Over 10% Gain of Output Power of Medium-Sized Solar Cells by an Improvement of Geometry of Collector Electrodes

Practical solar cells require larger active areas than ones in the R&D stage in laboratories. However, the enlargement lowers conversion efficiency because of the following two reasons: (1) increase of resistive loss in the transparent conductive electrode caused by the longer distance for the photogenerated carriers to pass and (2) active area loss caused by shadows of collector electrodes laid on to reduce the previous resistive loss. In the present study, we have constructed an advisable modeling method to calculate output power of medium-sized solar cells and optimized geometry of the collector electrodes. Results of the modeling taught us a possible improvement of the output power by over 10%. These simulated results were reproduced by electrochemical experiments

Hydrogen/deuterium absorption capacity of Pd nanomaterials and its relation with heat generated upon loading of hydrogen isotope gases

Abstract: Using Sievert's method, hydrogen/deuterium absorption capacity was measured for Pd nanopowder and nanocomposites of nanoPd/ γ Al2O3 and nanoPd/ZrO2. For these materials, heat evolution upon loading of hydrogen isotope gases was also measured by a flow calorimeter. In order to identify the properties of metallic Pd nanoparticles, both measurements were conducted repeatedly three or four times without exposing the samples to air. It was found that both apparent absorption capacity and heat evolution depended strongly on the degree of oxidation of Pd. The amount of the oxidized Pd in each sample was estimated from the difference between the apparent and the true values of hydrogen/deuterium absorption capacity and used to evaluate the heat generated from chemical reactions. The hydrogen absorption capacity at 1MPa was found to be slightly smaller than that of Pd bulk for all the Pd nanomaterials studied. The heat evolution was composed of two stages, i.e., the first stage during pressurizing the samples from 0 to 1MPa and the second stage where the the sample was kept under a fixed pressure of 1MPa. The heat generated in the first stage was largely explained by taking into account two chemical reactions, i.e., the water formation reaction and the hydride/deuteride formation reaction. It was noted that in the second stage, where the heat generated from chemical reactions was hardly expected to occur, a small heat power was observed intermittently when the samples were loaded with deuterium gas

Direct fast heating efficiency of a counter-imploded core plasma employing a laser for fast ignition experiments (LFEX)

Fast heating efficiency when a pre-imploded core is directly heated with an ultraintense laser (heating laser) was investigated. \u27Direct heating\u27 means that a heating laser hits a pre-imploded core without applying either a laser guiding cone or an external field. The efficiency, η, is defined as the increase in the internal core energy divided by the energy of the heating laser. Six beams (output of 1.6 kJ) from the GEKKO XII (GXII) green laser system at the Institute of Laser Engineering (ILE), Osaka University were applied to implode a spherical deuterated polystyrene (CD) shell target to form a dense core. The DD-reacted protons and the core x-ray emissions showed a core density of 2.8 ± 0.7 g cm−3, or 2.6 times the solid density. Furthermore, DD-reacted thermal neutrons were utilized to estimate the core temperature between 600 and 750 eV. Thereafter, the core was directly heated by a laser for fast-ignition experiments (LFEX, an extremely energetic ultrashort pulse laser) at ILE with its axis lying along or perpendicular to the GXII bundle axis, respectively. The former and latter laser configurations were termed \u27axial\u27 and \u27transverse modes\u27, respectively. The η was estimated from three independent methods: (1) the core x-ray emission, (2) the thermal neutron yield, and (3) the runaway hot electron spectra. For the axial mode, 0.8%< η <2.1% at low power (low LFEX energy) and 0.4%< η <2.5% at high power (high LFEX energy). For the transverse mode, 2.6%< η <7% at low power and 1.5%< η <7.7% at high power. Their efficiencies were compared with that in the uniform implosion mode using 12 GXII beams, 6% < η <12%, which appeared near to the η for the transverse mode, except that the error bar is very large

日本睡眠歯科学会口腔内装置診療ガイドライン作成委員会の活動報告

Oral appliance therapy was approved by national health insurance in Japan in 2004 and oral appliances（OAs）have since been widely used in the treatment of obstructive sleep apnea（OSA）. We herein described the process of making clinical practice guidelines by the task force of the Japanese Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine as a work report. In Japan, OAs are covered by national health insurance. In consideration of the balance between medical treatment fees and the price of technical materials, we used a single-piece（monoblock）OA that advanced the mandible forward and limited mouth opening in OSA patients in Japan. The Japanese Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine（JADSM）focused on OAs frequently used for the treatment of OSA in Japan, and considered an evaluation of their effects to benecessary. Clinical practice guidelines were developed using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation（GRADE）system. We recommend OAs that advanced the mandible forward and limited mouth opening for patients with OSA.However, CPAP should be used by patients for whom it has been indicated. OAs are desirable for those who cannot use CPAP（GRADE 1B, strong recommendation/quality of evidence, “Moderate quality”）. The long-term effects and side effects, OSA severity, and comorbidities of OA therapy were not examined, which represented a limitation to the present study. In future studies, the Japanese Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine plan to update clinical practice guidelines for oral appliances used in OSA

Estimation of the Electricity Storage Volume Density of Compact SMESs of a New Concept Based on Si Microfabrication Technologies

A compact superconducting magnetic energy storage system (SMES) produced by Si micro fabrication technologies has been proposed to improve electricity storage volume density, w, in the sub-Wh/L range of conventional SMESs and to produce them at a low cost by mass production. In parallel with the experimental development reported previously, a series of trials was performed to estimate a feasible value of w based on the calculation of the magnetic field generated by the compact SMES by improving the calculation models step by step. In this work, the experimentally obtained magnetic flux density dependence of superconductive critical current density was taken into consideration for the first time in this series of trials, together with the additional improvement of the calculation models. The results of the estimation indicated that a compact SMES produced by the proposed concept can attain a w in the Wh/L range or more, ranking with or surpassing that of presently used capacitors

Ionization potentials of transparent conductive indium tin oxide films covered with a single layer of fluorine-doped tin oxide nanoparticles grown by spray pyrolysis deposition

Indium tin oxide (ITO) films deposited with single layers of monodispersive fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) nanoparticles of several nanometers in size were grown on glass substrates by intermittent spray pyrolysis deposition using conventional atomizers. These films have significantly higher ionization potentials than the bare ITO and FTO films grown using the same technique. The ITO films covered with FTO particles of 7 nm in average size show an ionization potential of 5.01 eV, as compared with 4.76 and 4.64 eV in ITO and FTO films, respectively, which decreases as the FTO particle size increases. The ionization potentials are practically invariant against oxidation and reduction treatments, promising a wide application of the films to transparent conducting oxide electrodes in organic electroluminescent devices and light-emitting devices of high efficiencies