Benchmark experiment of large-angle scattering reaction cross section of iron at 14 MeV using two shadow bars – Comparison of experimental results with ENDF/B-VIII –

ABSTRACT

It is important to perform neutron transport simulations with accurate nuclear data in the neutronics design of a fusion reactor. However, absolute values of large-angle scattering cross sections vary among nuclear data libraries even for well-examined nuclide of iron. Benchmark experiments focusing on large-angle scattering cross sections were thus performed to confirm the correctness of nuclear data libraries. The series benchmark experiments were performed at a DT neutron source facility, OKTAVIAN of Osaka University, Japan, by the unique experimental system established by the authors’ group, which can extract only the contribution of large-angle scattering reactions. This system consists of two shadow bars, target plate (iron), and neutron detector (niobium). Two types of shadow bars were used and four irradiations were conducted for one experiment, so that contribution of room-return neutrons was effectively removed and only large-angle scattering neutrons were extracted from the measured four Nb reaction rates. The obtained experimental results were compared with calculations for five nuclear data libraries including JENDL-4.0, JEFF.-3.3, FENDL-3.1, ENDF/B- VII, and recently released ENDF/B-VIII. It was found from the comparison that ENDF/B-VIII showed the best result, though ENDF/B-VII showed overestimation and others are in large underestimation at 14 MeV.     

Influence of pores arrangement on stability of photonic structures during sintering

Discrete Element Method (DEM) has been used for numerical investigation of sintering-induced structural deformations occurring in inverse opal photonic structures. The influence of the initial arrangement of template particles on the stability of highly porous inverse opal α-Al₂O₃ structures has been analyzed. The material transport, densification, as well as formation of defects and cracks have been compared for various case studies. Three different stages of defects formation have been distinguished starting with local defects ending with intrapore cracks. The results show that the packing of the template particles defined during the template self-assembly process play a crucial role in the later structural deformation upon thermal exposure. The simulation results are in very good agreement with experimental data obtained from SEM images and previous studies by ptychographic X-ray tomography.     

The Electron–Phonon Interaction of Low-Dimensional and Multi-Dimensional Materials from He Atom Scattering

Atom scattering is becoming recognized as a sensitive probe of the electron–phonon interaction parameter λ at metal and metal-overlayer surfaces. Here, the theory is developed, linking λ to the thermal attenuation of atom scattering spectra (in particular, the Debye–Waller factor), to conducting materials of different dimensions, from quasi-1D systems such as W(110):H(1 × 1) and Bi(114), to quasi-2D layered chalcogenides, and high-dimensional surfaces such as quasicrystalline 2ML-Ba(0001)/Cu(001) and d-AlNiCo(00001). Values of λ obtained using He atoms compare favorably with known values for the bulk materials. The corresponding analysis indicates in addition, the number of layers contributing to the electron–phonon interaction, which is measured in an atom surface collision.     

Study of metal assisted anisotropic chemical etching of silicon for high aspect ratio in crystalline silicon solar cells

Textured surface is commonly used to enhance the efficiency of silicon solar cells by reducing the overall reflectance and improving the light scattering. In this study, a comparison between isotropic and anisotropic etching methods was investigated. The deep funnel shaped structures with high aspect ratio are proposed for better light trapping with low reflectance in crystalline silicon solar cells. The anisotropic metal assisted chemical etching (MACE) was used to form the funnel shaped structures with various aspect ratios. The funnel shaped structures showed an average reflectance of 14.75% while it was 15.77% for the pillar shaped structures. The average reflectance was further reduced to 9.49% using deep funnel shaped structures with an aspect ratio of 1:1.18. The deep funnel shaped structures with high aspect ratios can be employed for high performance of crystalline silicon solar cells.     

High-resolution ISAR imaging of fast rotating targets based on pattern-coupled Bayesian strategy for multiple measurement vectors

Very high resolution inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) imaging of fast rotating targets is a complicated task. There may be insufficient pulses or may introduce migration through range cells (MTRC) during the coherent processing interval (CPI) when we use the conventional range Doppler (RD) ISAR technique. With compressed sensing (CS) technique, we can achieve the high-resolution ISAR imaging of a target with limited number of pulses. Sparse representation based method can achieve the super resolution ISAR imaging of a target with a short CPI, during which the target rotates only a small angle and the range migration of the scatterers is small. However, traditional CS-based ISAR imaging method generally faced with the problem of basis mismatch, which may degrade the ISAR image. To achieve the high resolution ISAR imaging of fast rotating targets, this paper proposed a pattern-coupled sparse Bayesian learning method for multiple measurement vectors, i.e. the PC-MSBL algorithm. A multi-channel pattern-coupled hierarchical Gaussian prior is proposed to model the pattern dependencies among neighboring range cells and correct the MTRC problem. The expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm is used to infer the maximum a posterior (MAP) estimate of the hyperparameters. Simulation results validate the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed algorithm.     

Synthesis of Diamond@SiO2@Ag composite materials for high SERS effect

Among various carbon materials, diamond stands out due to excellent physical and chemical properties. In this work, we designed Dia@SiO₂@Ag composites combining diamond micropowder and Ag nanoparticles by a simple chemical method and obtained stable substrate for surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) owing to its high surface-to-volume ratio, low density, as well as close bond between diamond and Ag. As-prepared Dia@SiO₂@Ag presented high activity to detect crystal violet and rhodamine 6G molecules, which was demonstrated by significantly enhanced SERS spectra and high enhancement factor values (10⁸-10⁹). Moreover, Dia@SiO₂@Ag also showed desired sensitivity, which was investigated by detection limit. Therefore, our study provided more theoretical support and broadened the functional applications of diamond, particularly in Raman detection.     

Thermal imaging of time-varying longitudinal defects in the internal coating of a tube

We deal with the mathematical model of the incremental degradation of the internal coating (e.g. a polymeric material) of a metallic pipe in which a fluid flows relatively fast. The fluid drags solid impurities so that longitudinal scratches, inaccessible to any direct inspection procedure, are produced on the coating. Time evolution of this kind of defects can be reconstructed from the knowledge of a sequence of temperature maps of the external surface. The time-varying orthogonal section of this damaged interface is determined as a function of time and polar angle through the identification of a suitable effective heat transfer coefficient by means of Thin Plate Approximation.     

A highly transparent and thermally stable copolymer of 1‐adamantyl methacrylate and styrene

Thermal and optical properties of copolymers of 1‐adamantyl methacrylate (AdMA) and styrene (St) prepared by free radical polymerization in the bulk are investigated. The copolymer forms an azeotrope when the composition is AdMA/St = 55/45 mol%. The glass transition temperature and decomposition temperature of the azeotropic copolymer are 170 and ca 340 °C, respectively. The refractive index increases nonlinearly with St content from 1.522 to 1.591. The light scattering loss at 633 nm is 28.1 dB km^?1, which is less than half of that of polystyrene. The total optical loss including molecular vibrational absorption, which is evaluated using a copolymer‐based optical fiber, is 292–645 dB km^?1 at 500–700 nm. These values correspond to transmittances of 86–93% for a 1 m optical path length. © 2014 Society of Chemical Industry     

Preparation of nanocrystalline nickel oxide from nickel hydroxide using spark plasma sintering and inverse Hall-Petch related densification

Nanocrystalline nickel oxide (NiO) was prepared from nickel hydroxide by Spark plasma sintering (SPS) and the mechanisms involved in the densification of NiO were studied. Reverse precipitated nickel hydroxide powders were SPS processed at 400, 600 and 700?°C with 70?MPa pressure. Pure NiO with 12?nm crystallite size formed after 400?°C sintering process. However NiO grains had grown to 18 and 38?nm after 600 and 700?°C sintering respectively. NiO pellets prepared using 600 and 700?°C SPS sintering schedules had relative densities of 83% and 94% respectively. Two displacement rate regimes were observed during densification of NiO in both 600 and 700?°C sintering processes. Decomposition of nickel hydroxide and particle sliding of NiO led to first displacement rate maximum while inverse Hall-Petch based plastic deformation facilitated densification during the constant second displacement rate regime. No densification occurred during sintering holding times indicating the limited role that diffusion played during densification.     

Nature of heterophase inclusions in high-purity optical fiber materials as studied with 3D laser ultramicroscopy

3D laser ultramicroscopy (3D LUM) is intended specially for determining the concentration and size distribution of submicron inclusions in the bulk samples of high-purity materials for visible and IR fiber optics. In this work the 3D LUM technique is shown to be able to identify the nature of individual inclusions detected. The measurement of the light scattered by an inclusion at a varied probe beam wavelength and polarization and at a varied scattered light collection angle makes it possible to determine the inclusion refractive index. The 3D LUM possibilities are illustrated by the example of studying the inclusion nature in the As₂S₃ glass samples prepared by the direct synthesis from elements in a quartz container at elevated temperatures.