Nanotechnology in the Chemical Industry – Opportunities and Challenges

The traditional chemical industry has become a largely mature industry with many commodity products based on established technologies. Therefore, new product and market opportunities will more likely come from speciality chemicals, and from new functionalities obtained from new processing technologies as well as new microstructure control methodologies. It is a well-known fact that in addition to its molecular structure, the microstructure of a material is key to determining its properties. Controlling structures at the micro- and nano-levels is therefore essential to new discoveries. For this article, we define nanotechnology as the controlled manipulation of nanomaterials with at least one dimension less than 100nm. Nanotechnology is emerging as one of the principal areas of investigation that is integrating chemistry and materials science, and in some cases integrating these with biology to create new and yet undiscovered properties that can be exploited to gain new market opportunities. In this article market opportunities for nanotechnology will be presented from an industrial perspective covering electronic, biomedical, performance materials, and consumer products. Manufacturing technology challenges will be identified, including operations ranging from particle formation, coating, dispersion, to characterization, modeling, and simulation. Finally, a nanotechnology innovation roadmap is proposed wherein the interplay between the development of nanoscale building blocks, product design, process design, and value chain integration is identified. A suggestion is made for an R&D model combining market pull and technology push as a way to quickly exploit the advantages in nanotechnology and translate these into customer benefits.     

Low Cost, High Efficiency, Gain Flattened L Band EDFA Using FBGs as C Band Seed Generators

A low cost, coolerless 980nm diode pumped, gain flattened L band EDFA with fast transient control, high pump efficiency and gain clamping effect was realized by using FBGs as C band seed generators.     

Influence of solvents on the formation of ultrathin uniform poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) nanofibers with electrospinning

Although there have been many reports on the preparation and applications of various polymer nanofibers with the electrospinning technique, the understanding of synthetic parameters in electrospinning remains limited. In this article, we investigate experimentally the influence of solvents on the morphology of the poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) (PVP) micro/nanofibers prepared by electrospinning PVP solution in different solvents, including ethanol, dichloromethane (MC) and N,N‐dimethylformamide (DMF). Using 4 wt % PVP solutions, the PVP fibers prepared from MC and DMF solvents had a shape like a bead‐on‐a‐string. In contrast, smooth PVP nanofibers were obtained with ethanol as a solvent although the size distribution of the fibers was somewhat broadened. In an effort to prepare PVP nanofibers with small diameters and narrow size distributions, we developed a strategy of using mixed solvents. The experimental results showed that when the ratio of DMF to ethanol was 50:50 (w/w), regular cylindrical PVP nanofibers with a diameter of 20 nm were successfully prepared. The formation of these thinnest nanofibers could be attributed to the combined effects of ethanol and DMF solvents that optimize the solution viscosity and charge density of the polymer jet. In addition, an interesting helical‐shaped fiber was obtained from 20 wt % PVP solution in a 50:50 (w/w) mixed ethanol/DMF solvent. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 42: 3721–3726, 2004     

Effect of end groups on complexation kinetics between cyclodextrins and guest polymers

α‐Cyclodextrin (α‐CD) has been complexed with various poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) derivatives in aqueous solution. It has been found that the end groups of PEG derivatives affect the complexation kinetics greatly, but have only a little influence on the thermodynamic behavior. By increasing the hydrophobicity of end groups, the complexation speeds up rapidly. On the other hand, the bulky end groups slow down the threading of polymeric guests into the cavity of CD. By changing the hydrophobicity and the size of end groups, the complexation rate can be adjusted in the range of several orders of magnitudes, which should be quite useful in the design of new supramolecular systems. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 44: 2050–2057, 2006     

超稳Y沸石制备技术对沸石铝分布的影响 Ⅱ.均匀铝分布的超稳Y沸石的制备

对水热处理后得到的USY沸石作进一步的酸处理以及采用改进的氟硅酸盐溶液骨架富硅工艺,分别得到了经XPS剖面分析证实为铝分布均匀的超稳Y沸石HAY-Ⅰ和HAY-Ⅱ。IR分析表明,在酸处理过程中从USY沸石中去掉的那部分非骨架铝类与3690cm~(-1)处羟基有关,仍残留在HAY-Ⅰ沸石中的那部分非骨架铝类与3670cm~(-1)和3600cm~(-1)处羟基有关。XRD和化学分析表明HAY-Ⅰ沸石仍含有约50％的非骨架铝类,而HAY-Ⅱ沸石则基本上不含非骨架铝类,HAY-Ⅱ沸石还显示更高的结晶保留度。DTA分析表明,HAY-Ⅰ和HAY-Ⅱ两种沸石的热稳定性均高于USY沸石。     

F+H2→HF+H反应的全量子态分辨的散射动力学研究

利用高灵敏度的氢原子里德堡飞渡时间谱方法研究了 F H_2→HF H 反应碰撞能在5.02kJ/mol 下的交叉分子束反应态态散射动力学.所有在时间飞渡谱中被观测到的谱峰可以归属为 HF 产物的振转态结构.还观测到了明显的 HF(v’=3)前向散射,以及少许的 HF(v’=2)前向散射.     

Eu2-xPbxRu2O7中的金属-绝缘体相变和自旋玻璃态行为

通过对Eu2-xPbxRu2O7(x=0.0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, 1.0和1.8)系列样品的结构、电阻和磁化率的观测,结果发现,随着Pb替代浓度x值的增加,样品的电阻率逐渐减小,系统在x=0.8附近发生了金属-绝缘体(M-I)相变;Ru4+的局域磁矩及其自旋玻璃冻结温度TG也随之降低. 在该体系中,Pb2+对Eu3+的部分替代使样品中载流子浓度增加,Pb的6p能带与Ru 4d电子的T2g能带混合,能带得以拓宽,Ru 4d电子的巡游性增强,导致该体系物性的系列变化.     

偶氮苯衍生物三阶非线性的四波混频研究

用皮秒Ｎｄ：ＹＡＧ激光器的倍频光（５３２ｎｍ）对具有离域π－共轭电子云结构的偶氮苯类样品材料作简并四波混频补给，测得三阶非线性电极化率ｘ＾（３）和它们的时间响应分别为１０＾－９ｅｓｕ和２０ｐｓ，并对影响ｘ＾（３）的瞬时光栅作用和ｘ＾（３）的响应时间人了讨论。     

Fabrication of Micro -Optical Devices by a Femtosecond Laser

Femtosecond laser is a perfect laser source for materials processing when high accuracy and small structure size are required. Due to the ultra short interaction time and the high peak power, the process is generally characterized by the absence of heat diffusion and, consequently molten layers. Various induced structures have been observed in materials after the femtosecond laser irradiation. Here, we report on fabrication of micro-optical devices by the femtosecond laser. 1) formation of optical waveguide with internal loss less than 0.5dB/cm in the wavelength region from 1.2 to 1.6 mm, by translating a silica glass perpendicular to the axis of the focused femtosecond laser beam; 2) nano-scale valence state manipulation of active ions inside transparent materials; 3) space-selective precipitation and control of metal nanoparticles inside transparent materials; The mechanisms and applications of the femtosecond laser induced phenomena were also discussed.     

Effect of Ultrashort Pulsed Laser and X-Ray Irradiation on Au+ -Doped Glass

Au nanoparticles were precipitated inside Au+-doped glass samples after irradiation by femtosecond laser or x-ray. Femtosecond laser and X-ray irradiation result in decreasing of anneal temperature and critical size for the precipitation of Au nanoparticles.