High Temperature Carbonization of Coal

It is defined as heating the coal in absence of air to a final solid mass temperature of 900 degree Centigrade and above. It is the only method of producing hard coke from coking coal with better size consistency, hardness and richer in fixed carbon content to cater the needs of the blast furnace, foundry, and chemical industry

Growth mechanism of Langmuir-Blodgett films

Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) deposition is an astonishingly simple technique to grow well-ordered correlated metal-organic multilayers. To understand this growth mechanism, we have performed X-ray scattering and atomic force microscopic (AFM) studies on cadmium arachidate LB films exhibiting self-affine and logarithmic in-plane correlation at the interfaces. Using linear stochastic theory for interface evolution, it is proposed that a 1D deposition followed by a 2D desorption process is the growth mechanism of LB films. X-ray and AFM measurements confirm the crossover between these two growth regimes

Nanopattern formation in self-assembled monolayers of thiol-capped Au nanocrystals

The structure and the stability of the transferred monolayers of gold-thiol nanoparticles, formed at air-water interface at different surface pressure, on to silicon surface have been studied using two complementary techniques, X-ray reflectivity and atomic force microscopy (AFM). Networklike nanopatterns, observed through AFM, of the in-plane aggregated nanoparticles can be attributed to the late stage drying of the liquid trapped in the islands formed by nanoparticles. During drying process the trapped liquid leaves pinholes in the islands which by the process of nucleation and growth carry the mobile nanoparticles on their advancing fronts such that the nanoparticles are trapped at the boundaries of similar adjacent holes. This process continues bringing about in-plane as well as out-of-plane restructuring in the monolayer until the liquid evaporates completely rendering a patterned structure to the islands and instability in the monolayer is then stabilized

Experimental investigations on forming limit diagram of ultra thin SS 304 steel : effect of circular grid size, sheet orientation, punch size and deformation speed

In the present work, SS 304 sheet of 200 μm thickness was used to experimentally evaluate the forming limit diagram (FLD). In this context, a sub-size limiting dome height (LDH) test setup was developed to deform rectangular specimens of different widths using a 30 mm hemispherical punch. Further, effect of various parameters such as change in circular grid size, stretching direction with respect to rolling direction of the sheet, punch size and deformation speed on limiting strains was investigated. It was observed that there was marginal change in limiting strains due to the change of punch diameter from 30 mm to 50 mm. The FLD0 level changed approximately 7.5% and 6.8% with the change in punch diameter and stretching direction respectively. It was also found that the FLD0 value increased by 15% with change in circular grid diameter from 2.5 mm to 2.0 mm. However, a negligible change in the limiting strains was noted when the grid diameter was further reduced to 1.0 mm. There was negligible change in the FLD0 level with increase in punch speed from 4 mm/min to 100 mm/min, but approximately 13% decrease was found when the punch speed was further increased to 400 mm/min. Moreover, the LDH, strain distribution and failure strains were also analyzed in context of formability

Extraction of density profile for near perfect multilayers

A simple inversion scheme, based on Born approximation, to determine the electron density profile of near perfect multilayers from specular X-ray reflectivity data has been presented. This scheme is useful for semiconductor multilayers and other thin films, which are grown almost according to the designed parameters. We also indicate the possibility of separating out the contribution of interdiffusion and roughness in electron density profiles of interfaces by utilizing information obtained from the analysis of diffuse scattering data. The extracted compositional profile was used to calculate structural details of epitaxial films along the growth direction. Simulated and metal organic vapor phase epitaxy grown InP/InxGa1−xAs/InP quantum-well systems have been used to demonstrate this scheme

Accounting for the effect of heterogeneous plastic deformation on the formability of aluminium and steel sheets

Forming Limit Curves characterise ‘mean’ failure strains of sheet metals. Safety levels from the curves define the deterministic upper limit of the processing and part design window, which can be small for high strength, low formability materials. Effects of heterogeneity of plastic deformation, widely accepted to occur on the microscale, are neglected. Marciniak tests were carried out on aluminium alloys (AA6111-T4, NG5754-O), dual-phase steel (DP600) and mild steel (MS3). Digital image correlation was used to measure the effect of heterogeneity on failure. Heterogeneity, based on strain variance was modelled with the 2-component Gaussian Mixture Model and a framework was proposed to 1) identify the onset of necking and to 2) re-define formability as a probability to failure. The result were ‘forming maps’ in major-minor strain space of contours of constant probability (from probability, P=0 to P=1), which showed how failure risk increased with major strain. The contour bands indicated the unique degree of heterogeneity in each material. NG5754-O had the greatest width (0.07 strain) in plane strain and MS3 the lowest (0.03 strain). This novel characterisation will allow engineers to balance a desired forming window for a component design with the risk to failure of the material

Ripple structure of crystalline layers in ion-beam-induced Si wafers

Ion-beam-induced ripple formation in Si wafers was studied by two complementary surface sensitive techniques, namely atomic force microscopy (AFM) and depth-resolved X-ray grazing incidence diffraction (GID). The formation of ripple structure at high doses (~7×1017 ions/cm2), starting from initiation at low doses (~1×1017 ions/cm2) of ion beam, is evident from AFM, while that in the buried crystalline region below a partially crystalline top layer is evident from GID study. Such ripple structure of crystalline layers in a large area formed in the subsurface region of Si wafers is probed through a nondestructive technique. The GID technique reveals that these periodically modulated wavelike buried crystalline features become highly regular and strongly correlated as one increases the Ar ion-beam energy from 60 to 100 keV. The vertical density profile obtained from the analysis of a Vineyard profile shows that the density in the upper top part of ripples is decreased to about 15% of the crystalline density. The partially crystalline top layer at low dose transforms to a completely amorphous layer for high doses, and the top morphology was found to be conformal with the underlying crystalline ripple

Determination of the yield loci of four sheet materials (AA6111-T4, AC600, DX54D+Z, and H220BD+Z) by using uniaxial tensile and hydraulic bulge tests)

In sheet metal forming simulation, a flow curve and a yield criterion are vital requirements for obtaining reliable numerical results. It is more appropriate to determine a flow curve by using biaxial stress condition tests, such as the hydraulic bulge test, than a uniaxial test because hardening proceeds higher strains before necking occurs. In a uniaxial test, higher strains are extrapolated, which might lead to incorrect results. The bulge test, coupled with the digital image correlation (DIC) system, is used to obtain stress–strain data. In the absence of the DIC system, analytical methods are used to estimate hardening. Typically, such models incorporate a correction factor to achieve correlation to experimental data. An example is the Chakrabarty and Alexander method, which uses a correction factor based on the n value. Here, the Chakrabarty and Alexander approach was modified using a correction factor based on normal anisotropy. When compared with DIC data, the modified model was found to be able to better predict the hardening curves for the materials examined in this study. Because a biaxial flow curve is required to compute the biaxial yield stress, which is an essential input to advanced yield functions, the effects of the various approaches used to determine the biaxial stress–strain data on the shape of the BBC2005 yield loci were also investigated. The proposed method can accurately predict the magnitude of the biaxial yield stress, when compared with DIC data, for all materials investigated in this study