Fabrication of a solution-processed thin-film transistor using zinc oxide nanoparticles and zinc acetate

We have fabricated a solution-processed ZnO thin-film transistor without vacuum deposition. ZnO nanoparticles were prepared by the polyol method from zinc acetate, polyvinyl pyrrolidone, and diethyleneglycol. The solution-processable semiconductor ink was prepared by dispersing the synthesized ZnO in a solvent. Inverted stagger type thin-film transistors were fabricated by spin casting the ZnO ink on the heavily doped Si wafer with 200 nm thick SiO₂, followed by evaporation of Cr/Au source and drain electrodes. After the drying and heat treatment at 600 C, a relatively dense ZnO film was obtained. The film characteristics were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). In order to obtain the electrical properties of the solution-derived transistor, the on–off ratio, threshold voltage, and mobility were measured.     

Nonlocal Interaction Equations in Environments with Heterogeneities and Boundaries

We study well-posedness of a class of nonlocal interaction equations with spatially dependent mobility. We also allow for the presence of boundaries and external potentials. Such systems lead to the study of nonlocal interaction equations on subsets ? of ? ^d endowed with a Riemannian metric g. We obtain conditions, relating the interaction potential and the geometry, which imply existence, uniqueness and stability of solutions. We study the equations in the setting of gradient flows in the space of probability measures on ? endowed with Riemannian 2-Wasserstein metric.     

Effect of spin–orbit coupling on spin transport at graphene/transition metal interface

In spite of large spin coherence length in graphene due to small spin–orbit coupling, the created potential barrier and antiferromagnetic coupling at graphene/transition metal (TM) contacts strongly reduce the spin transport behavior in graphene. Keeping these critical issues in mind in the present work, ferromagnetic (Co, Ni) nanosheets are grown on graphene surface to elucidate the nature of interaction at the graphene/ferromagnetic interface to improve the spin transistor characteristics. Temperature dependent magnetoconductance shows unusual behavior exhibiting giant enhancement in magnetoconductance with increasing temperature. A model based on spin–orbit coupling operated at the graphene/TM interface is proposed to explain this anomalous result. We believe that the device performance can be improved remarkably tuning the spin–orbit coupling at the interface of graphene based spin transistor. (© 2015 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH &Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

QoS enhancement in OFDM based systems under transceiver impairments

Broadband wireless systems generally use orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) with link adaptation (LA) to achieve high throughput while meeting bit error rate (BER) constraint. OFDM systems are known to be affected by non-linearity of high power amplifier (HPA) at transmitter, carrier frequency offset (CFO), symbol timing offset (STO) and channel estimation error at the receiver. The delay in feedback of channel state information (CSI) further affects the performance of LA procedures. The focus of this work is on performance analysis in presence of simultaneous affect of all these impairments on LA based OFDM systems. The results are found to be useful for threshold readjustment which is essential for successful implementation of LA scheme to counter the effects of change in operating conditions from ideal to as listed above.     

Anisotropic resistivity of the monolayer graphene in the trigonal warping and connected Fermi curve regimes

In the present study, the anisotropic resistivity of the monolayer graphene has been obtained in semiclassical regime beyond the Dirac point approximation. In particular, detailed investigations were made on the dependence of conductivity on the Fermi energy. At low energies, in the vicinity of the Dirac points, band energy of the monolayer graphene is isotropic at the Fermi level. Meanwhile, at the intermediate Fermi energies anisotropic effects such as trigonal warping is expected to be the origin of the anisotropic resistivity. However, besides the band anisotropy there also exists an other source of anisotropic resistivity which was introduced by scattering matrix. At high energies it was shown that the band anisotropy is less effective than the anisotropy generated by the scattering matrix. It was also shown that there exist two distinct regimes of anisotropic resistivity corresponding the trigonal warping and connected Fermi curve at intermediate and high energies respectively.     

Dune morphodynamics

The physics of dunes relies on the interaction between a wind flow and an erodible topography. Thus, if strong enough to transport grains, the wind shapes sandy areas into dune fields. These dunes are reminiscent of a wavy sea so that sandy deserts are called sand seas. However, the comparison stops there. Contrary to water waves, dunes propagate only under wind action and when the wind stops, they do not vanish but stand. Consequently, dunes are not only the result of the present winds, but can integrate the wind regimes over long periods. Thus, they exhibit a range of shapes and sizes with superimposed patterns. They are witnesses of past wind regimes and their shape and orientation are used to constraint climatic models on other planetary bodies where they are observed as well (e.g., Mars, Titan and Venus). Here, we discuss the morphodynamics of dunes and endeavor to identify and to explain the physical mechanisms at play in the selection of their shape, size and orientation, whilst focusing on Earth desert sand dunes.     

Influence of interlayer coupling and intra-layer Coulomb interaction on electronic transport in bilayer graphene

Calculations of renormalized perpendicular conductivity within Kubo formula employing single particle temperature dependent Green's function formalism for bilayer graphene has been attempted. On the basis of numerical analysis, perpendicular conductivity as a function of temperature, interlayer coupling, onsite Coulomb interaction and carrier concentration per site has been analyzed for both AA- and AB-stacked bilayer graphene. It is found that perpendicular conductivity increases with interlayer coupling and also with temperature at low temperatures while at higher temperatures, there is saturation in perpendicular conductivity. Influences of onsite Coulomb interaction and carrier concentration per site on perpendicular conductivity is just opposite to each other while onsite Coulomb energy suppresses the rate of increase of σ_⊥/σ_⊥0 with temperature, on the other hand increase in carrier density per site enhance this rate significantly. Finally, theoretically obtained results on temperature dependent perpendicular conductivity are viewed in terms of electronic transport data as well as recent theoretical works available in bilayer graphene.     

Simulation of proppant transport at intersection of hydraulic fracture and natural fracture of wellbores using CFD-DEM

Proppants transport is an advanced technique to improve the hydraulic fracture phenomenon, in order to promote the versatility of gas/oil reservoirs. A numerical simulation of proppants transport at both hydraulic fracture (HF) and natural fracture (NF) intersection is performed to provide a better understanding of key factors which cause, or contribute to proppants transport in HF–NF intersection. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) in association with discrete element method (DEM) is used to model the complex interactions between proppant particles, host fluid medium and fractured walls. The effect of non-spherical geometry of particles is considered in this model, using the multi-sphere method. All interaction forces between fluid flow and particles are considered in the computational model. Moreover, the interactions of particle–particle and particle–wall are taken into account via Hertz–Mindlin model. The results of the CFD-DEM simulations are compared to the experimental data. It is found that the CFD-DEM simulation is capable of predicting proppant transport and deposition quality at intersections which are in agreement with experimental data. The results indicate that the HF–NF intersection type, fluid velocity and NF aperture affect the quality of blockage occurrence, presenting a new index, called the blockage coefficient which indicates the severity of the blockage.     

Hydrocarbon/hydrogen mixed gas permeation in poly(1-trimethylsilyl-1-propyne) (PTMSP), poly(1-phenyl-1-propyne) (PPP), and PTMSP/PPP blends

The gas permeation properties of poly(1-trimethylsilyl-1-propyne) (PTMSP), poly(1-phenyl-1-propyne) (PPP), and blends of PTMSP and PPP have been determined with hydrocarbon/hydrogen mixtures. For a glassy polymer, PTMSP has unusual gas permeation properties which result from its very high free volume. Transport in PPP is similar to that observed in conventional, low-free-volume glassy polymers. In experiments with n-butane/hydrogen gas mixtures, PTMSP and PTMSP/PPP blend membranes were more permeable to n-butane than to hydrogen. PPP, on the other hand, was more permeable to hydrogen than to n-butane. As the PTMSP composition in the blend increased from 0 to 100%, n-butane permeability increased by a factor of 2600, and n-butane/hydrogen selectivity increased from 0.4 to 24. Thus, both hydrocarbon permeability and hydrocarbon/hydrogen selectivity increase with the PTMSP content in the blend. The selectivities measured with gas mixtures were markedly higher than selectivities calculated from the corresponding ratio of pure gas permeabilities. The difference between mixed gas and pure gas selectivity becomes more pronounced as the PTMSP content in the blend increases. The mixed gas selectivities are higher than pure gas selectivities because the hydrogen permeability in the mixture is much lower than the pure hydrogen permeability. For example, the hydrogen permeability in PTMSP decreased by a factor of 20 as the relative propane pressure (p/p_sat) in propane/hydrogen mixtures increased from 0 to 0.8. This marked reduction in permanent gas permeability in the presence of a more condensable hydrocarbon component is reminiscent of blocking of permanent gas transport in microporous materials by preferential sorption of the condensable component in the pores. The permeability of PTMSP to a five-component hydrocarbon/hydrogen mixture, similar to that found in refinery waste gas, was determined and compared with published permeation results for a 6-Å microporous carbon membrane. PTMSP exhibited lower selectivities than those of the carbon membrane, but permeability coefficients in PTMSP were nearly three orders of magnitude higher. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Simultaneous Determination of Seven Lipophilic and Hydrophilic Components in Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge by LC-MS/MS Method and Its Application to a Transport Study in a Blood-Brain-Barrier Cell Model

Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge (SM) has been extensively used in Alzheimer’s disease treatment, the permeability through the blood-brain barrier (BBB) determining its efficacy. However, the transport mechanism of SM components across the BBB remains to be clarified. A simple, precise, and sensitive method using LC-MS/MS was developed for simultaneous quantification of tanshinone I (TS I), dihydrotanshinone I (DTS I), tanshinone IIA (TS IIA), cryptotanshinone (CTS), protocatechuic aldehyde (PAL), protocatechuic acid (PCTA), and caffeic acid (CFA) in transport samples. The analytes were separated on a C18 column by gradient elution. Multiple reaction monitoring mode via electrospray ionization source was used to quantify the analytes in positive mode for TS I, DTS I, TS IIA, CTS, and negative mode for PAL, PCTA, and CFA. The linearity ranges were 0.1–8 ng/mL for TS I and DTS I, 0.2–8 ng/mL for TS IIA, 1–80 ng/mL for CTS, 20–800 ng/mL for PAL and CFA, and 10–4000 ng/mL for PCTA. The developed method was accurate and precise for the compounds. The relative matrix effect was less than 15%, and the analytes were stable for analysis. The established method was successfully applied for transport experiments on a BBB cell model to evaluate the apparent permeability of the seven components.