Search results for "Zoe"
showing 10 items of 180 documents
Carrier Transport in GaAs Nanowires Using Surface Acoustic Waves
2012
ABSTRACTThe oscillating piezoelectric field of a surface acoustic wave (SAW) is employed to transport photoexcited electrons and holes in GaAs nanowires (NWs) transferred to a SAW beam line on a LiNbO3 crystal. We show that carriers generated in the NW by a focused light spot can be acoustically transported to a second location, where they recombine emitting short light pulses. The results presented here demonstrate the high-frequency manipulation of carriers in NWs without the use of electrical contacts, which opens new perspectives for applications in opto-electronic devices operating at GHz frequencies.
A Strain Sensing Structural Health Monitoring System for Delaminated Composite Structures
2012
Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) for composite materials is becoming a primary task due to their extended use in safety critical applications. Different methods, based on the use of piezoelectric transducers as well as of fiber optics, has been successfully proposed to detect and monitor damage in composite structural components with particular attention focused on delamination cracks.In the present paper a Structural Health Monitoring model, based on the use of piezoelectric sensors, already proposed by the authors for isotropic damaged components, is extended to delaminated composite structures. The dynamic behavior of the host damaged structure and the bonded piezoelectric sensors is m…
Monitoring road pavement performance through a novel data processing approach, accelerated pavement test results
2020
This research presents a novel performance-based interpretation method for continuous monitoring of pavement condition through the use of piezoelectric sensors. The objective of this study is to validate the compressed cumulative loading event approach, implemented in a previously developed piezoelectric sensor, for detecting subsurface fatigue cracking through full-scale accelerated pavement testing. A piezo-electric film of polyvinylidene fluoride is used to harvest the microstrain energy induced by the traffic loading at the surface. Epoxy is used to protect the sensor following a H-shape packaging. Piezoelectric sensors were exposed to approximately 1.0 million load repetitions between …
A regular variational boundary model for free vibrations of magneto-electro-elastic structures
2011
In this paper a regular variational boundary element formulation for dynamic analysis of two-dimensional magneto-electro-elastic domains is presented. The method is based on a hybrid variational principle expressed in terms of generalized magneto-electro-elastic variables. The domain variables are approximated by using a superposition of weighted regular fundamental solutions of the static magneto-electro-elastic problem, whereas the boundary variables are expressed in terms of nodal values. The variational principle coupled with the proposed discretization scheme leads to the calculation of frequency-independent and symmetric generalized stiffness and mass matrices. The generalized stiffne…
Low-Temperature Solution Processable Electrodes for Piezoelectric Sensors Applications
2013
Piezoelectric thin-film sensors are suitable for a wide range of applications from physiological measurements to industrial monitoring systems. The use of flexible materials in combination with high-throughput printing technologies enables cost-effective manufacturing of custom-designed, highly integratable piezoelectric sensors. This type of sensor can, for instance, improve industrial process control or enable the embedding of ubiquitous sensors in our living environment to improve quality of life. Here, we discuss the benefits, challenges and potential applications of piezoelectric thin-film sensors. The piezoelectric sensor elements are fabricated by printing electrodes on both sides of…
On the repeatability of the EMI for the monitoring of bonded joints
2015
We study the feasibility and the repeatability of the electromechanical impedance (EMI) method for the health monitoring of lightweight bonded joints. The EMI technique exploits the coupling between the displacement field and the potential field of a piezoelectric material, by attaching or embedding a piezoelectric transducer to the structure to be monitored. The sensor is excited by an external voltage and the electrical admittance which is the ratio between the electric current and the applied voltage is measured as it depends on the mechanical coupling between the transducer and the host structure. Owing to this interaction, the admittance may represent a signature for the health of the …
Residual strain effects on the two-dimensional electron gas concentration of AlGaN/GaN heterostructures
2001
Ga-face AlGaN/GaN heterostructures with different sheet carrier concentrations have been studied by photoluminescence and Raman spectroscopy. Compared to bulk GaN, an energy shift of the excitonic emission lines towards higher energies was observed, indicating the presence of residual compressive strain in the GaN layer. This strain was confirmed by the shift of the E2 Raman line, from which biaxial compressive stresses ranging between 0.34 and 1.7 GPa were deduced. The spontaneous and piezoelectric polarizations for each layer of the heterostructures have been also calculated. The analysis of these quantities clarified the influence of the residual stress on the sheet electron concentratio…
Structural Health Monitoring Procedure for Composite Structures through the use of Artificial Neural Networks
2015
In this paper different architectures of Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) for structural damage detection are studied. The main objective is to investigate an ANN able to detect and localize damage without any prior knowledge on its characteristics so as to serve as a real-time data processor for Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) systems. Two different architectures are studied: the standard feed-forward Multi Layer Perceptron (MLP) and the Radial Basis Function (RBF) ANNs. The training data are given, in terms of a Damage Index ℑD, properly defined using a piezoelectric sensor signal output to obtain suitable information on the damage position and dimensions. The electromechanical respon…
Numerical Analysis of Piezoelectric Active Repair in the Presence of Frictional Contact Conditions
2013
The increasing development of smart materials, such as piezoelectric and shape memory alloys, has opened new opportunities for improving repair techniques. Particularly, active repairs, based on the converse piezoelectric effect, can increase the life of a structure by reducing the crack opening. A deep characterization of the electromechanical behavior of delaminated composite structures, actively repaired by piezoelectric patches, can be achieved by considering the adhesive layer between the host structure and the repair and by taking into account the frictional contact between the crack surfaces. In this paper, Boundary Element (BE) analyses performed on delaminated composite structures …
Piezoelectric energy harvesting from raised crosswalk devices
2015
This paper presents the main characteristics of an experimental energy harvesting device that can be used to recover energy from the vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The use of a piezoelectric bender devices leads to a innovative approach to Henergy Harvesting. The study focuses on the definition and specification of a mechanical configuration able to transfer the vibration from the main box to the piezoelectric transducer. The piezoelectric devices tested is the commonly used monolithic piezoceramic material lead-zirconate-titanate (PZT). The experimental results estimate the efficiency of this device tested and identify the feasibility of their use in real world applications. The results…