497 research outputs found
Iron single crystal growth from a lithium-rich melt
\alpha-Fe single crystals of rhombic dodecahedral habit were grown from a
melt of LiNFe. Crystals of several millimeter along a
side form at temperatures around C. Upon further cooling
the growth competes with the formation of Fe-doped LiN. The b.c.c.
structure and good sample quality of \alpha-Fe single crystals were confirmed
by X-ray and electron diffraction as well as magnetization measurements and
chemical analysis. A nitrogen concentration of 90\,ppm was detected by means of
carrier gas hot extraction. Scanning electron microscopy did not reveal any
sign of iron nitride precipitates.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure
Laves phases: a review of their functional and structural applications and an improved fundamental understanding of stability and properties
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Stabilization of the ζ-Cu10Sn3 Phase by Ni at Soldering-Relevant Temperatures
A current issue in electrical engineering is the enhancement of the quality of solder joints. This is mainly associated with the ongoing electrification of transportation as well as the miniaturization of (power) electronics. For the reliability of solder joints, intermetallic phases in the microstructure of the solder are of great importance. The formation of the intermetallic phases in the Cu-Sn solder system was investigated for different annealing temperatures between 472 K and 623 K using pure Cu as well as Cu-1at.%Ni and Cu-3at.%Ni substrate materials. These are relevant for lead frame materials in electronic components. The Cu and Cu-Ni alloys were in contact to galvanic plated Sn. This work is focused on the unexpected formation of the hexagonal ζ-(Cu,Ni)10Sn3 phase at annealing temperatures of 523â623 K, which is far below the eutectoid decomposition temperature of binary ζ-Cu10Sn3 of about 855 K. By using scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, electron backscatter diffraction and X-ray diffraction the presence of the ζ phase was confirmed and its structural properties were analyzed
Prediction of stable walking for a toy that cannot stand
Previous experiments [M. J. Coleman and A. Ruina, Phys. Rev. Lett. 80, 3658
(1998)] showed that a gravity-powered toy with no control and which has no
statically stable near-standing configurations can walk stably. We show here
that a simple rigid-body statically-unstable mathematical model based loosely
on the physical toy can predict stable limit-cycle walking motions. These
calculations add to the repertoire of rigid-body mechanism behaviors as well as
further implicating passive-dynamics as a possible contributor to stability of
animal motions.Comment: Note: only corrections so far have been fixing typo's in these
comments. 3 pages, 2 eps figures, uses epsf.tex, revtex.sty, amsfonts.sty,
aps.sty, aps10.sty, prabib.sty; Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. E.
4/9/2001 ; information about Andy Ruina's lab (including Coleman's, Garcia's
and Ruina's other publications and associated video clips) can be found at:
http://www.tam.cornell.edu/~ruina/hplab/index.html and more about Georg
Bock's Simulation Group with whom Katja Mombaur is affiliated can be found at
http://www.iwr.uni-heidelberg.de/~agboc
Suppression of the structural phase transition and lattice softening in slightly underdoped Ba(1-x)K(x)Fe2As2 with electronic phase separation
We present x-ray powder diffraction (XRPD) and neutron diffraction
measurements on the slightly underdoped iron pnictide superconductor
Ba(1-x)K(x)Fe2As2, Tc = 32K. Below the magnetic transition temperature Tm =
70K, both techniques show an additional broadening of the nuclear Bragg peaks,
suggesting a weak structural phase transition. However, macroscopically the
system does not break its tetragonal symmetry down to 15 K. Instead, XRPD
patterns at low temperature reveal an increase of the anisotropic microstrain
proportionally in all directions. We associate this effect with the electronic
phase separation, previously observed in the same material, and with the effect
of lattice softening below the magnetic phase transition. We employ density
functional theory to evaluate the distribution of atomic positions in the
presence of dopant atoms both in the normal and magnetic states, and to
quantify the lattice softening, showing that it can account for a major part of
the observed increase of the microstrain.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figure
Tactile Sensors Based on Conductive Polymers
This paper presents results from a selection of tactile sensors that have been designed and fabricated. These sensors are based on a common approach that consists in placing a sheet of piezoresistive material on the top of a set of electrodes. We use a thin film of conductive polymer as the piezoresistive mateÂŹrial. Specifically, a conductive water-based ink of this polymer is deposited by spin coating on a flexible plastic sheet, giving it a smooth, homogeneous and conducting thin film. The main interest in this procedure is that it is cheap and it allows the fabrication of flexible and low cost tactile sensors. In this work we present results from sensors made using two technologies. Firstly, we have used a flexible Printed Circuit Board (PCB) technology to fabricate the set of electrodes and addressing tracks. The result is a simple, flexible tactile sensor. In addition to these sensors on PCB, we have proposed, designed and fabricated sensors with screen printing technology. In this case, the set of electrodes and addressing tracks are made by printing an ink based on silver nanoparticles. The intense characterization provides us insights into the design of these tactile sensors.This work has been partially funded by the spanish government under contract TEC2006-12376-C02
Chemical bath deposition of textured and compact zinc oxide thin films on vinyl-terminated polystyrene brushes
In this study we investigated the influence of an organic polystyrene brush on the deposition of ZnO thin films under moderate conditions. On a non-modified SiOx surface, island growth is observed, whereas the polymer brush induces homogeneous film growth. A chemical modification of the polystyrene brushes during the mineralization process occurs, which enables stronger interaction between the then polar template and polar ZnO crystallites in solution. This may lead to oriented attachment of the crystallites so that the observed (002) texture arises. Characterization of the templates and the resulting ZnO films were performed with ζ-potential and contact angle measurements as well as scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Infrared spectroscopy (IR) measurements were used to investigate the polystyrene brushes before and after modification
Relaxation Methods for Mixed-Integer Optimal Control of Partial Differential Equations
We consider integer-restricted optimal control of systems governed by
abstract semilinear evolution equations. This includes the problem of optimal
control design for certain distributed parameter systems endowed with multiple
actuators, where the task is to minimize costs associated with the dynamics of
the system by choosing, for each instant in time, one of the actuators together
with ordinary controls. We consider relaxation techniques that are already used
successfully for mixed-integer optimal control of ordinary differential
equations. Our analysis yields sufficient conditions such that the optimal
value and the optimal state of the relaxed problem can be approximated with
arbitrary precision by a control satisfying the integer restrictions. The
results are obtained by semigroup theory methods. The approach is constructive
and gives rise to a numerical method. We supplement the analysis with numerical
experiments
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