1,643 research outputs found
Nanostructured titanium dioxide coatings prepared by Aerosol Assisted Chemical Vapour Deposition (AACVD)
Titanium dioxide is a compound of great interest, due to its functional properties; one of its most important uses is as a photocatalyst. TiO2 coatings can be deposited using different techniques. Aerosol Assisted Chemical Vapour Deposition (AACVD) is particularly interesting, as high temperature or pressure are not necessary to generate the gaseous precursors. Furthermore, by carefully choosing the deposition conditions (i.e. deposition temperature, solvent), it is possible to obtain deposits with different morphology and, consequently, different functional properties. In this paper we present the synthesis of titanium dioxide coatings with AACVD using complexes between titanium isopropoxide (TIPP) and acetyl acetone (acac) as precursors. Deposition experiments were performed using different ratios of TIPP to acac, to assess the effect on the composition of the coatings, their morphology and photocatalytic activity. Results showed that the use of acac led to nanostructured titanium dioxide (nanoparticles of about 10−25 nm diameter). Raman analysis showed the presence of both anatase and rutile phases. XPS analysis indicated the presence of residual carbonaceous species in the coatings; despite this, they displayed photocatalytic properties similar or superior to AACVD films without carbon. Photocatalytic tests, performed measuring the Formal Quantum Efficiency (FQE) and the Formal Quantum Yield (FQY) in the degradation of resazurin, showed that a acac:TIPP ratio equal to 1 led to the material with the highest performance, as the FQE value was about three times higher than that for the coating prepared with TIPP alone. Overall the complexes between TIPP and acac are promising precursors for the AACVD technique, leading to nanostructured coatings with enhanced performance
A Radio Determination of the Time of the New Moon
The detection of the New Moon at sunset is of importance to communities based
on the lunar calendar. This is traditionally undertaken with visual
observations. We propose a radio method which allows a higher visibility of the
Moon relative to the Sun and consequently gives us the ability to detect the
Moon much closer to the Sun than is the case of visual observation. We first
compare the relative brightness of the Moon and Sun over a range of possible
frequencies and find the range 5--100\,GHz to be suitable. The next
consideration is the atmospheric absorption/emission due to water vapour and
oxygen as a function of frequency. This is particularly important since the
relevant observations are near the horizon. We show that a frequency of GHz is optimal for this programme. We have designed and constructed a
telescope with a FWHM resolution of 0.6 and low sidelobes to
demonstrate the potential of this approach. At the time of the 21 May 2012 New
Moon the Sun/Moon brightness temperature ratio was in agreement
with predictions from the literature when combined with the observed sunspot
numbers for the day. The Moon would have been readily detectable at from the Sun. Our observations at 16\,hr\,36\,min UT indicated that
the Moon would have been at closest approach to the Sun 16\,hr\,25\,min
earlier; this was the annular solar eclipse of 00\,hr\,00\,min\,UT on 21 May
2012.Comment: 11 pages, 15 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA
POLAR: Instrument and Results
We describe the design, performance, and results of a polarimeter used to make precision measurements of the 2.7 K cosmic microwave background. In the Spring of 2000 the instrument searched for polarized emission in three microwave frequency bands spanning 26–36 GHz. The instrument achieved high sensitivity and long-term stability, and has produced the most stringent limits to date on the amplitude of the large angular scale polarization of the cosmic microwave background radiation
Novel hydroxyapatite-TiO2 composite material for photocatalytic degradation of diclofenac
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
COMPASS: a 2.6m telescope for CMBR polarization studies
COMPASS (COsmic Microwave Polarization at Small Scale) is an experiment devoted to measuring the polarization of the CMBR. Its design and characteristics are presented
Biomimetic calcium carbonate with hierarchical porosity produced using cork as a sustainable template agent
Calcium carbonate has many applications in different fields; its use in environment remediation is particularly considered, due to its non-toxicity and potentially high efficiency. The structure, morphology and surface features of calcium carbonate can greatly affect its performance. Hierarchical porosity, in particular, can be beneficial for several functional properties. In this study, we report the synthesis of biomorphic calcium carbonate using a sustainable template agent – waste cork powder. Pyrolysed cork powder was infiltrated by an appropriate calcium-containing salt and successively thermally treated. Selected precursors, different impregnation-solution concentrations and thermal conditions were tested. The resulting materials were characterised by XRD, Raman spectroscopy and SEM. Surface area and porosity features were studied by BET analysis, with a detailed study on the effect of synthesis on the mesoporosity of the materials, average sizes varying between 4−15 nm. The most valuable results were achieved with calcium acetate followed by pyrolysis performed for relatively short time period. This maintained the porous 3D honeycomb cork structure made of ∼20 μm hexagonal cells, while consisting of highly mesoporous single-phase CaCO3. Such samples showed the highest surface area ever reported for CaCO3 prepared using a plant-based template; moreover, it also exhibited a dual-scale hierarchical porosity as, in addition to micrometer scale cellular macroporosity, it contained a significant mesoporosity in the cell walls, with a very narrow range of 3.6–3.9 nm.
These promising characteristics enable the potential employment of cork-derived CaCO3 for environment remediation.publishe
Detection of Zak phases and topological invariants in a chiral quantum walk of twisted photons
Topological insulators are fascinating states of matter exhibiting protected
edge states and robust quantized features in their bulk. Here, we propose and
validate experimentally a method to detect topological properties in the bulk
of one-dimensional chiral systems. We first introduce the mean chiral
displacement, and we show that it rapidly approaches a multiple of the Zak
phase in the long time limit. Then we measure the Zak phase in a photonic
quantum walk, by direct observation of the mean chiral displacement in its
bulk. Next, we measure the Zak phase in an alternative, inequivalent timeframe,
and combine the two windings to characterize the full phase diagram of this
Floquet system. Finally, we prove the robustness of the measure by introducing
dynamical disorder in the system. This detection method is extremely general,
as it can be applied to all one-dimensional platforms simulating static or
Floquet chiral systems.Comment: 10 pages, 7 color figures (incl. appendices) Close to the published
versio
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