Development of a parallel storm surge model

A new parallel storm surge model, the Parallel Environmental Model (PEM), is developed and tested by comparisons with analytic solutions. The PEM is a 2‐D vertically averaged, wetting and drying numerical model and can be operated in explicit, semi‐implicit and fully implicit modes. In the implicit mode, the propagation, Coriolis and bottom friction terms can all be treated implicitly. The advection and diffusion terms are solved with a parallel Eulerian–Lagrangian scheme developed for this study. The model is developed specifically for use on parallel computer systems and will function accordingly in either explicit of implicit modes. Storm boundary conditions are based on a simple exponential decay of pressure from the centre of a storm. The simulated flooding caused by a major Category 5 hurricane making landfall in the Indian River Lagoon, Florida is then presented as an example application of the PEM. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Altered protein synthesis in rat kidney cells exposed to semiconductor materials

It is thought that the extensive industrial use of arsenic, gallium and indium, which have applications as the materials for III–V semiconductors, will increase human exposure to these compounds in the near future. We have undertaken the development of new biological indicators for assessing exposure to these elements. Element-specific alterations in protein synthesis patterns were expected to occur following exposure to arsenic compounds. We examined alterations in protein synthesis in primary cultures of rat kidney proximal tubule epithelial cells by sodium arsenite, gallium chloride and indium chloride, utilizing two-dimensional gel electrophoresis. After incubation with the chemicals for 20 h, newly synthesized proteins were labeled with [³⁵S]methionine. A protein with a molecular weight (M_r) of 30 000 was markedly induced on exposure to 10 μM arsenite or 300 μM gallium chloride, and synthesis of proteins with M_r values of 85 000, 71 000, 65 000, 51 000, 38 000 and 28 000 were also increased by exposure to arsenite and gallium chloride. No significant changes were observed upon exposure to indium. Some of these increased proteins could be heat-shock proteins.     

Tuning size and catalytic activity of nano-clusters of cobalt oxide

Cobalt oxides were prepared by three different methods: (1) by reacting cobalt nitrate with oxalic acid, (2) co-precipitating cobalt nitrate with sodium carbonate, and (3) using sodium dodecyl sulphate as organic surfactant. All three samples were characterized before and after calcination by solvent extraction and the resulting products examined by IR spectroscopy. In the case of method 3, the removal of surfactant was followed by TGA studies. Products from all three methods were identified by XRD. Peaks in low angle XRD indicate the porous nature of the oxides. The morphology of the pores was studied by transmission electron microscopy. Some irregular pore structures were obtained for samples from methods 1 and 2, with an average size of 4–6 nm. Only the product from method 3 using SDS as template showed ordered structure and optimum size, and Brunauer-Emmet-Teller surface areas of the as-prepared, as well as the treated samples, exhibited H3 type hysteresis. The samples from the three methods were used as catalysts in the oxidation reaction of cyclohexane under mild conditions and the catalytic efficiency of the cobalt oxide was comparable with mesoporous cobalt oxides.     

Thermal conductivity, dislocation density and GaN device design

The performance of high power transistor devices is intimately connected to the substrate thermal conductivity. In this study, the relationship between thermal conductivity and dislocation density is examined using the 3 omega technique and free standing HVPE GaN substrates. Dislocation density is measured using imaging cathodoluminescence. In a low dislocation density regime below 10⁵ cm⁻², the thermal conductivity appears to plateau out near 230 W/K m and can be altered by the presence of isotopic defects and point defects. For high dislocation densities the thermal conductivity is severely degraded due to phonon scattering from dislocations. These results are applied to the design of homoepitaxially and heteroepitaxially grown HEMT devices and the efficiency of heat extraction and the influence of lateral heat spreading on device performance are compared.     

Synthesis and structural studies of polynuclear ruthenium clusters derived from reactions of 1,2,3,4-tetraphenyl-1,2,3,4-tetraphospholane with [Ru3(CO)12]

Reactions of 1,2,3,4-tetraphenyl-1,2,3,4-tetraphospholane (I) with triruthenium dodecacarbonyl at different temperatures result in the cleavage of P-P bonds and even P-C bond(s) in I to afford a series of new ruthenium cluster derivatives containing phosphido and phosphinidene ligands: a penta-ruthenium wing-tip bridged butterfly cluster [Ru₅(CO)₁₁(μ₄-PPh)(μ₃-PPh){(μ₄-η²-(PPh)₂CH₂}] (1), a hepta-ruthenium polyhedral (consisting of two fused square pyramids with a co-apex) cluster [Ru₇(CO)₁₅(μ₄-PPh)₂{(μ₂-PPh)₂CH₂}](2), a linked penta-ruthenium cluster [Ru₄(CO)₁₀(μ₄-PPh)(μ₃-PPh)₂(μ₃-η²-PPhCH₂)Ru(CO)₃] (3), and a hepta-nuclear polyhedral (consisting of two fused square pyramids with different apexes) cluster [Ru₇(CO)₁₅(μ₄-PPh)₂{(μ₂-PPh)₂CH₂}](4). Clusters 2 and 4 are isomeric and differ only in the connection of the two square pyramids in the Ru₇ polyhedron. All the newly obtained clusters have been fully characterized by spectroscopic (IR, FABMS, ¹H- and ³¹P-NMR spectroscopy) and analytical techniques, and their molecular structures are established by single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis.     

Reaction of Tetracopper(I)-Phosphonitocavitand with PhSeSiMe3: Synthesis and Structure of a Polyanionic Cluster [pyH]6[(CuCl)9(μ3-SePh)5(μ4-SePh)]

Treatment of tetracopper(I)-phosphonitocavitand [1·Cu₄(μ-Cl)₄(μ₄-Cl)] (2) (1 = tetraphosphonitocavitand [rccc-2,8,14,20-tetrakis-(iso-butyl)-phosphonitocavitand (C₄₄H₄₈O₈P₄Ph₄)]) with PhSeSiMe₃ in THF at low temperature afforded a novel polyanionic cluster [pyH]₆[(CuCl)₉(μ₃-SePh)₅(μ₄-SePh)] (4) as a major product along with a new tetracopper(I)-phosphonitocavitand (3) with a centered μ₃-Cl. Molecular structure of anionic cluster in 4 consists of six PhSe⁻ bridging ligands containing five μ₃-SePh and one exceptional μ₄-SePh bridging nine copper atoms, of which eight copper atoms have trigonal coordination geometry and the other has distorted tetrahedral geometry. Dedicated to Professor Han-Qin Liu on the occasion of his 70th birthday.     

STUDIES ON cis-trans-ISOMERIZATION AND REACTION KINETICS OF A μ, η~2-VINYL LIGAND IN A TRIOSMIUM CLUSTER

The dihydride cluster H_2O_(s_3)(CO)_(10) reacts with ethyne to give a cis-adduct [O_(s_3)H(μ,η~2-CH=CH_2)(CO)_(10)]. The high deuterated cluster D_2O_(s_3)(CO)_(10), the reaction of D_2O_(s_3)(CO)_(10)with ethyne C_2H_2 to form the vinyl product cluster [O_(s_3)D(μ, η~2-CH=CHD)(CO)_(10)], and thereaction of H_2O_(s_3)(CO)_(10) with the deuterated ethyne C_2D_2 to form [O_(s_3)H(μ,η~2-CD=CDH)(CO)_(10)] have been reported primarily in this paper. The two cis-adducts undergo cis-trans-isomerization of μ,η~2-vinyl ligands under a small amount of the nucleophile pyridine. Usingthe combination of deuteration and dynamic ~1H,~2H NMR spectra, we report the experimen-tal evidence determined by the dynamic ~1H, ~2H NMR spectra, mechanism, and kinetic dataof the isomerization.     

A variational coupled cluster theory for closed shells using a propagator modification procedure

A general partial summation method for including arbitrary classes of diagrams to all orders in the coupled cluster based size consistent energy functional for closed shell states is developed. Since the various reduced density matrices which appear in the energy functional are essentially the time-independent analogues of the corresponding many body Green functions, it is possible to derive Dyson-like equations for these quantities. By expanding the associated proper self energy parts in terms of the T-amplitudes, one can carry out partial summations in the reduced density matrices and thus in energy. At a higher level, higher order terms in a proper self energy can also be generated by renormalizing the internal propagators in it, and considering only the irreducible self-energy terms.     

Microstructural and physicochemical study of the buried Fe/AlGaAs(100) interface by transmission electron microscopy and x‐ray emission spectroscopy

Among the magnetic metal/semiconductor contacts, the Fe/GaAs system has been widely studied owing to its potential applications in electronic devices. In contrast, there are not many studies concerning the Fe/Al_xGa_1?xAs contact, and in particular there are no reports concerning the changes induced in the interfacial zone by the presence of Al. In this work, thin polycrystalline iron films were deposited by ion beam sputtering at room temperature on a 300 nm thick Al_0.25Ga_0.75As layer grown by molecular beam epitaxy onto GaAs(001). X‐ray diffraction analysis showed that the iron films are polycrystalline, and indications of a (002) texture of the film were observed. The fine scale analysis of the interface was achieved by high‐resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) observations, the results of which are compared with the physicochemical information obtained from electron‐induced x‐ray emission spectroscopy, by analysing the Al 3p valence states at the Fe/Al_xGa_1?xAs interface. The HRTEM experiments on cross‐section samples indicate that the interfacial zone between iron and AlGaAs is limited to <1.5 nm in thickness. X‐ray emission spectroscopy showed the presence of Al atoms in an FeAl‐like environment at the interface, and the existence of wrong bonds and point defects. The estimated width of the perturbed interface (2.0 ± 0.5 nm) is in agreement with the HRTEM results. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.