High-resolution strain sensing on steel by Silicon-On-Insulator flexural resonators fabricated with chip-level vacuum packaging

This paper reports on the fabrication and characterization of high-resolution strain sensors for steel based on Silicon On Insulator flexural resonators manufactured with chip-level LPCVD vacuum packaging. The sensors present high sensitivity (120 Hz/μ), very high resolution (4 n), low drift, and near-perfect reversibility in bending tests performed in both tensile and compressive strain regimes. © 2013 IEEE.

High-resolution TEM characterization of ZnO core-shell nanowires for dye-sensitized solar cells

Recently ZnO nanowire films have been used in very promising and inexpensive dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC). It was found that the performance of the devices can be enhanced by functionalising the nanowires with a thin metal oxide coating. This nm-scale shell is believed to tailor the electronic structure of the nanowire, and help the absorption of the dye. Core-shell ZnO nanowire structures are synthesised at low temperature (below 120°C) by consecutive hydrothermal growth steps. Different materials are investigated for the coating, including Mg, Al, Cs and Zr oxides. High resolution TEM is used to characterise the quality of both the nanowire core and the shell, and to monitor the thickness and the degree of crystallisation of the oxide coating. The interface between the nanowire core and the outer shell is investigated in order to understand the adhesion of the coating, and give valuable feedback for the synthesis process. Nanowire films are packaged into dye-sensitised solar cell prototypes; samples coated with ZrO2 and MgO show the largest enhancement in the photocurrent and open-circuit voltage and look very promising for further improvement. © 2010 IOP Publishing Ltd.

Self-aligned high-resolution printed polymer transistors

A process to fabricate solution-processable thin-film transistors (TFTs) with a one-step self-aligned definition of the dimensions in all functional layers is demonstrated. The TFT-channel, semiconductor materials, and effective gate dimention of different layers are determined by a one-step imprint process and the subsequent pattern transfer without the need for multiple patterning and mask alignment. The process is compatible with fabrication of large-scale circuits. Copyright © 2011 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

High resolution cortical bone thickness measurement from clinical CT data.

The distribution of cortical bone in the proximal femur is believed to be a critical component in determining fracture resistance. Current CT technology is limited in its ability to measure cortical thickness, especially in the sub-millimetre range which lies within the point spread function of today's clinical scanners. In this paper, we present a novel technique that is capable of producing unbiased thickness estimates down to 0.3mm. The technique relies on a mathematical model of the anatomy and the imaging system, which is fitted to the data at a large number of sites around the proximal femur, producing around 17,000 independent thickness estimates per specimen. In a series of experiments on 16 cadaveric femurs, estimation errors were measured as -0.01+/-0.58mm (mean+/-1std.dev.) for cortical thicknesses in the range 0.3-4mm. This compares with 0.25+/-0.69mm for simple thresholding and 0.90+/-0.92mm for a variant of the 50% relative threshold method. In the clinically relevant sub-millimetre range, thresholding increasingly fails to detect the cortex at all, whereas the new technique continues to perform well. The many cortical thickness estimates can be displayed as a colour map painted onto the femoral surface. Computation of the surfaces and colour maps is largely automatic, requiring around 15min on a modest laptop computer.