Alkaline oxygen evolution: exploring synergy between fcc and hcp cobalt nanoparticles entrapped in N-doped graphene

Herein, we report a Mott-Schottky catalyst by entrapping cobalt nanoparticles inside the N-doped graphene shell (Co@NC). The Co@NC delivered excellent oxygen evolution activity with an overpotential of merely 248 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm^–2 with promising long-term stability. The importance of Co encapsulated in NC has further been demonstrated by synthesizing Co nanoparticles without NC shell. The synergy between the hexagonal close-packed (hcp) and face-centered cubic (fcc) Co plays a major role to improve the OER activity, whereas the NC shell optimizes the electronic structure, improves the electron conductivity, and offers a large number of active sites in Co@NC. The density functional theory calculations have revealed that the hcp Co has a dominant role in the surface reaction of electrocatalytic oxygen evolution, whereas the fcc phase induces the built-in electric field at the interfaces with N-doped graphene to accelerate the H⁺ ion transport.     

2.3–21 GHz broadband and high linearity distributed low noise amplifier

This paper focuses on the design of a 2.3–21 GHz Distributed Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) with low noise figure (NF), high gain (S₂₁), and high linearity (IIP3) for broadband applications. This distributed amplifier (DA) includes S/C/X/Ku/K-band, which makes it very suitable for heterodyne receivers. The proposed DA uses a 0.18 μm GaAs pHEMT process (OMMIC ED02AH) in cascade architecture with lines adaptation and equalization of phase velocity techniques, to absorb their parasitic capacitances into the gate and drain transmission lines in order to achieve wide bandwidth and to enhance gain and linearity. The proposed broadband DA achieved an excellent gain in the flatness of 13.5 ± 0.2 dB, a low noise figure of 3.44 ± 1.12 dB, and a small group delay variation of ±19.721 ps over the range of 2.3–21 GHz. The input and output reflection coefficients S₁₁ and S₂₂ are less than −10 dB. The input compression point (P_1dB) and input third-order intercept point (IIP3) are −1.5 dBm and 11.5 dBm, respectively at 13 GHz. The dissipated power is 282 mW and the core layout size is 2.2 × 0.8 mm².     

Phase transition in the one-dimensional pair-hopping model with unusual one-electron hopping

By modifying the conventional one-electron hopping behavior, we study effects of an occupation-dependent hopping on the ground state of the half-filled one-dimensional pair-hopping model. At weak coupling, the use of bosonization and renormalization-group analysis techniques helps to derive the phase diagram. Such unusual hopping is shown to drive a spin-gap transition and to introduce a new region where the triplet superconducting instability dominates for positively small pair-hopping interaction.     

Change of evaporation rate of single monocomponent droplet with temperature using time-resolved phase rainbow refractometry

Droplet evaporation characterization, although of great significance, is still challenging. The recently developed phase rainbow refractometry (PRR) is proposed as an approach to measuring the droplet temperature, size as well as evaporation rate simultaneously, and is applied to a single flowing n-heptane droplet produced by a droplet-on-demand generator. The changes of droplet temperature and evaporation rate after a transient spark heating are reflected in the time-resolved PRR image. Results show that droplet evaporation rate increases with temperature, from ?1.28$\times {10}^{?8}$ m²/s at atmospheric 293 K to a range of (?1.5, ?8)$\times {10}^{?8}$ m²/s when heated to (294, 315) K, agreeing well with the Maxwell and Stefan–Fuchs model predictions. Uncertainty analysis suggests that the main source is the indeterminate gradient inside droplet, resulting in an underestimation of droplet temperature and evaporation rate. With the demonstration on simultaneous measurements of droplet refractive index as well as droplet transient and local evaporation rate in this work, PRR is a promising tool to investigate single droplet evaporation in real engine conditions.     

Measured and Predicted Solubility Phase Diagrams of Quaternary Systems LiBr-NaBr-MgBr2-H2O and LiBr-KBr-MgBr2-H2O at 298.15 K

The stable phase equilibria of quaternary systems LiBr-NaBr-MgBr₂-H₂O and LiBr-KBr-MgBr₂-H₂O at 298.15 K were studied by both experimental measurement(isothermal solution saturation method) and theoretical prediction(Pitzer model). The solubilities of the saturated solution have been determined experimentally and two stable phase diagrams and relevant water diagrams of the two quaternary systems were obtained. Results show that quaternary system LiBr-NaBr-MgBr₂-H₂O is hydrate II type as NaBr and NaBr·2H₂O coexistence. Its phase diagram consists of only one invariant point, four univariant curves, and five crystallization fields. The quaternary system LiBr-KBr-MgBr₂-H₂O is a complex type as the double salt KBr·MgBr₂·6H₂O formed. In addition to this double salt, the three single salts LiBr·2H₂O, KBr and MgBr₂·6H₂O also crystallize. In this paper, the solubilities of phase equilibria in above quaternary systems were also calculated by the Pitzer's electrolyte solution model. All the needed parameters can be obtained from the literature or be fitted by experimental data. On the Basis of the experimental and calculated results, the phase diagram of the quaternary system was plotted for comparison. It shows that the calculation results are consistent with the experimental ones.     

Pattern universes

In this essay we explore analogies between macroscopic patterns, which result from a sequence of phase transitions/instabilities starting from a homogeneous state, and similar phenomena in cosmology, where a sequence of phase transitions in the early universe is believed to have separated the fundamental forces from each other, and also shaped the structure and distribution of matter in the universe. We discuss three distinct aspects of this analogy: (i) Defects and topological charges in macroscopic patterns are analogous to spins and charges of quarks and leptons; (ii) Defects in generic 3+1 stripe patterns carry an energy density that accounts for phenomena that are currently attributed to dark matter; (iii) Space-time patterns of interacting nonlinear waves display behaviors reminiscent of quantum phenomena including inflation, entanglement and dark energy.     

Dielectric and optical properties of polymer-liquid crystal composite

Dielectric properties of polymer-liquid crystal mixture, having constituent polymer, poly-butyl methacrylate (PBMA) and liquid crystal, cholesteryl nonanoate, are reported as a function of frequency and temperature. The measurement has been done in a temperature range of 300-375 K and frequency range of 100 Hz-10 MHz. The dielectric permittivity and dielectric loss shows significant changes with the addition of polymer molecules in liquid crystal. The significant feature of composite formation is that the pure liquid crystal and polymer do not show dielectric relaxation in the frequency range covered, while the composite shows relaxation peak at a particular frequency. The optical transmittance of pure liquid crystal and composite has also been measured and compared.     

MEMS移相器及其在微型通信系统中的应用

从传统移相器的构造和原理出发，进一步分析了MEMS移相器的结构、特性。结果表明，MEMS移相器具有传统移相器所无法比拟的体积小、损耗小、成本低、频带宽、易于集成等突出优点。随着高阻硅衬底在微波领域应用的扩展，MEMS移相器介质损耗大幅度降低，将能与信号处理电路一同集成于硅衬底上，便于相控阵雷达等通信系统实现微小型化。     

Anisotropy of two-photon absorption in gallium selenide at 1064 nm

The Bridgman method is used to grow single crystals of ε-GaSe. The two-photon absorption (TPA) coefficient β was measured for especially un-doped crystals at room temperature for the ordinary o-ray (β_⊥) and extraordinary e-ray (β_∥) using single-wavelength excitation by a Nd:YVO₄ laser at 1.064 μm with a pulse duration of 10 ps and a repetition rate of 81 MHz. No large anisotropy was observed for the TPA coefficients between the two geometries. The TPA coefficients were found to be β_⊥ = 1.07 × 10⁻⁹ cm/W and β_∥ = 1.88 × 10⁻⁹ cm/W. It was found that doping slightly increases the TPA coefficient. The value of the TPA for crystals doped with 0.5 at.% of Tl is β_⊥ = 7.56 × 10⁻⁹ cm/W.     

A dynamical test of phase transition order: New things in old places or old wine in new bottles

We first discuss nonlinear aspects of phase transition theory applied to a particular liquid crystal phase transition. A simple derivation is given to show how two coupled Goldstone modes (one appearing as gauge fluctuations of the ordered phase) can force a phase transition, against all expectations, to take place discontinuously (theory of Halperin, Lubensky, and Ma)-but the discontinuity may be immeasurably small. Then, we describe a new dynamical test of phase transition order, developed by Cladiset al., that turns out to be more sensitive than x-ray diffraction and adiabatic calorimetry. Quantitative data found by this new method are in excellent agreement with the measurements of adiabatic calorimetry and x-ray diffraction as well as expectations implicit in the predictions of HLM.This is the text of an after-banquet talk given at the CNLS Workshop on the Dynamics of Concentrated Systems.