Effect of ZnO layer thickness upon optoelectrical properties of NiO/ ZnO heterojunction prepared at room temperature

In this work, p-NiO/n-ZnO heterostructures were successfully prepared at room temperature using RF sputtering technique. The influence of ZnO layer thickness on the performance of the heterojunction was investigated. The deposited ZnO layers have a hexagonal Wurtzite structure with preferable growth orientations along (002) and (103) for thinner films. Increasing the thickness results in more crystallographic orientation randomness. The current–voltage measurements of the realized heterojunctions showed a clear rectifying behavior. The measured ideality factor varies from 2.5 to 1.6 according to the thickness of ZnO layer. The series resistance of the device is enlarged with increasing ZnO thickness. The deduced parameters from the I–V characteristics suggest that 200 nm is the optimal thickness of the ZnO layer according to our experimental conditions. We attribute the relatively better performance of this thickness to achieving reasonable compensation between serial resistance and ideality factor. The best heterojunction was tested and successfully used as a UV detector.     

Cross-Layer Optimization of Dynamic Packet Assignment for Video Transmission Over IEEE 802.11e Networks

Video transmission over IEEE 802.11e wireless networks still shows poor performance for large bandwidth demand and frequently changed environments. Thus, several enhancements of IEEE 802.11e were proposed. On the other hand, big frames and simultaneous sending of adjacent frames always cause packet dropping for buffer overflow. In the past, we proposed an IEEE 802.11e enhancement named DFAA and a content aware mechanism to solve the above problems. The motivation of this paper is to find a proper way to integrate these two mechanisms. A DFAA enhancement (DFAA-E) is proposed to make up the insufficiency of content aware mechanism. Experiments results show that the combination of DFAA-E and content aware mechanism improves the video decoded quality greatly. And its performance can be further enhanced by selecting the suitable settings of certain parameters.     

Formation of a protective layer against corrosion on Mg alloy via alkali pretreatment followed by vanillic acid treatment

Although Mg alloy possesses high specific strength, low density, and good biocompatibility, poor corrosion resistance hinders its further applications. In the present study, an innovative protective layer against corrosion was prepared on the AZ31 Mg alloy via alkali pretreatment followed by vanillic acid treatment. The alkali pretreatment supplied –OH for the AZ31 Mg alloy surface to react with vanillic acid. The vanillic acid treatment played a crucial role in enhancing the corrosion resistance due to the excellent ability to act as a barrier and retard aqueous solution penetration, which effectively isolated the underlying Mg alloy from the corrosive environment. The corrosion current density of alkali and vanillic acid-treated Mg alloy (AZ31V) almost showed two orders of magnitude lower values in comparison with that of the AZ31 Mg alloy, and the corrosion potential of AZ31V Mg alloy increased from −1.41 to −1.25 V. The immersion tests proved that there was no occurrence of severe corrosion. Hence, the alkali pretreatment and vanillic acid treatment may represent a promising method to improve the corrosion resistance of Mg alloy.     

Coexistence of three ferroelectric phases and enhanced piezoelectric properties in BaTiO3–CaHfO3 lead-free ceramics

Perovskite ferroelectrics possess the fascinating piezoelectric properties near a morphotropic phase boundary, attributing to a low energy barrier that the results in structural instability and easy polarization rotation. In this work, a new lead-free system of (1-x)BaTiO₃-xCaHfO₃ was designed, and characterized by a coexistence of ferroelectric rhombohedral-orthorhombic-tetragonal (R-O-T) phases. With the increase amount of CaHfO₃ (x), a stable coexistence region of three ferroelectric phases (R-O-T) exists at 0.06 ≤ x ≤ 0.08. Both large piezoelectric coefficient (d₃₃～400 pC/N), inverse piezoelectric coefficient (d₃₃^*～547 pm/V) and planar electromechanical coupling factor (k_p～58.2%) can be achieved for the composition with x = 0.08 near the coexistence of three ferroelectric phases. Our results show that the materials with the composition located at a region where the three ferroelectric R-O-T phases coexist would have the lowest energy barrier and thus greatly promote the polarization rotation, resulting in a strong piezoelectric response.     

Reoptimization framework and policy analysis for maritime inventory routing under uncertainty

We study a maritime inventory routing problem, in which shipments between production and consumption nodes are carried out by a fleet of vessels. The vessels have specific capacities and can be chartered under different agreements. The inventory levels of all consumption nodes and some production nodes should be maintained within specified bounds; for the remaining production nodes, orders should be picked up within pre-defined time windows. We propose a discrete-time mixed-integer programming model. In the face of new information and uncertainty, this optimization model has to be re-solved, as the horizon is rolled forward. We discuss how to account for different sources of uncertainty. We present a rolling-horizon reoptimization framework that allows us to study different policies that impact the quality of the implemented solution, so we can identify the optimal set of policies.     

Comparative studies on thermal and toughness properties of polybenzoxazine composites with two functionalized graphene oxides

Abstract

Graphene oxide (GO) was functionalized by polyether amine (PEA) via two methods which were one-pot modification in acetone (GON) and two steps with the intermediate product of GOCO-Cl generated (GONS). There were more PEA successfully grafted onto GO for GONS than GON. The onset polymerization temperatures of the benzoxazine (Bz) composites decreased by the inclusion of 1?wt% of GO, GON or GONS. Thermal stability of the polybenzoxazine (PBz) composites was significantly improved indicated from the increase of weight loss temperature. T₁₀, T₂₀ and T₅₀ values of the composites with GONS were higher than that of the others. Toughness of PBzs may be enhanced by the incorporation of nanofillers, and GONS had stronger interfacial interaction with PBz matrix than GON.     

Operating Range Scheduled Robust Dahlin Algorithm to Typical Industrial Process with Input Constraint

International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems - There is a class of typical nonlinear industrial process, which can be characterized by a first-order inertia plus pure delay model in an...     

土壤中石油污染物的脱附过程

文章中主要采用有机溶剂萃取法（OSE）对高浓度石油污染土壤进行修复，经过精馏操作，有效回收原油，建立脱附等温曲线，研究了石油污染物在土壤-有机溶剂两相间的迁移规律。     

Synthesis of highly efficient,structurally improved Li4SiO4 sorbents for high-temperature CO2 capture

Li₄SiO₄ sorbents for high-temperature CO₂ removal have drawn extensive attention owing to their potential application in carbon capture and storage (CCS). The major challenge in the application lies in the poor CO₂ capture performance under realistic conditions of low CO₂ concentrations, owing to the dense structure and poor porosity. In this work, Li₄SiO₄ sorbents were prepared with porous micromorphologies and large contact areas using a variety of organometallic Li-precursors, achieving fast CO₂ sorption kinetics, high capacity and excellent cyclic stability at a low CO₂ concentration (15?vol%). It was found that a high conversion of ~?74% was maintained for pure Li₄SiO₄ even after 100 sorption/desorption cycles. Moreover, by doping with Na₂CO₃ to reduce the CO₂ diffusion resistance, the conversion of the sorbent was further enhanced to 93.2%. The enhancement mechanism of alkali carbonate have been proven here to be ascribed to the formation of the eutectic melt of Li/Na carbonates, the existence and function of which has been confirmed in this study.