Soluble alkyl substituted poly(3,4‐propylenedioxyselenophene)s: A new platform for optoelectronic materials

Optical and electrochemical properties of regiosymmetric and soluble alkylenedioxyselenophene‐based electrochromic polymers, namely poly(3,3‐dibutyl‐3,4‐dihydro‐2H‐selenopheno[3,4‐b][1,4]dioxephine) (PProDOS‐C₄), poly(3,3‐dihexyl‐3,4‐dihydro‐2H‐selenopheno[3,4‐b][1,4]dioxephine) (PProDOS‐C₆), and poly(3,3‐didecyl‐3,4‐dihydro‐2H‐selenopheno[3,4‐b][1,4]dioxephine) (PProDOS‐C₁₀), are highlighted. It is noted that these unique polymers have low bandgaps (1.57–1.65 eV), and they are exceptionally stable under ambient atmospheric conditions. Polymer films retained 82–97% of their electroactivity after 5000 cycles. The percent transmittance of PProDOS‐C_n (n = 4, 6, 10) films found to be between 55 and 59%. Furthermore, these novel soluble PProDOS‐C_n polymers showed electrochromic behavior: a color change form pure blue to highly transparent state in a low switching time (1.0 s) during oxidation with high coloration efficiencies (328–864 cm² C^?1) when compared to their thiophene analogues. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem, 2011     

Electrochemical behavior of anthraquinone in aqueous solution in presence of a non-ionic surfactant

Cyclic voltammetric behavior of anthraquinone in aqueous medium has been studied in presence of a non-ionic surfactant, Triton X-100 (TX-100) using sodium salt of anthraquinone-2-sulphonic acid (AQS) as the electro-active species. When cathodic potential is applied, the anthraquinone (AQ) group of AQS is reduced to its dianion. In the reverse scan, the oxidation of AQ²⁻ gives AQ. The electrochemical behavior shows a profound influence from the dissolved state of TX-100 in aqueous media. Spectrophotometric results indicate interaction between AQ and TX-100. A CEC (chemical–electrochemical–chemical) mechanism with the electrochemical reaction coupled with preceding interaction of AQS with TX-100 and following protonation reaction of reduced AQ has been proposed.     

Possible stretched exponential parametrization for humidity absorption in polymers

Polymer thin films have irregular transient current characteristics under constant voltage. In hydrophilic and hydrophobic polymers, the irregularity is also known to depend on the humidity absorbed by the polymer sample. Different stretched exponential models are studied and it is shown that the absorption of humidity as a function of time can be adequately modelled by a class of these stretched exponential absorption models.     

The design of Helmholtz resonator based acoustic lenses by using the symmetric Multi-Level Wave Based Method and genetic algorithms

Sonic crystals can be used as acoustic lenses in certain frequencies and the design of such systems by creating vacancies and using genetic algorithms has been proven to be an effective method. So far, rigid cylinders have been used to create such acoustic lens designs. On the other hand, it has been proven that Helmholtz resonators can be used to construct acoustic lenses with higher refraction index as compared to rigid cylinders, especially in low frequencies by utilizing their local resonances. In this paper, these two concepts are combined to design acoustic lenses that are based on Helmholtz resonators. The Multi-Level Wave Based Method is used as the prediction method. The benefits of the method in the context of design procedure are demonstrated. In addition, symmetric boundary conditions are derived for more efficient calculations. The acoustic lens designs that use Helmholtz resonators are compared with the acoustic lens designs that use rigid cylinders. It is shown that using Helmholtz resonator based sonic crystals leads to better acoustic lens designs, especially at the low frequencies where the local resonances are pronounced.     

A genetic algorithm for flow shop scheduling problems

Many scheduling problems are NP-hard problems. For such NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems, heuristics play a major role in searching for near-optimal solutions. In this paper we develop a genetic algorithm-based heuristic for the flow shop scheduling problem with makespan as the criterion. The performance of the algorithm is compared with the established NEH algorithm. Computational experience indicates that genetic algorithms can be good techniques for flowshop scheduling problems.