Structure of Atomic and Molecular Adsorbates on Low-Miller-Index ZnO Surfaces Using X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy

We review our X-ray absorption spectroscopy studies of adsorbate geometries on the O-terminated (000 ) and Zn-terminated (0001) basel faces, as well as the non-polar (10 0) prism face of ZnO. Studies employing near-edge X-ray absorption fine-structure (NEXAFS) and surface X-ray absorption fine-structure (SEXAFS) are included.     

The flexible surface or the rigid surface?

In this paper we discuss aspects of the concept described by Somorjai as the flexible surface, and whether some surfaces can be considered to be inflexible, or rigid. We present STM results which appear to manifest both types of behaviour for surfaces, depending on their oxidation state. Copper metal surfaces can be classed as flexible, showing facile reconstruction in the presence of oxygen, whereas an oxidised Pd(110) surface shows no apparent diffusivity, even at 500 K. We go on to show data for a bulk oxide which indicates that sub-stoichiometry in the sample induces an element of flexibility in the surface, especially during reaction with oxygen. Finally, this is related to the direct observation of spillover on model catalysts of Pd nanoparticles supported on TiO₂. It must be recognised that flexibility relates to surface diffusivity and hence length- and time-scales. Surfaces which appear inflexible at short times may be flexible at long times. In relation to catalysis then, surface flexibility depends on the relationship between the time-scale of diffusive events on the surface and the catalytic turnover number.     

Chemical modification of hemp,sisal, jute,and kapok fibers by alkalization

Plant fibers are rich in cellulose and they are a cheap, easily renewable source of fibers with the potential for polymer reinforcement. The presence of surface impurities and the large amount of hydroxyl groups make plant fibers less attractive for reinforcement of polymeric materials. Hemp, sisal, jute, and kapok fibers were subjected to alkalization by using sodium hydroxide. The thermal characteristics, crystallinity index, reactivity, and surface morphology of untreated and chemically modified fibers have been studied using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), X‐ray diffraction (WAXRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), respectively. Following alkalization the DSC showed a rapid degradation of the cellulose between 0.8 and 8% NaOH, beyond which degradation was found to be marginal. There was a marginal drop in the crystallinity index of hemp fiber while sisal, jute, and kapok fibers showed a slight increase in crystallinity at caustic soda concentration of 0.8–30%. FTIR showed that kapok fiber was found to be the most reactive followed by jute, sisal, and then hemp fiber. SEM showed a relatively smooth surface for all the untreated fibers; however, after alkalization, all the fibers showed uneven surfaces. These results show that alkalization modifies plant fibers promoting the development of fiber–resin adhesion, which then will result in increased interfacial energy and, hence, improvement in the mechanical and thermal stability of the composites. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 84: 2222–2234, 2002     

Slow stable crack growth in high density polyethylenes

The phenomenon of slow stable crack growth in polyethylene is investigated using notched specimens subject to constant load and the concepts of fracture mechanics. The effect of specimen geometry and dimension, the loading and the mode of loading on the applied stress intensity factor versus crack speed ($\text{K}{}_{\mathrm{c}}\text{-}\text{a}\text{?}$) curves has been studied to demonstrate that K_c is the controlling stress parameter for crack growth under suitable conditions. $\text{K}{}_{\mathrm{c}}\text{-}\text{a}\text{?}$ curves are obtained for a high density polyethylene homopolymer in distilled water and in a diluted detergent solution at four different temperatures. Results are also obtained for a much tougher medium density polyethylene copolymer whenever possible. Several mechanisms can be identified from the form of the $\text{K}{}_{\mathrm{c}}\text{-}\text{a}\text{?}$ curves. Two, in particular, have been observed but not explained before: (i) crack growth with a time dependence of 0.25, and (ii) the high $\text{K}{}_{\mathrm{c}}\text{-}\text{a}\text{?}$ slopes for crack growth in a tough copolymer. With the help of scanning electron microscopic studies of the fracture surfaces, (i) is postulated to be due to diffusion controlled void growth process and (ii) is considered to be the result of crack tip blunting effects. From the temperature dependence of crack growth, the activation energy of the diffusion controlled crack growth process is found to coincide with that of the x-relaxation process in polyethylene implying that diffusion controlled crack growth may be related to the motion of main chains in the polymer.     

Surface modification of ultra‐high‐molecular‐weight polyethylene. II. Effect on the physicomechanical and tribological properties of ultra‐high‐molecular‐weight polyethylene/poly(ethylene terephthalate) composites

We performed surface modification of ultra‐high‐molecular‐weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) through chromic acid etching, with the aim of improving the performance of its composites with poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) fibers. In this article, we report on the morphology and physicomechanical and tribological properties of modified UHMWPE/PET composites. Composites containing chemically modified UHMWPE had higher impact properties than those based on unmodified UHMWPE because of improved interfacial bonding between the polymer matrix and the fibers and better dispersion of the fibers within the modified UHMWPE matrix. Chemical modification of UHMWPE before the introduction of PET fibers resulted in composites exhibiting improved wear resistance compared to the base material and compared to unmodified UHMWPE/PET composites. On the basis of the morphological studies of worn samples, microploughing and fatigue failure associated with microcracking were identified as the principle wear mechanisms. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2006     

Study of needle penetration speeds on frictional properties of nonwoven webs: A new approach

H1 technology needlepunching machinery is one of the recent developments in the needleloom technology. H1 technology needlepunching nonwoven machinery has been effectively utilized to develop a set of nonwoven substrates at different punching rates. The effect of needlepunching speeds on the frictional properties of H1 technology polyester nonwoven webs is reported in this article. The frictional properties of nonwoven webs have been characterized using a simple normalized friction factor. In addition, the surfaces of the nonwoven substrates were scanned using scanning electron microscopy. The results show that for the three different penetration rates studied there seems to be a marginal difference in the frictional properties. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 89: 3626–3631, 2003     

Continuous Self‐Collision Detection for Deformable Surfaces Interacting with Solid Models

In this paper, we propose a new continuous self‐collision detection (CSCD) method for a deformable surface that interacts with a simple solid model. The method is developed based on the radial‐view‐based culling method. Our method is suitable for the deformable surface that has large contact region with the solid model. The deformable surface may consist of small round‐shaped holes. At the pre‐processing stage, the holes of the deformable surface are filled with ghost triangles so as to make the mesh of the deformable surface watertight. An observer primitive (i.e. a point or a line segment) is computed so that it lies inside the solid model. At the runtime stage, the orientations of triangles with respect to the observer primitive are evaluated. The collision status of the deformable surface is then determined. We evaluated our method for several animations including virtual garments. Experimental results show that our method improves the process of CSCD.     

A Projective Framework for Polyhedral Mesh Modelling

We present a novel framework for polyhedral mesh editing with face‐based projective maps that preserves planarity by definition. Such meshes are essential in the field of architectural design and rationalization. By using homogeneous coordinates to describe vertices, we can parametrize the entire shape space of planar‐preserving deformations with bilinear equations. The generality of this space allows for polyhedral geometric processing methods to be conducted with ease. We demonstrate its usefulness in planar‐quadrilateral mesh subdivision, a resulting multi‐resolution editing algorithm, and novel shape‐space exploration with prescribed transformations. Furthermore, we show that our shape space is a discretization of a continuous space of conjugate‐preserving projective transformation fields on surfaces. Our shape space directly addresses planar‐quad meshes, on which we put a focus, and we further show that our framework naturally extends to meshes with faces of more than four vertices as well.     

Continuous Levels‐of‐Detail and Visual Abstraction for Seamless Molecular Visualization

Molecular visualization is often challenged with rendering of large molecular structures in real time. We introduce a novel approach that enables us to show even large protein complexes. Our method is based on the level‐of‐detail concept, where we exploit three different abstractions combined in one visualization. Firstly, molecular surface abstraction exploits three different surfaces, solvent‐excluded surface (SES), Gaussian kernels and van der Waals spheres, combined as one surface by linear interpolation. Secondly, we introduce three shading abstraction levels and a method for creating seamless transitions between these representations. The SES representation with full shading and added contours stands in focus while on the other side a sphere representation of a cluster of atoms with constant shading and without contours provide the context. Thirdly, we propose a hierarchical abstraction based on a set of clusters formed on molecular atoms. All three abstraction models are driven by one importance function classifying the scene into the near‐, mid‐ and far‐field. Moreover, we introduce a methodology to render the entire molecule directly using the A‐buffer technique, which further improves the performance. The rendering performance is evaluated on series of molecules of varying atom counts.     

General triangular midpoint subdivision

In this paper, we introduce triangular subdivision operators which are composed of a refinement operator and several averaging operators, where the refinement operator splits each triangle uniformly into four congruent triangles and in each averaging operation, every vertex will be replaced by a convex combination of itself and its neighboring vertices. These operators form an infinite class of triangular subdivision schemes including Loop's algorithm with a restricted parameter range and the midpoint schemes for triangular meshes. We analyze the smoothness of the resulting subdivision surfaces at their regular and extraordinary points by generalizing an established technique for analyzing midpoint subdivision on quadrilateral meshes. General triangular midpoint subdivision surfaces are smooth at all regular points and they are also smooth at extraordinary points under certain conditions. We show some general triangular subdivision surfaces and compare them with Loop subdivision surfaces.