Tunneling injection quantum-dot lasers with polarization-dependent photon-mediated carrier redistribution and gain narrowing

A theoretical and experimental study of a particular transverse-electric (TE) mode lasing mechanism of a tunneling injection InP quantum-dot (QD) laser is reported. In the experiment, the TE mode lasing action takes place at the first excited state of InP biaxially compressively strained QDs. This QD state is coupled to the ground state of two tensile-strained InGaP quantum wells (QWs) although the tensile-strained QW structure favors the transverse-magnetic (TM) polarization light emission. The measured TE and TM modal gain spectra show a typical QW gain evolution behavior at low injection currents, which can be theoretically modeled by the quasi-equilibrium of carrier distribution. When the injection current is increased near threshold, a TE gain narrowing and a simultaneous TM gain pinning are observed in the measured modal gain spectra, which cannot be explained via the quasi-equilibrium model. We propose a polarization-dependent photon-mediated carrier redistribution in the QD-coupled-QW structure to explain this TE and TM gain evolution behavior. When the injection current is just below threshold, the strong carrier depletion via stimulated emission due to coupling between the InP QD and InGaP QW states plays an important role in carrier redistribution, which depends on the optical transition energy and polarization. This concept of the polarization-dependent photon-mediated carrier redistribution explains the TE gain narrowing and TM gain pinning behavior. In addition, a coupled rate equation model is established, and the calculated polarization power ratio based on the coupled rate equations explains the experimental observation.     

A Framework for Moving Least Squares Method with Total Variation Minimizing Regularization

In this paper, we propose a computational framework to incorporate regularization terms used in regularity based variational methods into least squares based methods. In the regularity based variational approach, the image is a result of the competition between the fidelity term and a regularity term, while in the least squares based approach the image is computed as a minimizer to a constrained least squares problem. The total variation minimizing denoising scheme is an exemplary scheme of the former approach with the total variation term as the regularity term, while the moving least squares method is an exemplary scheme of the latter approach. Both approaches have appeared in the literature of image processing independently. By putting schemes from both approaches into a single framework, the resulting scheme benefits from the advantageous properties of both parties. As an example, in this paper, we propose a new denoising scheme, where the total variation minimizing term is adopted by the moving least squares method. The proposed scheme is based on splitting methods, since they make it possible to express the minimization problem as a linear system. In this paper, we employed the split Bregman scheme for its simplicity. The resulting denoising scheme overcomes the drawbacks of both schemes, i.e., the staircase artifact in the total variation minimizing based denoising and the noisy artifact in the moving least squares based denoising method. The proposed computational framework can be utilized to put various combinations of both approaches with different properties together.     

Physical agglomeration behavior in preparation of cellulose‐N‐methyl morpholine N‐oxide hydrate solutions by simple mixing

The different melting temperatures of N‐methyl morpholine N‐oxide (NMMO) hydrates in the cellulose–NMMO hydrate solution may be explained by the rather different crystal structures of NMMO hydrates, which are determined by the amount of the hydrates. The preparative process of cellulose–NMMO hydrate solution may result in cellulose structural change from cellulose I to cellulose II, depending on the amount of the hydrate. Mixtures of cellulose and NMMO hydrate in a blender was changed from the granules to slurry with increasing mixing time at 60–70°C, which is below the melting point of the NMMO hydrate. In the case of 15 wt % cellulose–NMMO hydrate granules, which were made by mixing for 20 min, the melting points of various NMMO hydrates were obtained as 77.8°C (n = 0.83), 70.2°C (n = 0.97), and 69.7°C (n = 1.23), respectively, depending on the hydrate number. However, the melting points of cellulose–NMMO hydrate slurry and solution were shifted lower than those of cellulose granules, while the mixing time of slurry and solution are 25 and 35 min, respectively. These melting behaviors indicate instantaneous liquefaction of the NMMO hydrate and the diffusion of the NMMO hydrate into cellulose during mixing in a blender. When cellulose was completely dissolved in NMMO hydrate, the crystal structure of cellulose showed only cellulose II structure. In the cellulose–NMMO products of granules or slurry obtained by high‐speed mixing, which is a new preparation method, they still retained the original cellulose I structure. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 93: 1687–1697, 2004     

Monitoring agricultural drought for arid and humid regions using multi-sensor remote sensing data

While existing remote sensing-based drought indices have characterized drought conditions in arid regions successfully, their use in humid regions is limited. We propose a new remote sensing-based drought index, the Scaled Drought Condition Index (SDCI), for agricultural drought monitoring in both arid and humid regions using multi-sensor data. This index combines the land surface temperature (LST) data and the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) data from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor, and precipitation data from Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite. Each variable was scaled from 0 to 1 to discriminate the effect of drought from normal conditions, and then combined with the selected weights. When tested against in-situ Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI), Palmer's Z-Index (Z-Index), 3-month Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), and 6-month SPI data during a ten-year (2000-2009) period, SDCI performed better than existing indices such as NDVI and Vegetation Health Index (VHI) in the arid region of Arizona and New Mexico as well as in the humid region of North Carolina and South Carolina. The year-to-year changes and spatial distributions of SDCI over both arid and humid regions generally agreed to the changes documented by the United States Drought Monitor (USDM) maps.     

Driving characteristics of the electrowetting-on-dielectric device using atomic-layer-deposited aluminum oxide as the dielectric

Electrowetting on dielectric (EWOD) is useful in manipulating droplets for digital (droplet-based) microfluidics, but its high driving voltage over several tens of volts has been a barrier to overcome. This article presents the characteristics of EWOD device with aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃, ε _r  ≈ 10) deposited by atomic layer deposition (ALD), for the first time as the high-k dielectric for lowering the EWOD driving voltage substantially. The EWOD device of the single-plate configuration was fabricated by several steps for the control electrode array of 1 mm × 1 mm squares with 50 μm space, the dielectric layer of 1,270 Å thick ALD Al₂O₃, the reference electrode of 20 μm wide line electrode, and the hydrophobic surface treatment by Teflon-AF coating, respectively. We observed the movement of a 2 μl water droplet in an air environment, applying a voltage between one of the control electrodes and the reference electrode in contact with the droplet. The droplet velocity exponentially depending on the applied voltage below 15 V was obtained. The measured threshold voltage to move the droplet was as low as 3 V which is the lowest voltage reported so far in the EWOD researches. This result opens a possibility of manipulating droplets, without any surfactant or oil treatment, at only a few volts by EWOD using ALD Al₂O₃ as the dielectric.     

Thermal treatment effect on the magnetoelectric properties of (Ni0.5Zn0.5)Fe2O4/Pt/Pb(Zr0.3Ti0.7)O3 heterostructured thin films

Magnetoelectric (ME) property modulation in heterostructured (Ni_0.5Zn_0.5)Fe₂O₄/Pt/Pb(Zr_0.3Ti_0.7)O₃ (NZFO/Pt/PZT) thin films on platinized Si substrate by thermal annealing condition variation was studied. In an attempt to prevent interfacial reaction between NZFO and PZT layers during high temperature annealing, thin Pt layer was deposited which can serve as inter-diffusion barrier as well as electrode. The ferroelectric, magnetic, and ME properties of the heterostructured film were noticeably modulated due to microstructural evolution and clamping relaxation developed during thermal annealing process. Room temperature ME voltage coefficient of the heterostructured thin films was enhanced with increasing annealing temperature and reached to 29 mV/cm·Oe when annealed at 650 °C.     

Charge Stripes and Superconductivity in La2−x Ba x CuO4 and La1.6−x Nd0.4Sr x CuO4

We report x-ray scattering study of charge density wave (stripe) order in La_2−x Ba _x CuO₄ (LBCO) and La_1.6−x Nd_0.4Sr _x CuO₄ (LNSCO). The doping dependence of the charge stripe ordering temperature and the low-temperature correlation length is compared with the bulk superconducting transition temperature. We find that the charge stripe ordering temperature and correlation length are quite different in these two families of cuprates, while there seems to be inverse correlation between the bulk superconducting temperature and the charge stripe correlation length.