Alternating Starvation Of Dislocations During Plastic Yielding In Metallic Nanowires

Using molecular dynamics simulations, we show that the mechanical deformation behaviors of single-crystalline nickel nanowires are quite different from their bulk counterparts. Correlation between the obtained stress-strain curves and the visualized defect evolution during deformation processes clearly demonstrates that a sequence of complex dislocation slip events results in a state of dislocation starvation, involving the nucleation and propagation of dislocations until they finally escape from the wires, so that the wires deform elastically until new dislocations are generated. (C) 2008 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Concentrated-Mass Cantilever Enhances Multiple Harmonics In Tapping-Mode Atomic Force Microscopy

The natural frequencies of a cantilever probe can be tuned with an attached concentrated mass to coincide with the higher harmonics generated in a tapping-mode atomic force microscopy by the nonlinear tip-sample interaction force. We provide a comprehensive map to guide the choice of the mass and the position of the attached particle in order to significantly enhance the higher harmonic signals containing information on the material properties. The first three eigenmodes can be simultaneously excited with only one carefully positioned particle of specific mass to enhance multiple harmonics. Accessing the interaction force qualitatively based on the high-sensitive harmonic signals combines the real-time material characterization with the imaging capability. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.

Aberration measurement of projection optics in lithographic tools by use of an alternating phase-shifting mask

As a critical dimension shrinks, the degradation in image quality caused by wavefront aberrations of projection optics in lithographic tools becomes a serious problem. It is necessary to establish a technique for a fast and accurate in situ aberration measurement. We introduce what we believe to be a novel technique for characterizing the aberrations of projection optics by using an alternating phase-shifting mask. The even aberrations, such as spherical aberration and astigmatism, and the odd aberrations, such as coma, are extracted from focus shifts and image displacements of the phase-shifted pattern, respectively. The focus shifts and the image displacements are measured by a transmission image sensor. The simulation results show that, compared with the accuracy of the previous straightforward measurement technique, the accuracy of the coma measurement increases by more than 30% and the accuracy of the spherical-aberration measurement increases by approximately 20%. (c) 2006 Optical Society of America.

Coma measurement by use of an alternating phase-shifting mask mark with a specific phase width

The correlation between the coma sensitivity of the alternating phase-shifting mask (Alt-PSM) mark and the mark's structure is studied based on the Hopkins theory of partially coherent imaging and positive resist optical lithography (PROLITH) simulation. It is found that an optimized Alt-PSM mark with its phase width being two-thirds its pitch has a higher sensitivity to coma than Alt-PSM marks with the same pitch and the different phase widths. The pitch of the Alt-PSM mark is also optimized by PROLITH simulation, and the structure of p - 1.92 lambda/NA and pw = 2p/3 proves to be with the highest sensitivity. The optimized Alt-PSM mark is used as a measurement mark to retrieve coma aberration from the projection optics in lithographic tools. In comparison with an ordinary Alt-PSM mark with its phase width being a half its pitch, the measurement accuracies of Z(7) and Z(14) apparently increase. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America

Image reconstruction by an alternating minimisation

This paper focuses on the problem of incomplete data in the applications of the circular cone-beam computed tomography. This problem is frequently encountered in medical imaging sciences and some other industrial imaging systems. For example, it is crucial when the high density region of objects can only be penetrated by X-rays in a limited angular range. As the projection data are only available in an angular range, the above mentioned incomplete data problem can be attributed to the limited angle problem, which is an ill-posed inverse problem. This paper reports a modified total variation minimisation method to reduce the data insufficiency in tomographic imaging. This proposed method is robust and efficient in the task of reconstruction by showing the convergence of the alternating minimisation method. The results demonstrate that this new reconstruction method brings reasonable performance. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Alternating Copolymerization of Cyclohexene Oxide and Carbon Dioxide Catalyzed by Noncyclopentadienyl Rare-Earth Metal Bis(alkyl) Complexes

The syntheses of several dialkyl complexes based on rare-earth metal were described. Three beta-diimine compounds with varying N-aryl substituents (HL1 = (2-CH3O(C6H4))N=C(CH3)CH=C(CH3)NH(2-CH3O(C6H4)), HL2 = (2,4,6-(CH3)(3) (C6H2))N=C(CH3)CH=C(CH3)NH(2,4,6-(CH3)(3)(C6H2)), HL3 = PhN=C(CH3)CH(CH3) NHPh) were treated with Ln(CH2SiMe3)(3)(THF)(2) to give dialkyl complexes L(1)Ln (CH2SiMe3)(2) (Ln = Y (1a), Lu (1b), Sc (1c)), L(2)Ln(CH2SiMe3)(2)(THF) (Ln = Y (2a), Lu (2b)), and (LLu)-Lu-3(CH2SiMe3)(2)(THF) (3). All these complexes were applied to the copolymerization of cyclohexene oxide (CHO) and carbon dioxide as single-component catalysts.

Monodisperse Co-oligomer Approach toward Nanostructured Films with Alternating Donor-Acceptor Lamellae

A series of donor-acceptor (D-A) co-oligomers with oligo(fluorene-alt-bithiophene) and perylene diimide as donor and acceptor segments, respectively, have been designed and synthesized. They can self-assembly into alternating D-A lamellar nanostructured films with the periods depending on the molecular length. These films have been successfully used in fabrication of high-performance single-molecular solar cells with power conversion efficiency up to 1.50%.

Alternating Copolymerization of Carbon Dioxide and Propylene Oxide Catalyzed by Cobalt Schiff Base Complex

Cobalt 2,4-dinitrophenolate (complex 1) based upon a N,N,O,O-tetradentate Schiff base ligand framework was prepared. X-ray diffraction analysis confirmed that complex 1 was triclinic species with a six-coordinated central cobalt octahedron in the solid. Asymmetric alternating copolymerization of carbon dioxide (CO2) with racemic propylene oxide (rac-PO) proceeded effectively by complex 1 in conjunction with (4-dimethylamino)pyridine (DMAP), yielding a perfectly alternating and bimodal molecular weight distribution PO/CO2 poly(propylene carbonate) (PPC) with a small amount of cyclic carbonate byproducts.

Alternating copolymerization of carbon dioxide and propylene oxide by single-component cobalt salen complexes with various axial group

A series of single-component cobalt salen complexes, N,N'-bis(salicylidene)-1,2phenylenediamino cobaltIII X(X = Cl (1a), Br (1b), NO3 (1c), CF3COO (1d), BF4 (le), and N3 (If)) (SalphCoX), were prepared for alternating copolymerization of carbon dioxide and propylene oxide(PO) under mild condition. The axial anion X group of the SalenphCoX played important role in tailoring the catalytic activity, polymeric/cyclic carbonate selectivity, as well as stereochemistry of carbonate unit sequence in the polymer chain. SalenphCoX with an electron-withdrawing axial X group (complex 1c) was an ideal catalyst for the copolymerization of CO2 and PO to selectively produce polycarbonate with similar to 99% carbonate linkage and over 81% head-to-tail structure.