻¹ of the bottom layers are about ± several %. A negative correlation is shown between the top and bottom layers, indicating that the performance of a‐Si:H/µc‐Si:H modules does not exceed the performance, at which the currents of the top and bottom layers are balanced, by the influence of solar spectrum. In the cases of cloudy weather, the SF⁻¹ of the pc‐Si, a‐Si:H/sc‐Si, and copper indium gallium (di)selenide modules is generally higher, suggesting favorable for performance than that in fine weather. Much higher SF⁻¹ than that in fine weather is shown by the a‐Si:H module and the top layer of the a‐Si:H/µc‐Si:H module. The SF⁻¹ of the bottom layer neither simply depend on season nor on location. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Evaporation of an oil‐in‐water type emulsion droplet on a hot surface

Evaporation characteristics of an Oil‐in‐Water (O/W) emulsion droplet were examined experimentally. The evaporation time per unit of initial surface area of a droplet τ^* was used to estimate the evaporation characteristics of droplets with different diameters and to compare a water droplet and an emulsion droplet. Results show that τ^* of an O/W emulsion droplet is shorter than a water droplet in the Leidenfrost film boiling regime. The four evaporation modes of O/W type emulsion droplets were observed. These depended on the mixing ratio of water and oil, G_S, and hot surface temperature, T_W. Increasing G_S increases the emulsion droplet's Leidenfrost temperature when the droplet is used as a die‐cast releasing agent. Microexplosions were observed during Leidenfrost film boiling when T_W was greater than 250^°C. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Heat Trans Asian Res, 34(7): 527–537, 2005; Published online in Wiley InterScience ( www.interscience.wiley.com ). DOI 10.1002/htj.20081