Effect of temperature on the interactions between cellulose and lignin via molecular dynamics simulations

Cellulose - Heating is essential in various biomass pre-treatments and thermal conversion processes. It is of practical significance to study the characteristics of cellulose-lignin and...     

Effect of Irradiation Absorbed Dose and Organic Solvent on the Grafting Rate of PVDF-g-PHEMA through Gamma-ray Irradiation in a Homogenous Solution

High Energy Chemistry - Modification of Polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) by radiation grafting is a research hotspot in recent years. In this study, the monomer 2-Hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) was...     

Functional Groups Assisted Tunable Dielectric Permittivity of Guest-Free Zn-Based Coordination Polymers for Gate Dielectrics

The dielectric properties of coordination polymers has been a topic of recent interest, but the role of different functional groups on the dielectric properties of these polymers has not yet been fully addressed. Herein, the effects of electron-donating (R=NH₂) and electron-withdrawing (R=NO₂) groups on the dielectric behavior of such materials were investigated for two thermally stable and guest-free Zn-based coordination polymers, [Zn(L₁)(L₂)]_n ( 1 ) and [Zn(L₁)(L₃)]_n ( 2 ) [L₁=2-(2-pyridyl) benzimidazole (Pbim), L₂=5-aminoisophthalate (Aip), and L₃=5-nitroisophthalate (Nip)]. The results of dielectric studies of 1 revealed that it possesses a high dielectric constant (κ=65.5 at 1 kHz), while compound 2 displayed an even higher dielectric constant (κ=110.3 at 1 kHz). The electron donating and withdrawing effects of the NH₂ and NO₂ substituents induce changes in the polarity of the polymers, which is due to the inductive effect from the aryl ring for both NO₂ and NH₂. Theoretical results from density functional theory (DFT) calculations, which also support the experimental findings, show that both compounds have a distinct electronic behavior with diverse wide bandgaps. The significance of the current work is to provide information about the structure-dielectric property relationships. So, this study promises to pave the way for further research on the effects of different functional groups on coordination polymers on their dielectric properties.     

基于快速神经网络架构搜索的鲁棒图像水印网络算法

为解决深度学习在图像水印算法中计算量大且模型冗余的问题，提高图像水印算法在抵抗噪声、旋转和剪裁等攻击时的鲁棒性，提出基于快速神经网络架构搜索（neural architecture search，NAS）的鲁棒图像水印网络算法。通过多项式分布学习快速神经网络架构搜索算法，在预设的搜索空间中搜索最优网络结构，进行图像水印的高效嵌入与鲁棒提取。首先，将子网络中线性连接的全卷积层设置为独立的神经单元结构，并参数化表示结构单元内节点的连接，预先设定结构单元内每个神经元操作的搜索空间；其次，在完成一个批次的数据集训练后，依据神经元操作中的被采样次数和平均损失函数值动态更新概率；最后，重新训练搜索完成的网络。水印网络模型的参数量较原始网络模型缩减了92%以上，大大缩短了模型训练时间。由于搜索得到的网络结构更为紧凑，本文算法具有较高的时间性能和较好的实验效果，在隐藏图像时，对空域信息的依赖比原始网络更少。对改进前后的2个网络进行了大量鲁棒性实验，对比发现，本文算法在CIFAR-10数据集上对抵抗椒盐噪声和旋转、移除像素行（列）等攻击优势显著；在ImageNet数据集上对抵抗椒盐高斯噪声、旋转、中值滤波、高斯滤波、JPEG压缩、裁剪等攻击优势显著，特别是对随机移除行（列）和椒盐噪声有较强的鲁棒性。     

High-performance nonfused ring electron acceptor with a steric hindrance induced planar molecular backbone

Three nonfused ring electron acceptors (NFREAs) TTC6,TT-C8T and TT-TC8 were purposefully designed and synthesized.The molecular geometry can be adjusted by the steric hindrance of lateral substituents.According to the DFT calculations,from TTC6 to TT-C8T and TT-TC8,planarity of the molecular backbone is gradually improved,accompanying with the enhancing of intramolecular charge transfer effect.As for TT-TC8,the two phenyl substituents are almost perpendicular to the molecular backbone,which endues the acceptor with good solubility and suppresses it to form over-aggregation.Multidirectional regular molecular orientation and closer molecular stacking are formed in TT-TC8 film.As a result,TT-TC8 based devices afford the highest PCE of 13.13%,which is much higher than that of TTC6 (4.41%) and TT-C8T (10.42%) and among the highest PCE values based on NFREAs.     

Developing Flexible Quinacridone-Derivatives-Based Photothermal Evaporaters for Solar Steam and Thermoelectric Power Generation

Solar-driven interfacial vaporization by localizing solar-thermal energy conversion to the air−water interface has attracted tremendous attention. In the process of converting solar energy into heat energy, photothermal materials play an essential role. Herein, a flexible solar-thermal material di-cyan substituted 5,12-dibutylquinacridone (DCN−4CQA)@Paper was developed by coating photothermal quinacridone derivatives on the cellulose paper. The DCN−4CQA@Paper combines desired chemical and physical properties, broadband light-absorbing, and shape-conforming abilities that render efficient photothermic vaporization. Notably, synergetic coupling of solar-steam and solar-electricity technologies by integrating DCN−4CQA@Paper and the thermoelectric devices is realized without trade-offs, highlighting the practical consideration toward more impactful solar heat exploitation. Such solar distillation and low-grade heat-to-electricity generation functions can provide potential opportunities for fresh water and electricity supply in off-grid or remote areas.     

Preface: Mechanics of soft materials and flexible structures

Acta Mechanica Sinica -     

Using principal eigenvectors of adjacency matrices with added diagonal weights to compose centrality measures and identify bowtie structures for a digraph

Principal eigenvectors of adjacency matrices are often adopted as measures of centrality for a graph or digraph. However, previous principal-eigenvector-like measures for a digraph usually consider only the strongly connected component whose adjacency submatrix has the largest eigenvalue. In this paper, for each and every strongly connected component in a digraph, we add weights to diagonal elements of its member nodes in the adjacency matrix such that the modified matrix will have the new unique largest eigenvalue and corresponding principal eigenvectors. Consequently, we use the new principal eigenvectors of the modified matrices, based on different strongly connected components, not only to compose centrality measures but also to identify bowtie structures for a digraph.