Thermodynamic vs kinetic control of particle assembly and pattern replication

This research aims to investigate how particles assemble together through thermodynamic and kinetic control. Particle assembly with thermodynamic control is achieved in part due to electrostatic attraction between particles. Electrostatic attraction between particles can be achieved by functionalizing polystyrene or SiO2 particles with different charges. Particles with different charges will come together in solution slowly and self-assemble to form ordered crystals with different patterns based on size and charge ratios of two oppositely charged particles. Kinetic control of particle assembly is achieved by pattern aided exponential amplification of nanoscale structures. Some of these nanoscale structures are difficult to build with other conventional synthetic methods. On the other hand, as for kinetically controlled particle replication, the patterns can be synthesized by one of two ways i) crystal products which are produced by thermodynamically controlled particle assembly or ii) single particle deposition. Specifically, kinetically controlled particle assembly focuses on constructing SiO2 particles. Exponential replication of SiO2 particles is achieved by growing a bridge layer , between templates of SiO2 particles and next generation SiO2 replicas. By dissolving the bridge layer, two times the amount of the SiO2 particles with the shape of the original templates can be formed. In the next generation, all the particles serve as template particles. Thus, after n cycles of replication, 2n amount of products can be formed. If successful, particle assembly can be thermodynamic controlled and particle exponential replication can be kinetical controlled, which will enable new ways to build particles with well-defined shapes from readily available building blocks

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS OF INDONESIA’S HIGHER EDUCATION SERVICES TRADE

Asia is one of the fastest growing destinations for international students. Therefore, this paper was conducted by conducting a comparative study and empirical study with the aim to find out Indonesia's international competitiveness for the higher education service trade aspect, which is compared with seven other countries. To measure the international competitiveness in the higher education services trade, data from 2010 to 2017 on the number of sending and receiving students in a country and other more complex data have been used to obtain valid results. A comparative study conducted by calculating data from eight countries using the IMS, TCI and RCA measurement methods, and empirical analysis conducted using a questionnaire survey with 302 respondents' data obtained to find out the significant factors that influence the competitiveness. The results show that although Indonesia's higher education service trade is unstable every year, it still has certain competitiveness in the international scope. In addition, culture, quality of higher education and cost of living have a significant impact on the international competitiveness of higher education service trade. On this basis, this paper puts forward some countermeasures and suggestions on how to improve the international competitiveness of Indonesia's higher education service trade, including: promoting the development of Indonesian culture, improving the quality of higher education, reducing tuition fees and living costs, increasing the employment opportunities for foreign students and promoting the balanced growth of Indonesian economy. Keywords: International Competitiveness; Service Trade; Higher Education; Indonesia

On Power Law Scaling Dynamics for Time-fractional Phase Field Models during Coarsening

In this paper, we study the phase field models with fractional-order in time. The phase field models have been widely used to study coarsening dynamics of material systems with microstructures. It is known that phase field models are usually derived from energy variation so that they obey some energy dissipation laws intrinsically. Recently, many works have been published on investigating fractional-order phase field models, but little is known of the corresponding energy dissipation laws. We focus on the time-fractional phase field models and report that the effective free energy and roughness obey a universal power-law scaling dynamics during coarsening. Mainly, the effective free energy and roughness in the time-fractional phase field models scale by following a similar power law as the integer phase field models, where the power is linearly proportional to the fractional order. This universal scaling law is verified numerically against several phase field models, including the Cahn-Hilliard equations with different variable mobilities and molecular beam epitaxy models. This new finding sheds light on potential applications of time fractional phase field models in studying coarsening dynamics and crystal growths