Examination of the role of oxygen in the photografting of methacrylic acid on a polyethylene film with a mixed solvent consisting of water and organic solvents

The photografting of methacrylic acid (MAA) on a linear low‐density polyethylene film (thickness = 30 μm) under air and nitrogen atmospheres was investigated at 60°C in mixed solvents consisting of water and an organic solvent, with xanthone as a photoinitiator. The organic solvents used were acetone, methanol, tetrahydrofuran, and dioxane. A maximum percentage of grafting occurred at a certain concentration of the organic solvent in the mixed solvent. This was observed for the systems under both air and nitrogen. The grafting reaction under air exhibited an induction period, but the rate of grafting after the period was greater than that under nitrogen. The formation of poly(ethylene peroxide)s by photoirradiation seemed to be a factor for the accelerated photografting under air. On the basis of attenuated total reflection infrared spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy of the grafted film, the MAA‐grafted chains of the sample prepared under air tended to penetrate more deeply inside the film than those of the sample prepared under nitrogen. The resulting grafted films exhibited a pH‐responsive character: the grafted films shrank in an acidic medium but swelled in alkaline medium. This was evaluated from measurements of dimensional changes in the grafted films. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 89: 992–998, 2003     

Dynamic Data Driven Simulations in Stochastic Environments

To improve the predictions in dynamic data driven simulations (DDDAS) for subsurface problems, we propose the permeability update based on observed measurements. Based on measurement errors and a priori information about the permeability field, such as covariance of permeability field and its values at the measurement locations, the permeability field is sampled. This sampling problem is highly nonlinear and Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is used. We show that using the sampled realizations of the permeability field, the predictions can be significantly improved and the uncertainties can be assessed for this highly nonlinear problem.     

Photografting of N‐isopropylacrylamide on polyethylene film in mixed solvents composed of water and organic solvent

The effects of a mixed solvent consisting of water and organic solvents such as acetone and methanol on the photografting (λ > 300 nm) of N‐isopropylacrylamide (NIPAAm) on linear low‐density polyethylene film (thickness = 30 μm) was investigated at 30°C and 60°C. Xanthone, which had been coated on the film, was used as a photoinitiator. The photografting initiated even in the system at 30°C by using a longer irradiation time. It was found that the maximum percentage of grafting was attained at a certain concentration of organic solvent in the mixed solvent, which shifted to a lower concentration of organic solvent in the system at 60°C compared with the system at 30°C. It was found that the grafted chains of the sample prepared in the system with the higher polymerization temperature and the use of mixed solvent penetrated into the center of the film compared with the sample prepared in the system with the lower polymerization temperature and use of a water solvent. Moreover, the NIPAAm‐grafted films exhibited temperature responsiveness, swelling and shrinking in water at 0°C and 50°C, respectively. The extent of this characteristic was found to be closely related to the location of the grafted chains in film substrate, which was measured by an attenuated total reflection infrared spectroscope and a scanning electron microscope. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 87: 458–463, 2003     

Locally Conservative Continuous Galerkin FEM for Pressure Equation in Two-Phase Flow Model in Subsurfaces

A typical two-phase model for subsurface flow couples the Darcy equation for pressure and a transport equation for saturation in a nonlinear manner. In this paper, we study a combined method consisting of continuous Galerkin finite element methods (CGFEMs) followed by a post-processing technique for Darcy equation and a nodal centered finite volume method (FVM) with upwind schemes for the saturation transport equation, in which the coupled nonlinear problem is solved in the framework of operator decomposition. The post-processing technique is applied to CGFEM solutions to obtain locally conservative fluxes which ensures accuracy and robustness of the FVM solver for the saturation transport equation. We applied both upwind scheme and upwind scheme with slope limiter for FVM on triangular meshes in order to eliminate the non-physical oscillations. Various numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the performance of the overall methodology.     

Photografting of N‐isopropylacrylamide and glycidyl methacrylate binary monomers on polyethylene film: Effect of mixed solvent consisting of water and organic solvent

Photografting (λ > 300 nm) of N‐isopropylacrylamide (NIPAAm) and glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) binary monomers (NIPAAm/GMA) on low‐density polyethylene film (thickness = 30 μm) was investigated at 60°C using mixed solvent consisting of water and an organic solvent such as acetone. Xanthone was used as a photoinitiator by coating it on the film surfaces. A maximum percentage of grafting was observed at a certain concentration of acetone in the mixed solvent, which was commonly observed for both ratios of NIPAAm/GMA, 8/2 and 7/3. Based on the photografting of NIPAAm/GMA on xanthone‐coated film, monomer reactivity ratios of NIPAAm (r₁) and GMA (r₂) were calculated using the Fineman–Ross method. The values were 0.31 ± 0.1 and 4.8 ± 0.2 for the water solvent system, while they were 0.96 ± 0.1 and 4.9 ± 0.1 for the mixed solvent system. NIPAAm/GMA‐grafted films with a homogeneous distribution of grafted chains were formed by photografting using water and mixed solvents. The NIPAAm/GMA‐grafted films exhibited temperature‐responsive characters, whereas the grafted films showed a reversible change in the degree of swelling between 0 and 50°C, respectively. Epoxy groups in the grafted poly(NIPAAm/GMA) chains could be aminated with ethylenediamine in N,N′‐dimethylformamide at 70°C for 3 h. Complexes of the aminated NIPAAm/GMA‐grafted chains with cupric ion exhibited catalytic activity for the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide at 20 to 50°C. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 97: 2469–2475, 2005     

Surface modification of ZnO nanorods with CdS quantum dots for application in inverted organic solar cells: effect of deposition duration

Incorporating cadmium sulfide quantum dots (CdS QDs) onto ZnO nanorod (ZNRs) has been investigated to be an efficient approach to enhance the photovoltaic performance of the inverted organic solar cell (IOSC) devices based on ZNRs/poly (3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT). To synthesize CdS/ZNRs, different durations of deposition per cycle from 1 to 9 min were used to deposit CdS via SILAR technique onto ZNRs surface grown via hydrothermal method at low temperature on FTO substrate. In typical procedures, P3HT as donor polymer were spun-coating onto CdS/ZNRs to fabricate IOSC devices, followed by Ag deposition as anode by magnetron sputtering technique. Incorporation of CdS QDs has modified the morphological, structural, and optical properties of ZNRs. Incorporation of CdS QDs onto ZNRs also led to higher open circuit voltage (V_oc) and short circuit current density (J_sc) of optimum ZNRs/CdS QDs devices due to the increased interfacial area between ZNRs and P3HT for more efficient exciton dissociation, reduced interfacial charge carrier recombination as a result of lower number of oxygen defects which act as electron traps in ZnO and prolonged carrier recombination lifetime. Therefore, the ZNRs/CdS QDs/P3HT device exhibited threefold higher PCE (0.55%) at 5 min in comparison to pristine ZNR constructed device (0.16%). Overall, our study highlights the potential of ZNRs/CdS QDs to be excellent electron acceptors for high efficiency hybrid optoelectronic devices.     

Conceptual tribo-energetic analysis of cutting tool protective coating delamination in dry cutting of hard-to-cut aero engine alloys

Machining in dry mode is characterized by intense thermo-mechanical loading. The coupling between the thermal and the mechanical loads may lead to tool failure, especially when machining the so-called hard-to-cut alloys. Within such environments the efficiency of heat removal plays an important role in preserving the structural integrity of the tool. Efficient heat removal in dry machining depends solely on the intrinsic thermal properties of the tool for uncoated tools and on the effective properties of the tool-coating combinations for coated tools. Thermal loads may also accelerate wear of the tool. As such, a relationship between the wear and the intrinsic thermal properties of the tool is worthy of investigation. This paper investigates such a relationship. Here we team numerical simulations to SEM-imagery to map the thermal conductivity within the tool zone of action of a coated carbide tool. The results indicate that, depending on the temperature rise, the tool-tip might undergo a severe drop in thermal conduction. This drop may locally restrict the ability of the tool material to dissipate the applied thermal load. This may nucleate thermally congested clusters within the tool-tip where the material completely loses the ability to transport heat. Thermal congestion renders an energetically active zone where the thermal energy available may be used to activate wear through different mechanisms. It is also found that the immediate layer under the surface of the tool tip is important to enhance the ability of the tool material to dissipate the thermal loads. The results also highlight the importance of matching the temperature dependant properties of the different coating layers in order to enhance delamination resistance.     

A Posteriori Error Estimates of Discontinuous Galerkin Method for Nonmonotone Quasi-linear Elliptic Problems

In this paper, we propose and study the residual-based a posteriori error estimates of h-version of symmetric interior penalty discontinuous Galerkin method for solving a class of second order quasi-linear elliptic problems which are of nonmonotone type. Computable upper and lower bounds on the error measured in terms of a natural mesh-dependent energy norm and the broken H ¹-seminorm, respectively, are derived. Numerical experiments are also provided to illustrate the performance of the proposed estimators.