Synthesis of nanoparticles in an atmospheric pressure glow discharge

Nanopowders are produced in a low temperature, non-equilibrium plasma jet (APPJ), which produces a glow discharge at atmospheric pressure, for the first time. Amorphous carbon and iron nanoparticles have been synthesized from Acetylene and Ferrocene/H₂, respectively. High generation rates are achieved from the glow discharge at near-ambient temperature (40–80°C), and rise with increasing plasma power and precursor concentration. Fairly narrow particle size distributions are measured with a differential mobility analyzer (DMA) and an aerosol electrometer (AEM), and are centered around 30–35 nm for carbon and 20–25 nm for iron. Particle characteristics analyzed by TEM and EDX reveal amorphous carbon and iron nanoparticles. The Fe particles are highly oxidized on exposure to air. Comparison of the mobility and micrograph diameters reveal that the particles are hardly agglomerated or unagglomerated. This is ascribed to the unipolar charge on particles in the plasma. The generated particle distributions are examined as a function of process parameters.     

双温度氦等离子体输运性质计算

获得覆盖较宽温度和压力范围内的等离子体输运性质是进行等离子体传热和流动过程数值模拟的必要条件.本文采用Saha方程计算等离子体组分, 采用基于将Chapman-Enskog方法扩展到高阶近似的方法, 计算获得了电子温度(T_e)不等于重粒子温度(T_h)的情形下, 在300 K到40000 K的温度范围内氦等离子体的黏性、热导率和电导率. 研究结果表明压力和热力学非平衡参数(θ =T_e/T_h)对氦等离子体的输运性质有较大的影响. 在局域热力学平衡条件下,计算获得的氦等离子体输运性质和文献报道的数据符合良好.     

燃烧系统的离散Boltzmann建模与模拟研究进展

燃烧系统的诸多模拟依托于流体建模, 离散Boltzmann方法(discrete Boltzmann method, DBM) 是近年来发展起来的一种新的流体介观建模方法. 本文简要评述DBM发展的两个方向——Navier-Stokes等偏微分方程的数值逼近解法和复杂系统的微介观动理学建模. 主要介绍在燃烧系统模拟方面DBM已有的工作、新近的思路、与传统流体建模的异同以及近期的研究成果. 本文重点传递的信息为: 作为复杂系统微介观动理学建模出现的DBM在模拟过程中同时给出“流动”及其相伴随的、关系最密切的那部分“热动”非平衡效应; 它为燃烧等复杂系统中各类非平衡行为的描述、非平衡信息的提取、非平衡程度的度量提供了一种简洁、有效的方法; 它所提供的热动非平衡测量量有两类: 一类是直接比较分布函数和平衡态分布函数的动理学矩关系得到的, 一类是来自于Chapman-Enskog多尺度分析给出的热传导和黏性项. 基于第二类DBM, 可以实现(燃烧等)一大类复杂流体系统的多尺度物理建模.     

亚大气压六相交流电弧等离子体射流特性研究:实验测量

以临近空间高超声速飞行器以及航天器再入大气环境飞行过程"黑障"问题的研究为背景,进行了多相交流电弧放电实验装置的物理设计,建立了六相交流电弧等离子体实验平台(MPX-2015),在背景压力为500 Pa的亚大气压条件下获得了最大直径和长度分别达到14.0 cm和60.0 cm的等离子体射流.研究了工作气体流量、真空腔压强、电极间距以及弧电流等因素对等离子体自由射流和冲击射流特性的影响规律.结果表明:在实验参数范围内,真空腔压强对等离子体的射流特性影响最为显著,等离子体自由射流的长度和直径以及冲击钝体条件下的鞘套有效工作长度和厚度均随着压强的降低而增大;提高沿电极环缝注入的工作气体流量或弧电流亦有利于等离子体鞘套尺寸的增加.上述工作有助于进一步开展临近空间飞行器与其周围复杂介质环境间复杂的气动热效应和"黑障"问题的研究.     

亚大气压六相交流电弧放电等离子体射流特性数值模拟

以临近空间高超声速飞行器和航天器再入大气环境飞行过程中其表面产生的高密度非平衡态等离子体为研究对象,基于本研究组所建立的多相交流电弧放电等离子体实验平台(MPX-2015),开展了非平衡态氩等离子体射流特性的二维数值模拟研究.在亚音速条件下二维、非平衡数值模拟所得到的计算结果与实验测量结果符合良好.超音速条件下的数值模拟结果表明,随着真空腔压强的降低,等离子体射流流速明显增大,覆盖钝体头部的等离子体鞘套的厚度先减小,而后又增加,鞘套的空间均匀性以及等离子体向钝体表面的总传热量均显著降低,而钝体头部的局部电子数密度则增大.数值模拟结果为在MPX-2015上开展超音速条件下的实验研究提供了理论指导.     

Calculation of the vibration–rotational transition intensities of water molecules trapped in an argon matrix: stretching O–H vibrations spectral region

The frequencies and intensities of vibration–rotational transitions of water molecules in an argon matrix were calculated for temperatures of 6 and 30 K. The rigid asymmetric top approximation was used with available literature values of the effective rotational constants in the ground and excited vibrational states. The calculations were carried out by taking into account the existence of a non-equilibrium population distribution between the rotational levels of ortho- and para-water isomers. It was assumed that the temperature relaxation of the population of rotational levels is independent of the ortho- and para-isomers. Comparison of the results of the theoretical calculations with experimental literature data shows good agreement for the majority of the rotational structure lines for symmetric and antisymmetric stretching vibrations both in the frequency values and in the values of the relative intensities.     

First-principles modelling of scanning tunneling microscopy using non-equilibrium Green’s functions

The investigation of electron transport processes in nano-scale architectures plays a crucial role in the development of surface chemistry and nano-technology. Experimentally, an important driving force within this research area has been the concurrent refinements of scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) techniques. The theoretical treatment of the STM operation has traditionally been based on the Bardeen and Tersoff–Hamann methods which take as input the single-particle wave functions and eigenvalues obtained from finite cluster or slabs models of the surface-tip interface. Here, we present a novel STM simulation scheme based on non-equilibrium Green’s functions (NEGF) and Wannier functions which is both accurate and very efficient. The main novelty of the scheme compared to the Bardeen and Tersoff–Hamann approaches is that the coupling to the infinite (macroscopic) electrodes is taken into account. As an illustrating example we apply the NEGF-STM method to the Si(001)-(2×1):H surface with sub-surface P doping and discuss the results in comparison to the Bardeen and Tersoff–Hamann methods.     

Stability Analysis of a Fully Coupled Implicit Scheme for Inviscid Chemical Non-Equilibrium Flows

Von Neumann stability theory is applied to analyze the stability of a fully coupled implicit (FCI) scheme based on the lower-upper symmetric Gauss-Seidel (LU-SGS) method for inviscid chemical non-equilibrium flows. The FCI scheme shows excellent stability except the case of the flows involving strong recombination reactions, and can weaken or even eliminate the instability resulting from the stiffness problem, which occurs in the subsonic high-temperature region of the hypersonic flow field. In addition, when the full Jacobian of chemical source term is diagonalized, the stability of the FCI scheme relies heavily on the flow conditions. Especially in the case of high temperature and subsonic state, the CFL number satisfying the stability is very small. Moreover, we also consider the effect of the space step, and demonstrate that the stability of the FCI scheme with the diagonalized Jacobian can be improved by reducing the space step. Therefore, we propose an improved method on the grid distribution according to the flow conditions. Numerical tests validate sufficiently the foregoing analyses. Based on the improved grid, the CFL number can be quickly ramped up to large values for convergence acceleration.     

（Anti-）de Sitter Black Hole Entropy and Generalized Uncertainty Principle

We generalize the method that is used to study corrections to Cardy-Verlinde formula due to generalized uncertainty principle and discuss corrections to Cardy-Verlinde formula due to generalized uncertainty principle in （anti）- de Sitter space. Because in de Sitter black hole spacetime the radiation temperature of the black hole horizon is different from the one of the cosmological horizon, this spacetime is a thermodynamical non-equilibrium spacetime.