Search results for "Surfaces"
showing 10 items of 2837 documents
Enhancement of photoconversion efficiency in dye-sensitized solar cells exploiting pulsed laser deposited niobium pentoxide blocking layers
2015
Abstract Among all the photovoltaic technologies developed so far, dye-sensitized solar cells are considered as a promising alternative to the expensive and environmentally unfriendly crystalline silicon-based solar cells. One of the possible strategies employed to increase their photovoltaic efficiency is to reduce the charge recombination at the cell conductive substrate through the use of a compact blocking layer. In this paper, we report on the fabrication and characterization of dye-sensitized solar cells employing niobium pentoxide (Nb 2 O 5 ) thin film blocking layer deposited through the pulsed laser deposition technique on conductive substrates. The careful selection of the optimal…
Confinement of charged dust particles by a hybrid-type electric curtain
2012
Abstract The hybrid-type electric curtain (HTEC) comprises a planar electric curtain and a perpendicular planar condenser. Serial cylindrical electrodes are supplied with AC voltage, whereas the condenser is fed with DC voltage. HTEC allows for better control of the particle position shift in space. The particle oscillation path within the hybrid curtain has been photographically analysed. The changing particle path was recorded according to a DC changing voltage value and a constant AC voltage value. The aim of the paper is to describe a successful method that enables one to experimentally determine the region where the particle can be stably oscillated.
Corrosion Protection of Steel with Oxide Nanolaminates Grown by Atomic Layer Deposition
2011
Atomic layer deposited (ALD) aluminum and tantalum oxide (Al 2 O 3 and Ta 2 O 5 ) and their nanolaminates were applied as corrosion protection coatings on AISI 52100 steel. The aim was to combine the good sealing properties of Al 2 O 3 with the chemical stability of Ta 2 O 5 and to optimize the coating architecture in order to obtain the best possible long-term durability. Coating composition and morphology were studied with time-of-flight elastic recoil detection analysis (ToF-ERDA), time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) and energy dispersive x-ray spectrometry (EDS). Electrochemical properties were studied with vo…
Tunable morphologies of ZnO films via the solution precursor plasma spray process for improved photocatalytic degradation performance
2018
Abstract The Solution Precursor Plasma Spray (SPPS) process is a novel, versatile and one-step route for building photocatalytic films. Herein, the influence of the precursor solution composition on the microstructure and on the properties of ZnO films prepared via the SPPS process was studied. Nanostructured ZnO particles (i.e. nanorods (NRs) and nanowires (NWs)) were obtained by using a solution of pure Zn(OAc)2 rather than pure Zn(NO3)2. Upon adding urea to the Zn(NO3)2 solution, NRs structured ZnO films were formed as well. The addition of acetic acid into the Zn(OAc)2 solution led to a damage of the nanostructured morphologies likely due to the inhibition of the zinc-containing cluster…
ReaxFF molecular dynamics simulation study of nanoelectrode lithography oxidation process on silicon (100) surface
2019
Abstract The nanoelectrode lithography has been strengthened in recent years as one of the most promising methods due to its high reproducibility, low cost and ability to manufacture nano-sized structures. In this work, the mechanism and the parametric influence in nanoelectrode lithography have been studied qualitatively in atomic scale using ReaxFF MD simulation. This approach was originally developed by van Duin and co-workers to investigate hydrocarbon chemistry. We have investigated the water adsorption and dissociation processes on Si (100) surface as well as the characteristics (structure, chemical composition, morphology, charge distribution, etc.) of the oxide growth. The simulatio…
Effects of electrolyte doping on electrodeposited nanostructured manganese oxide and chromium oxide
2020
Abstract Electrolyte additions are used to control the functionality of a nanostructured oxide. Dopant ions affect the size and shape of deposit crystallites and modify the host structure. Such ions can be incorporated into the deposit or form a separate oxide phase. The manganese dioxide family of polymorphs with ion-molecular sieve properties represents the additional possibilities of “template” effects of dopant ions on the phase composition, heterovalent substitution in the cationic sublattice, changes in morphology and alteration of nanocrystallite size during electrocrystallisation. The effects of electrolyte doping in electrodeposited, non-stoichiometric manganese dioxide (NH4+, Li+ …
Adsorbate-Induced Oxygen Vacancy Mobility in Ultrathin Oxide Films
2013
Oxides at the nanometric scale show a behavior markedly different from that of their bulk counterparts. Ultrathin oxides grown on metals do not reach the full insulator regime, and they cannot decouple the electronic clouds of incoming adsorbates from that of the metal substrate. Although oxygen vacancies control the chemical and physical properties of ultrathin oxide films, the role of intrinsic defects has been overlooked so far. By means of density functional theory methods, we show that the addition of atoms with high electron affinity, such as Au, to ultrathin MgO grown either on a Ag or Mo support, completely reverses the preferential positions of oxygen vacancies, decreases their res…
Laser heating and ablation at high repetition rate in thermal confinement regime
2006
International audience; Laser heating and ablation of materials with low absorption and thermal conductivity (paint and cement) were under experimental and theoretical investigations. The experiments were made with a high repetition rate Q-switched Nd:YAG laser (10 kHz, 90 ns pulse duration and l = 532 nm). High repetition rate laser heating resulted in pulse per pulse heat accumulation. A theoretical model of laser heating was developed and demonstrated a good agreement between the experimental temperatures measured with the infrared pyrometer and the calculated ones. With the fixed wavelength and laser pulse duration, the ablation threshold fluence of paint was found to depend on the repe…
Optical modeling of nickel-base alloys oxidized in pressurized water reactor
2012
International audience; The knowledge of the aging process involved in the primary water of pressurized water reactor entails investigating a mixed growth mechanism in the corrosion of nickel-base alloys. A mixed growth induces an anionic inner oxide and a cationic diffusion parallel to a dissolution-precipitation process forms the outer zone. The in situ monitoring of the oxidation kinetics requires the modeling of the oxide layer stratification with the full knowledge of the optical constants related to each component. Here, we report the dielectric constants of the alloys 600 and 690 measured by spectroscopic ellipsometry and fitted to a Drude-Lorentz model. A robust optical stratificati…
Donor–Acceptor Interfaces by Engineered Nanoparticles Assemblies for Enhanced Efficiency in Plastic Planar Heterojunction Solar Cells
2016
Precisely positioning functionalized gold nanoparticles assemblies at planar donor-acceptor interfaces results in 14-fold enhancement of power conversion efficiency in P3HT/PCBM organic solar cells on plastic (ITO/PET) substrates. This result has been achieved by employing naphthalenethiol-capped gold nanoparticles (NT-Au-NPs) produced by laser ablation in liquid and size varied in the 10-30 nm range. Upon surface functionalization with the aromatic thiol, these particles self-assemble in submicrometer aggregates, which give increased light scattering. When these aggregates are deposited in the planar heterojunction between the donor and the acceptor systems, the localized scattering leads …