Conducting Polymers with Functional Dopants and their Applications in Energy, Environmental Technology, and Nanotechnology

Development of novel conducting polymers (CPs) is expected to facilitate the advancement of functional materials used for energy, environmental, and nanotechnology. Recent research efforts are focused on doping CPs with functional dopants to enhance their performance or add additional functions that are not inherent in CPs. This review surveys literatures about the doped CPs focusing on the roles of functional dopants, unlike other reviews focusing on the development of new conducting polymer backbones. The functional dopants presented in this review include redox active molecules, carbon nanomaterials, biopolymers, and chelating molecules. Depending on the dopants and their physicochemical properties, the doped CPs can be used for a variety of applications such as polymer batteries, membranes for waste water treatment, and chemical sensors. A major challenge of the CPs is presented and the ways to overcome the challenge is also suggested for the future development of stable, high performance CPs.ope

DeepIron: Predicting Unwarped Garment Texture from a Single Image

Realistic reconstruction of 3D clothing from an image has wide applications, such as avatar creation and virtual try-on. This paper presents a novel framework that reconstructs the texture map for 3D garments from a single image with pose. Assuming that 3D garments are modeled by stitching 2D garment sewing patterns, our specific goal is to generate a texture image for the sewing patterns. A key component of our framework, the Texture Unwarper, infers the original texture image from the input clothing image, which exhibits warping and occlusion of texture due to the user's body shape and pose. The Texture Unwarper effectively transforms between the input and output images by mapping the latent spaces of the two images. By inferring the unwarped original texture of the input garment, our method helps reconstruct 3D garment models that can show high-quality texture images realistically deformed for new poses. We validate the effectiveness of our approach through a comparison with other methods and ablation studies

Increasing the Durability of Piezoelectric Impact-based Micro Wind Generator in Real Application

AbstractThe purpose of this study is to increase the durability of piezoelectric impact-based micro wind generator (PIMWG) in real application. Using new PIMWG design, numerical simulation, and experimental comparison analysis, we improved the durability of PIMWGs in real application. The experimental results show that the optimized PIMWG generated 2.4 mW (RMS value), and it did not crack within 40h. In this study, we improved the durability of PIMWGs for real application

Chiroptical signal enhancement in quasi-null-polarization-detection geometry: Intrinsic limitations

Despite its unique capability of distinguishing molecular handedness, chiroptical spectroscopy suffers from the weak-signal problem, which has restricted more extensive applications. The quasi-null-polarization-detection (QNPD) method has been shown to be useful for enhancing the chiroptical signal. Here, the underlying enhancement mechanism in the QNPD method combined with a heterodyne detection scheme is elucidated. It is experimentally demonstrated that the optical rotatory dispersion signal can be amplified by a factor of similar to 400, which is the maximum enhancement effect achievable with our femtosecond laser setup. The upper limit of the QNPD enhancement effect of chiroptical measurements could, in practice, be limited by imperfection of the polarizer and finite detection sensitivity. However, we show that there exists an intrinsic limit in the enhancement with the QNPD method due to the weak but finite contribution from the homodyne chiroptical signal. This is experimentally verified by measuring the optical rotation of linearly polarized light with the QNPD scheme. We further provide discussions on the connection between this intrinsic limitation in the QNPD scheme for enhanced detection of weak chiroptical signals and those in optical enantioselectivity and Raman optical activity with a structured chiral field. We anticipate that the present work could be useful in further developing time-resolved nonlinear chiroptical spectroscopy.111Nsciescopu

Structural studies on Helicobacter pylori ATP-dependent protease, FtsH

The crystal structures of the Helicobacter pylori FtsH ATPase domain in the nucleotide-free state and complexed with ADP have been determined

A Flexible Piezoelectric Energy Harvester-Based Single-Layer WS2 Nanometer 2D Material for Self-Powered Sensors

A piezoelectric sensor is a typical self-powered sensor. With the advantages of a high sensitivity, high frequency band, high signal-to-noise ratio, simple structure, light weight, and reliable operation, it has gradually been applied to the field of smart wearable devices. Here, we first report a flexible piezoelectric sensor (FPS) based on tungsten disulfide (WS2) monolayers that generate electricity when subjected to human movement. The generator maximum voltage was 2.26 V, and the produced energy was 55.45 μJ of the electrical charge on the capacitor (capacity: 220 μF) when applying periodic pressing by 13 kg. The generator demonstrated here can meet the requirements of human motion energy because it generates an average voltage of 7.74 V (a knee), 8.7 V (a sole), and 4.58 V (an elbow) when used on a running human (weight: 75 kg). Output voltages embody distinct patterns for different human parts, the movement-recognition capability of the cellphone application. This generator is quite promising for smart sensors in human–machine interaction detecting personal movement