Optical Enhancement via Electrode Designs for High‐Performance Polymer Solar Cells

To capture the essence of the rapid progress in optical engineering exploited in high‐performance polymer solar cells (PSCs), a comprehensive overview focusing on recent developments and achievements in PSC electrode engineering is provided in this review. To date, various kinds of electrode materials and geometries are exploited to enhance light‐trapping in devices through distinct optical strategies. In addition to the widely used nanostructured electrodes that induce plasmonic‐enhanced light absorption, planar ultra‐thin metal films also have attracted significant attention due to their remarkably reflective transparent properties that beget efficient optical microcavities. These microcavities confine incident light with resonant frequencies between two reflective electrodes due to optically coherent interference, boosting the light absorption of thin‐film PSCs while maintaining efficient charge dissociation and extraction. After reviewing the challenges in developing high‐performance microcavity‐enhanced PSCs (MCPSCs), we discuss strategies to improve MCPSC performance further to showcase the potential of harnessing microcavity resonance effects in thin‐film PSCs.     

Controlled growth of carbon nanotube-graphene hybrid materials for flexible and transparent conductors and electron field emitters

We report a versatile synthetic process based on rapid heating and cooling chemical vapor deposition for the growth of carbon nanotube (CNT)-graphene hybrid materials where the thickness of graphene and density of CNTs are properly controlled. Graphene films are demonstrated as an efficient barrier layer for preventing poisoning of iron nanoparticles, which catalyze the growth of CNTs on copper substrates. Based on this method, the opto-electronic and field emission properties of graphene integrated with CNTs can be remarkably tailored. A graphene film exhibits a sheet resistance of 2.15 kΩ sq(-1) with a transmittance of 85.6% (at 550 nm), while a CNT-graphene hybrid film shows an improved sheet resistance of 420 Ω sq(-1) with an optical transmittance of 72.9%. Moreover, CNT-graphene films are demonstrated as effective electron field emitters with low turn-on and threshold electric fields of 2.9 and 3.3 V μm(-1), respectively. The development of CNT-graphene films with a wide range of tunable properties presented in this study shows promising applications in flexible opto-electronic, energy, and sensor devices.     

Hydrated bovine serum albumin as the gate dielectric material for organic field-effect transistors

Bovine serum albumin (BSA) is a natural protein with good hydration ability which contains acidic and basic amino acid residues of ca. 34% in total. In vacuum, pentacene organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) with BSA as the gate dielectric exhibits a field-effect mobility value (μ_FE,sat) of 0.3 cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹ in the saturation regime and a threshold voltage (V_TH) of ca. −16 V. BSA is easy to be hydrated in air ambient. Electrical properties of BSA in vacuum and hydrated BSA in air ambient are characterized. Similar to polyelectrolyte, hydrated BSA may act the gate dielectric with the formation of electric double-layer capacitors (EDLCs) to improve the device performance. In a relative humidity of 47%, the μ_FE,sat value increases to 4.7 cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹ and the V_TH reduces to −0.7 V. Generation of mobile ions in hydrated BSA and the formation of EDLCs are discussed.     

Pentacene organic thin-film transistors with solution-based gelatin dielectric

Gelatin is a natural protein in the field of food, pharmaceutical and tissue engineering, which works very well as the gate dielectric for pentacene organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs). An aqueous solution process has been applied to form a gelatin thin film on poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) or glass by spin-coating and subsequent casting. The device performance of pentacene OTFTs depend on the bloom number (molecular weight) of gelatin. The pentacene OTFT with 300 bloom gelatin as the gate dielectric in air ambient exhibits the best performance with an average field-effect mobility (μ_FE) value of ca. 16 cm² V^?1 s^?1 in the saturation regime and a low threshold voltage of ?1 V. The high performance of the pentacene OTFT in air ambient is attributed to the water resided in gelatin. The crystal quality of pentacene is not the key factor for the high performance.     

臭豆腐中部分元素的调查分析

目的调查臭豆腐中部分元素含量,为长沙油炸臭豆腐安全控制提供参考。方法采用电感耦合等离子体质谱(inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry,ICP-MS)法测定了长沙市面上具有代表性的11家臭豆腐炸前后的As、Pb、Cr、Ca、Mg、Al、Cu、Mn、Zn、Fe等10种元素的含量变化。结果大部分元素均在安全控制范围内,部分臭豆腐的3种安全卫生指标元素As、Pb、Cr的检出浓度超出国家标准,人体的必需常量元素Ca、Mg的平均含量达到1375.78 mg/kg、447.08 mg/kg,微量元素Zn、Fe、Cu、Mn的平均含量达到24.51、411.68、4.79、14.86 mg/kg,非必须元素Al的平均含量为8.33 mg/kg。结论测定元素浓度表明,正常食用臭豆腐不会超出人体每日元素的限定摄入量。     

Seamless channel transition for the staircase video broadcasting scheme

In the literature, many broadcasting-based schemes have been proposed to efficiently support near-VOD services. However, none of these schemes allows the server to dynamically and seamlessly change the number of channels allocated to a video. Naively allocating a new set of channels for the transition could increase server's load, waste communication bandwidth, and even drain the channels of the system. In Tseng et al. (2000), it is shown how to enhance the Fast Broadcasting (FB) scheme for seamless channel transition. The problem remains open whether other broadcasting-based schemes can sustain seamless channel transition. In this paper, we show how to enhance the Staircase Broadcasting (SB) scheme so that a server can seamlessly increase or decrease the channels allocated to a video. The SB scheme has been proved to require significantly less buffering space than FB, while sustaining the same startup latency as FB. Detailed performance comparisons are presented to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed scheme.