Search results for "NICS"
showing 10 items of 15025 documents
Anomalous electrical parameters improvement in Ruthenium DSSC
2018
. In this work, we present a series of measurements carried out on Ruthenium-based Dye Sensitized Solar Cells (DSSCs) after the application of different external electrical field values. Such measurements have been performed both in the dark and by illuminating the sample with sunlight emitted by a solar simulator (AM1.5G spectrum with a power irradiance of 1000 W/m2). Our results demonstrate that the initial electrical bias field modifies in both cases the behavior of the cell in terms of an anomalous improvement of the main electrical parameters.
Anomalous performance enhancement effects in Ruthenium-based Dye Sensitized Solar Cells
2017
Dye Sensitized Solar Cells (DSSCs) are nowadays more and more employed since they present lower production costs than traditional silicon photovoltaic devices. An interesting phenomenon affecting such devices consists in the fact that current density-voltage (J-V) characteristic can depend on the history of the cell prior to the measurement, which often can be assimilated to an anomalous hysteresis effect. In this work, we study such phenomenon on Ruthenium-based DSSCs through a series of measurements performed after applying different values of external electrical field to the cell. The measurements have been carried out both under simulated sunlight (AM1.5G - 1000 W/m2) and in the dark. W…
Robots responding to care needs? : A multitasking care robot pursued for 25 years, available products offer simple entertainment and instrumental ass…
2020
Twenty-five years ago, robotics guru Joseph Engelberger had a mission to motivate research teams all over the world to design the ‘Elderly Care Giver’, a multitasking personal robot assistant for everyday care needs in old age. In this article, we discuss how this vision of omnipotent care robots has influenced the design strategies of care robotics, the development of R&D initiatives and ethics research on use of care robots. Despite the expectations of robots revolutionizing care of older people, the role of robots in human care has remained marginal. The value of world trade in service robots, including care robots, is rather small. We argue that the implementation of robots in care is n…
Molecular mechanics models for the image charge, a comment on “including image charge effects in the molecular dynamics simulations of molecules on m…
2017
We re-investigate the image charge model of Iori and Corni (Iori and Corni, J. Comput. Chem. 2008, 29, 1656). We find that a simple symmetrization of their model allows to obtain quantitatively correct results for the electrostatic interaction of a water molecule with a metallic surface. This symmetrization reduces the magnitude of the electrostatic interaction to less than 10% of the total interaction energy. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Immuno-MALDI-MS in Human Plasma and on-Chip Biomarker Characterizations at the Femtomole Level
2012
Immuno-SPR-MS is the combination of immuno-sensors in biochip format with mass spectrometry. This association of instrumentation allows the detection and the quantification of proteins of interest by SPR and their molecular characterization by additional MS analysis. However, two major bottlenecks must be overcome for a wide diffusion of the SPR-MS analytical platform: (i) To warrant all the potentialities of MS, an enzymatic digestion step must be developed taking into account the spot formats on the biochip and (ii) the biological relevancy of such an analytical solution requires that biosensing must be performed in complex media. In this study, we developed a procedure for the detection …
Bone-Healing Pattern on the Surface of Titanium Implants at Cortical and Marrow Compartments in Two Topographic Sites: an Experimental Study in Rabbi…
2018
This study evaluates the bone-healing patterns on the surface of titanium implants at the cortical and marrow compartments of bicortically-installed implants in the diaphysis and metaphysis of rabbit tibiae. In 27 New Zealand rabbits, two implants, one for each macro-design and with equal resorbable blasted media (RBM) implant surfaces, were randomly implanted in the diaphysis or metaphysis of each tibia. The flaps were sutured to allow submerged healing. The animals were sacrificed after two, four, or eight weeks, with nine weeks used for the period of healing. Ground sections were prepared and analyzed. No statistically significant differences were found between the two groups for newly f…
Optimal Heating of an Indoor Swimming Pool
2020
This work presents the derivation of a model for the heating process of the air of a glass dome, where an indoor swimming pool is located in the bottom of the dome. The problem can be reduced from a three dimensional to a two dimensional one. The main goal is the formulation of a proper optimization problem for computing the optimal heating of the air after a given time. For that, the model of the heating process as a partial differential equation is formulated as well as the optimization problem subject to the time-dependent partial differential equation. This yields the optimal heating of the air under the glass dome such that the desired temperature distribution is attained after a given…
Novel Porous Carbon Material for the Detection of Traces of Volatile Organic Compounds in Indoor Air
2021
International audience; A highly sensitive and selective silicon-based microanalytical prototype was used to identify a few ppb of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in indoor air. Herein, a new nonactivated tannin-derived carbon synthesized by an environmentally friendly method, DM2C, a MIL-101(Cr) MOF, and a DaY zeolite were selected for the preconcentration of BTEX compounds (i.e., benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes). Integrating a small amount of these nanoporous solids inside a miniaturized preconcentration unit led to excellent preconcentration performance. By taking advantage of the high adsorption−desorption capacities of the DM2C adsorbent, concentrations as low as 23.5, 30…
La evolución energética del sector español de baldosas cerámicas
2014
espanolEl presente texto analiza como ha ido evolucionando el consumo y la eficiencia energetica de la industria espanola de baldosas ceramicas durante el siglo XX, y explora las posibilidades que se le plantean en el siglo XXI. Durante el pasado siglo este sector industrial acometio tres transiciones radicales al pasar de los combustibles tradicionales de biomasa a los hidrocarburos liquidos (fueloleo y gasoleo), y posteriormente a los gaseosos, principalmente gas natural. Aunque la informacion que permite evaluar de manera fiable la eficiencia energetica real en las plantas de fabricacion no es facil de obtener, los datos disponibles indican que se ha llegado a una elevada eficiencia con …
Droplet digital PCR as a tool for investigating dynamics of cryptic symbionts
2021
Abstract Interactions among symbiotic organisms and their hosts are major drivers of ecological and evolutionary processes. Monitoring the infection patterns among natural populations and identifying factors affecting these interactions are critical for understanding symbiont–host relationships. However, many of these interactions remain understudied since the knowledge about the symbiont species is lacking, which hinders the development of appropriate tools. In this study, we developed a digital droplet PCR (ddPCR) assay based on apicomplexan COX1 gene to detect an undescribed agamococcidian symbiont. We show that the method gives precise and reproducible results and enables detecting cryp…