The thermal properties of Al–Mg–TM (TM = Sc,Zr): Ab initio study

Ab initio density functional theory (DFT) and density function perturbation theory (DFPT) have been used to investigate the thermal properties of the Al–Mg–Sc, Al–Mg–Zr and Al–Mg–Sc–Zr alloys over a wide range of temperature and pressure. Phonon dispersions are obtained at equilibrium and strained configurations by DFPT. Using the quasiharmonic approximation (QHA) for the free energy, several physical quantities of interest such as thermal Grüneisen parameter, heat capacity at constant pressure and at constant volume, thermal expansion coefficient, entropy, adiabatic bulk modulus and isothermal bulk modulus as a function of temperature and pressure are calculated and discussed. The present results show that the thermal expansion coefficient of the Al–Mg–Sc–Zr is far lower than that of Al–Mg–Sc and Al–Mg–Zr, and the variation features in the adiabatic bulk modulus and isothermal bulk modulus for the Al–Mg–Sc–Zr are also very different from that of Al–Mg–Sc and Al–Mg–Zr.     

HF激光脉冲与水柱表面相互作用产生电信号(英文)

研究了脉冲HF激光与水柱表面相互作用下电信号的产生过程。电信号显示了与激光能量线性相关的峰值间有时间间隔的两峰结构,且第二个尖峰在水柱底部的蒸汽腔塌缩后出现。实验还显示电信号的幅值和激光脉冲照射过程中是否存在膨胀和挤压的薄水层密切相关。如果在电池上边缘和石英平板(石英板紧邻电池,并与水柱上表面相接)之间存在一薄水层,电信号强度会增加10倍。     

Non-universal thermodynamics of a strongly interacting inhomogeneous Fermi gas using the quantum virial expansion

Within a quantum virial expansion, we investigate theoretically the violation of universal thermodynamics for a strongly interacting unitary Fermi gas trapped in a harmonic potential. The violation is caused by the existence and anisotropy of the trapping potential and a finite-range of the two-body interaction. We calculate the second virial coefficient by solving a two-fermion problem in 3D uniform harmonic traps, as well as in anisotropic traps. In the unitarity limit, the universal value of the trapped second virial coefficient is 1/4. We discuss in detail the non-universal correction to the second virial coefficient and to the equation of state.     

On almost sure max-limit theorems of complete and incomplete samples from stationary sequences

Let M _n denote the partial maximum of a strictly stationary sequence (X _n ). Suppose that some of the random variables of (X _n ) can be observed and let [(M)\tilde]_n\tilde M_n stand for the maximum of observed random variables from the set {X ₁, ..., X _n }. In this paper, the almost sure limit theorems related to random vector ([(M)\tilde]_n\tilde M_n , M _n ) are considered in terms of i.i.d. case. The related results are also extended to weakly dependent stationary Gaussian sequence as its covariance function satisfies some regular conditions.     

Statistical method for resolving the photon–photoelectron-counting inversion problem

A statistical inversion method is proposed for the photon–photoelectron-counting statistics in quantum key distribution experiment. With the statistical viewpoint, this problem is equivalent to the parameter estimation for an infinite binomial mixture model. The coarse-graining idea and Bayesian methods are applied to deal with this ill-posed problem, which is a good simple example to show the successful application of the statistical methods to the inverse problem. Numerical results show the applicability of the proposed strategy. The coarse-graining idea for the infinite mixture models should be general to be used in the future.     

IN MEMORIAM PROFESSOR DONGGAO DENG

Donggao Deng, professor of mathematics, the associate Editor of ATA,was born in June 8, 1935 in Rongqi Town, Shunde City, GuangdongProvince, China. He passed away by illness in Guangzhou on October21, 2007.     

Bio-inspired and Eco-friendly Synthesis of 3D Spongy Meso-Microporous Carbons from CO2 for Supercapacitors

Inspired by the spongy bone structures, three-dimensional (3D) sponge-like carbons with meso-microporous structures are synthesized through one-step electro-reduction of CO₂ in molten carbonate Li₂CO₃−Na₂CO₃−K₂CO₃ at 580 °C. SPC4-0.5 (spongy porous carbon obtained by electrolysis of CO₂ at 4 A for 0.5 h) is synthesized with the current efficiency of 96.9 %. SPC4-0.5 possesses large electrolyte ion accessible surface area, excellent wettability and electronical conductivity, ensuring the fast and effective mass and charge transfer, which make it an advcanced supercapacitor electrode material. SPC4-0.5 exhibits a specific capacitance as high as 373.7 F g⁻¹ at 0.5 A g⁻¹, excellent cycling stability (retaining 95.9 % of the initial capacitance after 10000 cycles at 10 A g⁻¹), as well as high energy density. The applications of SPC4-0.5 in quasi-solid-state symmetric supercapacitor and all-solid-state flexible devices for energy storage and wearable piezoelectric sensor are investigated. Both devices show considerable capacitive performances. This work not only presents a controllable and facile synthetic route for the porous carbons but also provides a promising way for effective carbon reduction and green energy production.