Bayesian analysis of ages, masses, and distances to cool stars with non-LTE spectroscopic parameters

For studies of Galactic evolution, the accurate characterization of stars in terms of their evolutionary stage and population membership is of fundamental importance. A standard approach relies on extracting this information from stellar evolution models but requires the effective temperature, surface gravity, and metallicity of a star obtained by independent means. In previous work, we determined accurate effective temperatures and non-LTE logg and [Fe/H] (NLTE-Opt) for a large sample of metal-poor stars, -3<[Fe/H]<-0.5, selected from the RAVE survey. As a continuation of that work, we derive here their masses, ages, and distances using a Bayesian scheme and GARSTEC stellar tracks. For comparison, we also use stellar parameters determined from the widely-used 1D LTE excitation-ionization balance of Fe (LTE-Fe). We find that the latter leads to systematically underestimated stellar ages, by 10-30%, but overestimated masses and distances. Metal-poor giants suffer from the largest fractional distance biases of 70%. Furthermore, we compare our results with those released by the RAVE collaboration for the stars in common (DR3, Zwitter et al. 2010, Seibert et al. 2011). This reveals -400 to +400 K offsets in effective temperature, -0.5 to 1.0 dex offsets in surface gravity, and 10 to 70% in distances. The systematic trends strongly resemble the correlation we find between the NLTE-Opt and LTE-Fe parameters, indicating that the RAVE DR3 data may be affected by the physical limitations of the 1D LTE synthetic spectra. Our results bear on any study, where spectrophotometric distances underlie stellar kinematics. In particular, they shed new light on the debated controversy about the Galactic halo origin raised by the SDSS/SEGUE observations.Comment: 13 pages and 15 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRA

First evidence of multiple populations along the AGB from Str\"omgren photometry

Spectroscopic studies have demonstrated that nearly all Galactic globular clusters (GCs) harbour multiple stellar populations with different chemical compositions. Moreover, colour-magnitude diagrams based exclusively on Str\"omgrem photometry have allowed us to identify and characterise multiple populations along the RGB of a large number of clusters. In this paper we show for the first time that Str\"omgren photometry is also very effcient at identifying multiple populations along the AGB, and demonstrate that the AGB of M3, M92, NGC362, NGC1851, and NGC6752 are not consistent with a single stellar population. We also provide a catalogue of RGB and AGB stars photometrically identified in these clusters for further spectroscopic follow-up studies.We combined photometry and elemental abundances from the literature for RGB and AGB stars in NGC6752 where the presence of multiple populations along the AGB has been widely debated. We find that, while the MS, SGB, and RGB host three stellar populations with different helium and light element abundances, only two populations of AGB stars are present in the cluster. These results are consistent with standard evolutionary theory.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, 1 table in the main article, 3 tables in the appendix of which 2 tables containing coordinates and photometry of photometrically identified RGB and AGB star

Porous silicon solar cells

We developed a new process for the fabrication of crystalline solar cell, based on an ultrathin silicon membrane, taking advantage of porous silicon technology. The suggested architecture allows the costs reduction of silicon based solar cell reusing the same wafer to produce a great number of membranes. The architectures combines the efficiency of crystalline silicon solar cell, with the great absorption of porous silicon, and with a more efficient way to use the material. The new process faces the main challenge to achieve an effective and not expensive passivation of the porous silicon surface, in order to achieve an efficient photovoltaic device. At the same time the process suggests a smart way to selective doping of the macroporous silicon layers despite the through-going pores. © 2015 IEEE. SciVal Topic Prominence  Topic: Porous silicon | Silicon | macroporous silicon Prominence percentile: 66.984  Author keywords nanofabricationporous siliconsilicon nanoelectronicssolar cells Indexed keywords Engineering controlled terms: Crystalline materialsNanoelectronicsNanostructured materialsNanotechnologyPorous siliconSiliconSilicon wafersSolar cells Engineering uncontrolled terms Crystalline silicon solar cellsCrystalline solar cellsMacro porous siliconPhotovoltaic devicesPorous silicon surfacesPorous silicon technologySilicon nanoelectronicsUltrathin silicon membrane Engineering main heading: Silicon solar cells ISBN: 978-146738155-0 Source Type: Conference Proceeding Original language: English DOI: 10.1109/NANO.2015.7388710 Document Type: Conference Paper Sponsors: Nanotechnology Council Publisher: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc. References (9) View in search results format ▻ All Export  Print  E-mail Save to PDF Create bibliography 1 (2012) International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaics Results 2012. Cited 24 times. ITRPV, Third Edition, Berlin 2012 www.ITRPV.net 2 Lehmann, V., Honlein, W., Stengl, R., Willer, J., Wendt, H. (1992) Verfahren Zur Herstellung Einer Solarzelle Aus Einer Substratscheibe. Cited 6 times. German patent DE4204455C1; Filing date: 29. 01. 3 Brendel, R., Ernst, M. Macroporous Si as an absorber for thin-film solar cells (2010) Physica Status Solidi - Rapid Research Letters, 4 (1-2), pp. 40-42. Cited 22 times. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/123215552/PDFSTART doi: 10.1002/pssr.200903372 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 4 Ernst, M., Brendel, R., Ferré, R., Harder, N.-P. Thin macroporous silicon heterojunction solar cells (2012) Physica Status Solidi - Rapid Research Letters, 6 (5), pp. 187-189. Cited 16 times. doi: 10.1002/pssr.201206113 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 5 Ernst, M., Brendel, R. Macroporous silicon solar cells with an epitaxial emitter (2013) IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics, 3 (2), art. no. 6472253, pp. 723-729. Cited 7 times. doi: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2013.2247094 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 6 Ernst, M., Schulte-Huxel, H., Niepelt, R., Kajari-Schröder, S., Brendel, R. Thin crystalline macroporous silicon solar cells with ion implanted emitter (Open Access) (2013) Energy Procedia, 38, pp. 910-918. Cited 2 times. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/18766102 doi: 10.1016/j.egypro.2013.07.364 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 7 Nenzi, P., Kholostov, K., Crescenzi, R., Bondarenka, H., Bondarenko, V., Balucani, M. Electrochemically etched TSV for porous silicon interposer technologies (2013) Proceedings - Electronic Components and Technology Conference, art. no. 6575887, pp. 2201-2207. Cited 2 times. ISBN: 978-147990233-0 doi: 10.1109/ECTC.2013.6575887 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 8 Perticaroli, S., Varlamava, V., Palma, F. Microwave sensing of nanostructured semiconductor surfaces (2014) Applied Physics Letters, 104 (1), art. no. 013110. Cited 3 times. doi: 10.1063/1.4861424 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher 9 De Cesare, G., Caputo, D., Tucci, M. Electrical properties of ITO/crystalline-silicon contact at different deposition temperatures (2012) IEEE Electron Device Letters, 33 (3), art. no. 6142006, pp. 327-329. Cited 28 times. doi: 10.1109/LED.2011.2180356 Locate full-text(opens in a new window) View at Publisher © Copyright 2017 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved. ◅ Back to results ◅ Previous 3of10 Next ▻  Top of page Metrics Learn more about article metrics in Scopus (opens in a new window)  0 Citations in Scopus 0 Learn more about Field-Weighted Citation Impact Field-Weighted Citation Impact PlumX Metrics Usage, Captures, Mentions, Social Media and Citations beyond Scopus.  Cited by 0 documents Inform me when this document is cited in Scopus: Set citation alert ▻ Set citation feed ▻ Related documents Thin crystalline macroporous silicon solar cells with ion implanted emitter Ernst, M. , Schulte-Huxel, H. , Niepelt, R. (2013) Energy Procedia Multilayer etching for kerf-free solar cells from macroporous silicon Schäfer, S. , Ernst, M. , Kajari-Schröder, S. (2013) Energy Procedia Macroporous silicon solar cells with an epitaxial emitter Ernst, M. , Brendel, R. (2013) IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics View all related documents based on references Find more related documents in Scopus based on: Authors ▻ Keywords ▻ About Scopus What is Scopus Content coverage Scopus blog Scopus API Privacy matters Language 日本語に切り替える 切换到简体中文 切換到繁體中文 Русский язык Customer Service Help Contact us Elsevier Terms and conditions ↗ Privacy policy ↗ Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V ↗. All rights reserved. Scopus® is a registered trademark of Elsevier B.V. We use cookies to help provide and enhance our service and tailor content. By continuing, you agree to the use of cookies. RELX Group We developed a new process for the fabrication of crystalline solar cell, based on an ultrathin silicon membrane, taking advantage of porous silicon technology. The suggested architecture allows the costs reduction of silicon based solar cell reusing the same wafer to produce a great number of membranes. The architectures combines the efficiency of crystalline silicon solar cell, with the great absorption of porous silicon, and with a more efficient way to use the material. The new process faces the main challenge to achieve an effective and not expensive passivation of the porous silicon surface, in order to achieve an efficient photovoltaic device. At the same time the process suggests a smart way to selective doping of the macroporous silicon layers despite the through-going pores

Laser Treatment to form An Effective Base Contact in a - Si:H/c-Si Heterojunction Solar Cells☆

Abstract In this paper we investigate the p-type a-Si:H/ia-Si:H/p-type c-Si structure, commonly used as base contact in amorphous/crystalline silicon heterojunction solar cell when fabricated on p-type c-Si wafer. Even though the most effective amorphous silicon/crystalline silicon heterostructure is based on n-type c-Si due to higher bulk lifetime, the p-type c-Si still remains the most common and cheaper substrate for silicon based solar cell. In particular we study the effect of localized 532 nm pulsed laser treatment at different laser conditions in order to reduce the cell series resistance due to the base contact. In this approach the p-type a-Si:H layer is used as a source of boron dopant. Depending on the thickness of the p-type a-Si:H film, when the laser beam is focused on p-type a-Si:H layer the boron can be transferred into the c-Si base to form an overdoped region and then an effective local Back Surface Field, able to enhance the hole collection at the metal of the base electrode in the p-type c-Si based heterojunction solar cell. The application of a thin Aluminum layer on top of the amorphous silicon to be treated by laser is also concerned. Series resistance of a transverse structure composed by the laser treated p-type a-Si:H/c-Si/opposite surface contacted by InGa is considered to optimize the laser procedure. Values as low as 0.5 Ωcm 2 are obtained when the aluminum layer is adopted

unveiling systematic biases in the 1d lte excitation-ionization balance of fe for fgk stars: A novel approach to determination of stellar parameters

We present a comprehensive analysis of different techniques available for the spectroscopic analysis of FGK stars and provide a recommended methodology which efficiently estimates accurate stellar atmospheric parameters for large samples of stars. Our analysis includes a simultaneous equivalent width analysis of Fe I and Fe II spectral lines, and for the first time, utilizes on-the-fly non-local thermodynamic equilibrium (NLTE) corrections of individual Fe I lines. We further investigate several temperature scales, finding that estimates from Balmer line measurements provide the most accurate effective temperatures at all metallicities. We apply our analysis to a large sample of both dwarf and giant stars selected from the Radial Velocity Experiment (RAVE) survey. We then show that the difference between parameters determined by our method and that by the standard 1D LTE excitation-ionization balance of Fe reveals substantial systematic biases: up to 400 K in effective temperature, 1.0 dex in surface gravity and 0.4 dex in metallicity for stars with [Fe/H] -2.5. This has large implications for the study of the stellar populations in the Milky Wa

Hydrogen Plasma and Thermal Annealing Treatments on a-Si:H Thin Film for c-Si Surface Passivation☆

Abstract High efficiency solar cells can be fruitfully built using the amorphous/crystalline silicon technology, taking advantage of the high V oc that occurs as a consequence of excellent c-Si surface passivation provided by a-Si:H films. Improvements of the interface quality can be obtained using post deposition treatments such as hydrogen plasma and thermal annealing. We propose the use of surface photovoltage technique, as a contact-less tool to evaluate the energetic distribution of the state density at amorphous/crystalline silicon interface, and FTIR spectroscopy of the same samples to appreciate the evolution of Si-H and Si-H 2 bonds. This approach leads to interesting applications for monitoring and improving the interface electronic quality, which is extremely susceptible to the different treatments adopted. We found that thermal annealing produces a metastable state which goes back to the initial state after just 48 hours, while the effect of hydrogen plasma post-treatment results more stable. Moreover H 2 plasma reduces the defect density of one order of magnitude with respect to thermal annealing and keeps it constant also after one month. The hydrogen plasma is able to reduce the defect density but at the same time increases the surface charge within the a-Si:H film due to the H + ions accumulated during the plasma exposure, leading to a more stable configuration

Hydrogen plasma and thermal annealing treatments on a-Si:H thin film for c-Si surface passivation

High efficiency solar cells can be fruitfully built using the amorphous/crystalline silicon technology, taking advantage of the high Voc that occurs as a consequence of excellent c-Si surface passivation provided by a-Si:H films. Improvements of the interface quality can be obtained using post deposition treatments such as hydrogen plasma and thermal annealing. We propose the use of surface photovoltage technique, as a contact-less tool to evaluate the energetic distribution of the state density at amorphous/crystalline silicon interface, and FTIR spectroscopy of the same samples to appreciate the evolution of Si-H and Si-H2 bonds. This approach leads to interesting applications for monitoring and improving the interface electronic quality, which is extremely susceptible to the different treatments adopted. We found that thermal annealing produces a metastable state which goes back to the initial state after just 48 hours, while the effect of hydrogen plasma post-treatment results more stable. Moreover H2 plasma reduces the defect density of one order of magnitude with respect to thermal annealing and keeps it constant also after one month. The hydrogen plasma is able to reduce the defect density but at the same time increases the surface charge within the a-Si:H film due to the H+ ions accumulated during the plasma exposure, leading to a more stable configuration

Discovery of Extended Main Sequence Turnoffs in Galactic Open Clusters

The color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of Galactic open clusters are widely considered to be the prototypes of single stellar populations. By using photometry in ultraviolet and optical bands we discovered that the nearby young cluster NGC 6705 (M11) exhibits an extended main-sequence turnoff (eMSTO) and a broadened main sequence (MS). This is the first evidence of multiple stellar populations in a Galactic open cluster. By using high-resolution Very Large Telescope (VLT) spectra we provide direct evidence that the multiple sequences along the CMD correspond to stellar populations with different rotation rates. Specifically, the blue MS (bMS) is formed of slow-rotating stars, while red-MS (rMS) stars are fast rotators. Moreover, we exploit photometry from Gaia data release 2 (DR2) to show that three Galactic open clusters, namely NGC 2099, NGC 2360, and NGC 2818, exhibit the eMSTO, thus suggesting that it is a common feature among these objects. Our previous work on the Large Magellanic Cloud star cluster NGC 1818 shows that slowly and rapidly rotating stars populate the bMS and rMS observed in its CMD. The similarities between M11 and the young clusters of the Magellanic Clouds (MCs) suggest that rotation is responsible for the appearance of multiple populations in the CMDs of both Milky Way open clusters and MCs young clusters.A.F.M. and L.C. acknowledge support by the Australian Research Council through Discovery Early Career Researcher Award DE160100851 and the Future Fellowship FT160100402. A.P.M. has been supported by the European Research Council through the Starting Grant “GALFOR” (716082) and the FAREMIUR project R164RM93XW “SEMPLICE”. A.S., L.B.N., and F.V. are partially supported by the MINECO (Spanish Ministry of Economy) through grants ESP2017-82674-R and ESP2016- 80079-C2-1-R (MINECO/FEDER, UE), SGR-1131 (Generalitat Catalunya), and MDM-2014-0369 of ICCUB (Unidad de Excelencia “María de Maeztu”)

The role of stress echocardiography in transcatheter aortic valve implantation and transcatheter edge-to-edge repair era: A systematic review

Objectives: In the last decade, percutaneous treatment of valve disease has changed the approach toward the treatment of aortic stenosis (AS) and mitral regurgitation (MR). The clinical usefulness of stress echocardiography (SE) in the candidates for transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) and transcatheter edge-to-edge repair (TEER) of MR remains to be established. Therefore, the key aim of this review is to assess the main applications of SE in patients undergoing TAVI or TEER. Methods: We searched for relevant studies to be included in the systematic review on PubMed (Medline), Cochrane library, Google Scholar, and Biomed Central databases. The literature search was conducted in February 2022. The inclusion criteria of the studies were: observational and clinical trials or meta-analysis involving patients with AS or MR evaluated with SE (excluding those in which SE was used only for screening of pseudo-severe stenosis) and treated with percutaneous procedures. Results: Thirteen studies published between 2013 and 2021 were included in the review: five regarding candidates for TEER and eight for TAVI. In TEER candidates, seeing an increase in MR grade, and stroke volume of &gt; 40% during SE performed before treatment was, respectively, related to clinical benefits (p = 0.008) and an increased quality of life. Moreover, overall, 25% of patients with moderate secondary MR at rest before TEER had the worsening of MR during SE. At the same time, in SE performed after TEER, an increase in mean transvalvular diastolic gradient and in systolic pulmonary pressure is expected, but without sign and symptoms of heart failure. Regarding TAVI, several studies showed that contractile reserve (CR) is not predictive of post-TAVI ejection fraction recovery and mortality in low-flow low-gradient AS either at 30 days or at long-term. Conclusion: This systematic review shows in TEER candidates, SE has proved useful in the optimization of patient selection and treatment response, while its role in TAVI candidates is less defined. Therefore, larger trials are needed to test and confirm the utility of SE in candidates for percutaneous procedures of valve diseases

First evidence of multiple populations along the AGB from Strömgren photometry

Spectroscopic studies have demonstrated that nearly all Galactic globular clusters (GCs) harbour multiple stellar populations with different chemical compositions. Moreover, colour-magnitude diagrams based exclusively on Strömgrem photometry have allowed us to identify and characterise multiple populations along the RGB of a large number of clusters. In this paper we show for the first time that Strömgren photometry is also very efficient at identifying multiple populations along the AGB, and demonstrate that the AGB of M 3, M 92, NGC 362, NGC 1851, and NGC 6752 are not consistent with a single stellar population. We also provide a catalogue of RGB and AGB stars photometrically identified in these clusters for further spectroscopic follow-up studies. We combined photometry and elemental abundances from the literature for RGB and AGB stars in NGC 6752 where the presence of multiple populations along the AGB has been widely debated. We find that, while the MS, SGB, and RGB host three stellar populations with different helium and light element abundances, only two populations of AGB stars are present in the cluster. These results are consistent with standard evolutionary theory.P.G. acknowledges support from grant No. 2011- 5042 from the Swedish Research Council. S.F acknowledge the grant The New Milky Way from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation. P.G. and S.F. acknowledges support from the Swedish National Space Board. AS acknowledges support from MINECO (ESP2015-66134-R) and Generalitat de Catalunya (SGR2014-1458). L.C gratefully acknowledge support from the Australian Research Council (grants DP150100250, FT160100402). A. P. M. acknowledges support by the Australian Research Council through Discovery Early Career Researcher Award DE150101816