Photoswitching of holographic polymer-dispersed liquid crystals doped with chiral dopant

Chiral dopants were added to the formulation of holographic polymer-dispersed liquid crystals and the effects studied in terms of grating formation dynamics, morphology, diffraction efficiency, contrast ratio and electro-optical properties of the films. A gradual increase of real-time diffraction efficiency, decrease of droplet size and increase of diffraction efficiency of the composite film were obtained with the addition and increasing content of chiral dopant, due to the increased viscosity of the liquid crystal (LC) doped with the chiral dopant leading to decreased droplet coalescence. The contrast ratio decreased with increasing content of chiral dopant due to the difficult orientation of LC molecules caused by the formation of a helical structure. Addition of a small amount of the chiral dopant increased the driving voltage slightly, whereas the decay time is decreased significantly as a result of the high twisting of the helical structure.     

Isothermal crystallization kinetics of poly(3‐hydroxybutyrate)/layered double hydroxide nanocomposites

Poly(3‐hydroxybutyrate) (PHB)/layered double hydroxides (LDHs) nanocomposites were prepared by mixing PHB and poly(ethylene glycol) phosphonates (PEOPAs)‐modified LDH (PMLDH) in chloroform solution. Both X‐ray diffraction data and TEM micrographs of PHB/PMLDH nanocomposites indicate that the PMLDHs are randomly dispersed and exfoliated into the PHB matrix. In this study, the effect of PMLDH on the isothermal crystallization behavior of PHB was investigated using a differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) and polarized optical microscopy. Isothermal crystallization results of PHB/PMLDH nanocomposites show that the addition of 2 wt % PMLDH into PHB induced more heterogeneous nucleation in the crystallization significantly increasing the crystallization rate and reducing their activation energy. By adding more PMLDH into the PHB probably causes more steric hindrance of the diffusion of PHB, reducing the transportation ability of polymer chains during crystallization, thus increasing the activation energy. The correlation among crystallization kinetics, melting behavior and crystalline structure of PHB/PMLDH nanocomposites can also be discussed. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 44: 3337–3347, 2006     

Enhanced ferromagnetic properties of diluted Fe doped ZnO with hydrogen treatment

The single-phase diluted magnetic Fe-ion (5%) doped ZnO powders were prepared by solid-state reaction method. The powders were annealed in Ar or Ar/H₂(5%) atmosphere at 1200 °C. The crystal structure, electric and magnetic properties for the Zn_0.95Fe_0.05O powders have been studied with X-ray diffraction (XRD) vibrating sample magnetometer, resistance and Hall measurement. All the peaks for the XRD pattern of samples belong to the hexagonal (P6₃mc) lattice of ZnO, and no indication of a secondary phase. The lattice parameters for the Zn_0.95Fe_0.05O with an annealing in Ar/H₂(5%) atmosphere were a₀=3.256 Å and c₀=5.206 Å at room temperature. The hysteresis curve for the Zn_0.95Fe_0.05O at room temperature was enhanced ferromagnetic behaviour with an annealing in Ar/H₂(5%) atmosphere. We give an explanation for enhanced ferromagnetic behaviour with H₂ treatment by electric properties.     

Thermal and chemical nanofractal relaxation

We studied shape relaxation of nano-fractal islands, during annealing, after their growth from antimony cluster deposition on graphite surface. Annealing at 180^°C shows evidence of an increase of the fractal branch width with time followed by branch fragmentation, without changing the fractal dimension. The time evolution of the width of the arm suggests the surface self-diffusion mechanism as the main relaxation process. With Monte Carlo simulations, we confirmed the observed behavior. Comparison is done with our previous results on fragmentation of nano-fractal silver islands when impurity added to the incident cluster promotes rapid fragmentation by surface self-diffusion enhancement [1].     

The effect of surface crystalline layers on asymmetric off-diagonal magnetoimpedance in field-annealed CoFeSiB amorphous ribbons

The off-diagonal magnetoimpedance in field-annealed CoFeSiB amorphous ribbons was measured using a pick-up coil wound around the sample. One side of a ribbon was etched in hydrofluoric acid solution during various times in order to change the thickness of the surface crystalline layer appearing after annealing. The asymmetric two-peak field dependence of the off-diagonal impedance was observed for all samples. The evolution of the off-diagonal magnetoimpedance with the change in the ribbon thickness is analyzed.     

Dimensional variation in production of high-aspect-ratio micro-pillars array by micro powder injection molding

Micro powder injection molding (μPIM) is one of the potential processes for the mass production of metallic microstructures and micro components. Here, μPIM is the miniaturization of conventional PIM, which involves four processing steps: mixing, injection molding, debinding and sintering. This paper looks into the feasibility and effectiveness of μPIM as a key mass production process for the fabrication of metallic micro components. For it to be an effective re-production process, it is imperative to examine how well parts can be duplicated/fabricated from a master mold. In this work, the dimensional variation of high-aspect-ratio micro-pillars arrays, in particular the dimensional shrinkage, global warpage, and surface roughness at each stage of the μPIM process for a range of molding pressures, are quantified and compared in detail. The sensitivity of the dimensional variation of the microstructures to the packing pressure is reported. The mechanism behind the dimensional variation is analyzed. PACS 81.20.Ev; 81.20.Hy; 81.70.Fy; 07.60.Ly; 81.05.-t     

The Recognition of Double Euler Trails in Series-Parallel Networks

Given a series-parallel network (network, for short)N, its dual networkN′ is given by interchanging the series connection and the parallel connection of networkN. We usually use a series-parallel graph to represent a network. LetG[N] andG[N′] be graph representations ofNandN′, respectively. A sequence of edgese₁, e₂,…,e_kis said to form a common trail on (G[N], G[N′]) if it is a trail on bothG[N] andG[N′]. If a common trail covers all of the edges inG[N] andG[N′], it is called adouble Euler trail.However, there are many different graph representations for a network. We say that a networkNhas a double Euler trail (DET) if there is a common Euler trail for someG[N] and someG[N′]. Finding a DET in a network is essential for optimizing the layout area of a complementary CMOS functional cell. Maziasz and Hayes (IEEE Trans. Computer-Aided Design9(1990), 708–719) gave a linear time algorithm for solving the layout problem in fixedG[N] andG[N′] and an exponential algorithm for finding the optimal cover in a network without fixing graph representations. In this paper, we study properties of subnetworks of a DET network. According to these properties, we propose an algorithm that automatically generates the rules for composition of trail cover classes. On the basis of these rules, a linear time algorithm for recognizing DET networks is presented. Furthermore, we also give a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of a double Euler circuit in a network.     

Determination of the boiling point distribution of sulfur compounds in light cycle oil using GC with a flame photometric detector and pyrolyzer

A method has been developed to determine the boiling point distribution of sulfur compounds in light cycle oils (LCO'S). The method chosen for this analysis was GC with a flame photometric detector (FPD) and pyrolyzer. Tests were carried out to evaluate the recovery efficiency, repeatability, and accuracy of the method. Repeatabilities within 2% were obtained. The recovery of benzothiophenes and dibenzothiophenes was close to 100%; this was important because these are the major sulfur components in LCO's. No hydrocarbon or solvent interferences were observed with the use of the pyrolyzer, even for a 95% solvent level. Comparison with results from other techniques showed that the method accurately determined the levels of sulfur compounds in the LCO boiling point range.