A prospective future towards bio/medical technology and bioelectronics based on 2D vdWs heterostructures

Nano Research - Nano-biotechnology research has become extremely important due to the possibilities in manipulation and characterization of biological molecules through nanodevices. Nanomaterials...     

Effect of hydrocarbon addition on tip opening of hydrogen-air bunsen flames

The effect of hydrocarbon addition on tip opening of lean and stoichiometric hydrogen-air flames is studied computationally by performing two-dimensional numerical simulations. The numerical study reveals that the flame tip of the H₂-air burner stabilized flame is open at lean and stoichiometric mixture conditions. The flame tip closes upon hydrocarbon addition. The tip closing is mainly affected by preferential diffusion of the multi-component mixture and the stretch effects. In the addition of light hydrocarbon (CH₄), the tip closing starts at a higher percentage of hydrocarbon addition in H₂-air flames. Whereas, upon the addition of heavy hydrocarbons such as propane and butane in H₂-air flames, tip closing starts with a lesser amount of hydrocarbon addition. Temperature, OH mole fraction and heat release rate have been investigated, focusing on the flame structure at the tip. The tip opening regime diagram for H₂–CH₄-air, H₂–C₃H₈-air and H₂–C₄H₁₀-air mixtures are presented.     

Modeling of moisture‐induced stress in PMMA: A simple approach to consider sorption behavior in FEM

Moisture‐induced stresses in amorphous thermoplastics are studied in detail using the finite element method (FEM). The approach is based on the coefficient of moisture expansion which is derived from the sorption behavior (i.e., changes of mass, density and elastic properties). The required model parameters were obtained by isothermal diffusion and swelling experiments at different levels of relative humidity at room temperature. In the analysis, the evolutions of moisture‐induced stresses in a model system have been analyzed, i.e., drying sheets of poly(methyl methacrylate). The calculated stresses during drying are discussed with regards to the sorption models. Results indicate that these computational models are essential in capturing the accurate moisture‐induced stress. Finally, the simulation results were verified by three‐point bending. The implemented method shows the potential to predict environmental stress cracking due to humidity by FEM. This is important for the improved design of plastics parts. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 57:3–12, 2017. © 2016 Society of Plastics Engineers     

Substrate temperature-dependent physical properties of nanocrystalline zirconium titanate thin films

Nanocrystalline zirconium titanate thin films were deposited by direct current magnetron reactive sputtering on to glass substrates at room temperature and at different substrate temperatures of 423, 473, 523, and 573 K under high vacuum conditions. The deposited films have been characterized to study the physical properties of the films as a function of substrate temperature. Though the film exhibited amorphous characteristics at room temperature the higher temperatures resulted in the evolution of crystallites in the films. The crystallinity increased with temperature from 423 K onwards and the film deposited at 523 K exhibited a high crystallite size of 22 nm. The SEM images of the films revealed the improvement in the crystallinity from 423 to 523 K with dense columnar structure normal to the substrate. Further higher treatment deteriorated the film properties. The films showed a good transmittance of above 80%. A high optical transmittance of 91% and a high packing density of 96% have been observed for the film deposited at 523 K. The thickness of the films remained consistent at ~230 nm (±6 nm). It is noticed that an increase in the substrate temperature enhanced the structural, optical, and electrical properties of the films up to 523 K.     

Tunneling Photocurrent Assisted by Interlayer Excitons in Staggered van der Waals Hetero‐Bilayers

Vertically stacked van der Waals (vdW) heterostructures have been suggested as a robust platform for studying interfacial phenomena and related electric/optoelectronic devices. While the interlayer Coulomb interaction mediated by the vdW coupling has been extensively studied for carrier recombination processes in a diode transport, its correlation with the interlayer tunneling transport has not been elucidated. Here, a contrast is reported between tunneling and drift photocurrents tailored by the interlayer coupling strength in MoSe₂/MoS₂ hetero‐bilayers (HBs). The interfacial coupling modulated by thermal annealing is identified by the interlayer phonon coupling in Raman spectra and the emerging interlayer exciton peak in photoluminescence spectra. In strongly coupled HBs, positive photocurrents are observed owing to the inelastic band‐to‐band tunneling assisted by interlayer excitons that prevail over exciton recombinations. By contrast, weakly coupled HBs exhibit a negative photovoltaic diode behavior, manifested as a drift current without interlayer excitonic emissions. This study sheds light on tailoring the tunneling transport for numerous optoelectronic HB devices.     

STWS approach for Hammerstein system of nonlinear Volterra integral equations of the second kind

In this paper, single-term Walsh series (STWS) method is applied to obtain the numerical solutions of Hammerstein systems of nonlinear Volterra integral equations of second kind (HSNVIES). Using the properties of the STWS method, HSNVIES can be easily converted into solvable recursive system of algebraic equations. Solutions obtained from the recursive system of algebraic equations are the solutions of the HSNVIES. Illustrative examples are provided with numerical solutions and the efficiency of this STWS method is also compared with the existing methods.     

Symbolic image indexing and retrieval by spatial similarity: An approach based on B-tree

In this paper, the problem of indexing symbolic images based on spatial similarity is addressed. A model based on modified triangular spatial relationship (TSR) and B-tree is proposed. The model preserves TSR among the components in a symbolic image by the use of quadruples. A Symbolic Image Database (SID) is created through the construction of B-tree, an efficient multilevel indexing structure. A methodology to retrieve similar symbolic images for a given query image is also presented. The presented retrieval model has logarithmic search time complexity. The study made in this work reveals that the model bears various advantages when compared to other existing models and it could be extended towards dynamic databases. An extensive experimentation is conducted on various symbolic images and also on the ORL and YALE face databases. The results of the experimentation conducted have revealed that the proposed scheme outperforms the existing algorithms and is of practical relevance.     

Performance analysis of image steganography using wavelet transform for safe and secured transaction

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Internet applications are increased and growing at efficient way. By this technological growth, data communication in the internet in secured way has got a...     

Quantifying Quasi‐Fermi Level Splitting and Mapping its Heterogeneity in Atomically Thin Transition Metal Dichalcogenides

One of the most fundamental parameters of any photovoltaic material is its quasi‐Fermi level splitting (?µ) under illumination. This quantity represents the maximum open‐circuit voltage (V_oc) that a solar cell fabricated from that material can achieve. Herein, a contactless, nondestructive method to quantify this parameter for atomically thin 2D transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) is reported. The technique is applied to quantify the upper limits of V_oc that can possibly be achieved from monolayer WS₂, MoS₂, WSe₂, and MoSe₂‐based solar cells, and they are compared with state‐of‐the‐art perovskites. These results show that V_oc values of ≈1.4, ≈1.12, ≈1.06, and ≈0.93 V can be potentially achieved from solar cells fabricated from WS₂, MoS₂, WSe₂, and MoSe₂ monolayers at 1 Sun illumination, respectively. It is also observed that ?µ is inhomogeneous across different regions of these monolayers. Moreover, it is attempted to engineer the observed ?µ heterogeneity by electrically gating the TMD monolayers in a metal‐oxide‐semiconductor structure that effectively changes the doping level of the monolayers electrostatically and improves their ?µ heterogeneity. The values of ?µ determined from this work reveal the potential of atomically thin TMDs for high‐voltage, ultralight, flexible, and eye‐transparent future solar cells.