Water-assisted mechanical testing of polymeric thin-films

Thin films with a nanometer-scale thickness are of great interest to both scientific and industrial communities due to their numerous applications and unique behaviors different from the bulk. However, the understanding of thin-film mechanics is still greatly hampered due to their intrinsic fragility and the lack of commercially available experimental instruments. In this review, we first discuss the progression of thin-film mechanical testing methods based on the supporting substrate: film-on-solid substrate method, film-on-water tensile tests, and water-assisted free-standing tensile tests. By comparing past studies on a model polymer, polystyrene, the effect of different substrates and confinement effect on the thin-film mechanics is evaluated. These techniques have generated fruitful scientific knowledge in the field of organic semiconductors for the understanding of structure–mechanical property relationships. We end this review by providing our perspective for their bright prospects in much broader applications and materials of interest.     

Preparation and Properties of Sr3B2O6:Dy3+, Eu3+ White Phosphors Using the High-Temperature Solid-State Method

Journal of Applied Spectroscopy - Sr3B2O6:Dy3+, Eu3+ single-matrix white-light-emitting materials are prepared using the high-temperature solid-state method. The microstructure, emission spectrum,...     

Unfamiliar Aspects of Bäcklund Transformations and an Associated Degasperis–Procesi Equation

We summarize the results of our recent work on Bäcklund transformations (BTs), particularly focusing on the relation between BTs and infinitesimal symmetries. We present a BT for an associated Degasperis–Procesi (aDP) equation and its superposition principle and investigate the solutions generated by applying this BT. Following our general methodology, we use the superposition principle of the BT to generate the infinitesimal symmetries of the aDP equation.     

Mesoscopic Modeling of Capillarity-Induced Two-Phase Transport in a Microfluidic Porous Structure

Mesoscopic modeling at the pore scale offers great promise in exploring the underlying structure transport performance of flow through porous media. The present work studies the fluid flow subjected to capillarity-induced resonance in porous media characterized by different porous structure and wettability. The effects of porosity and wettability on the displacement behavior of the fluid flow through porous media are discussed. The results are presented in the form of temporal evolution of percentage saturation and displacement of the fluid front through porous media. The present study reveals that the vibration in the form of acoustic excitation could be significant in the mobilization of fluid through the porous media. The dependence of displacement of the fluid on physicochemical parameters like wettability of the surface, frequency along with the porosity is analyzed. It was observed that the mean displacement of the fluid is more in the case of invading fluid with wetting phase where the driving force strength is not so dominant.