Investigation of activated transport in hole doped rare earth manganites in the high temperature paramagnetic regime

Electronic transport in the high temperature paramagnetic regime of the colossal magnetoresistive oxides, La(1-x)A(x)MnO(3), A=Ca, Sr, Ba, x similar or equal to 0.1-0.3, has been investigated using resistivity measurements. The main motivation for this work is to relook into the actual magnitude of the activation energy for transport in a number of manganites and study its variation as a function of hole doping (x), average A-site cation radius (< r(A)>), cationic disorder (sigma(2)) and strain (epsilon(zz)). We show that contrary to current practice, the description of a single activation energy in this phase is not entirely accurate. Our results clearly reveal a strong dependence of the activation energy on the hole doping as well as disorder. Comparing the results across different substituent species with different < r(A)> reveals the importance of sigma(2) as a metric to qualify any analysis based on (r(A)). (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Effect of disorder on the exponent in the coherence region in high temperature superconductors

Effect of disorder on the electrical resistance near the superconducting transition temperature in the paracoherence region of high temperature YBa2CU3O7-delta (YBCO) thin film superconductor is reported. For this, c-axis oriented YBa2Cu3O7-delta thin films having superconducting transition width varying between 0.27 K and 6 K were deposited using laser ablation and high pressure oxygen sputtering techniques. Disorder in these films was further created by using 100 MeV oxygen and 200 MeV silver ions with varying fluences. It is observed that the critical exponent in the paracoherence region for films with high transition temperature and small transition width is in agreement with the theoretically predicted value (gamma = 1.33) and is not affected by disorder, while for films with lower transition temperature and larger transition width the value of exponent is much larger as compared to that theoretically predicted and it varies from sample to sample and usually changes with disorder induced by radiation. This difference in the behaviour of the exponent has been explained on the basis of differences in the strength of weak links and the transition between temperatures T. and T, is interpreted as a percolation like transition with disorder. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Ambient temperature, zinc ion-conducting, binary molten electrolyte based on acetamide and zinc perchlorate: Application in rechargeable zinc batteries

Binary room temperature molten electrolytes based on acetamide and zinc perchlorate have been prepared and characterized. The electrolytes are found to be highly zinc ion-conducting with very favorable physicochemical and electrochemical characteristics. Raman and infrared spectroscopic studies reveal the presence of large free-ion concentration in the molten liquid. This is corroborated by the high conductivity observed under ambient conditions. Rechargeable zinc batteries assembled using gamma-MnO2 as the cathode and Zn as the anode with the molten electrolyte show high discharge capacities over several cycles, indicating excellent reversibility. This unique class of acetamide-based, room temperature molten liquids may become viable and green alternative electrolytes for rechargeable zinc-based secondary batteries. (C) 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

On the use of a coordinate transformation for analysis of axisymmetric vibration of polar orthotropic annular plates

Estimates of natural frequencies corresponding to axisymmetric modes of flexural vibration of polar orthotropic annular plates have been obtained for various combinations of clamped, simply supported and free edge conditions. A coordinate transformation in the radial direction has been used to obtain effective solutions by the classical Rayleigh-Ritz method. The analysis with this transformation has been found to be advantageous in computations, particularly for large hole sizes, over direct analysis. Numerical results have been obtained for various values of hole sizes and rigidity ratio. The eigenvalue parameter has been found to vary more or less linearly with the rigidity ratio. A comparison with the results for isotropic plates has brought out some interesting features.

Kinetics of two-stage crystallization in Metglas 2826A

Crystallization kinetics of MSI and MSII stages in Metglas 2826A has been investigated by quantitative transmission electron microscopy. The volume fraction of crystallization against time curve has been found to show a plateau in the lower temperature region of annealing. It has been found that the glass transition temperature, T g, has no effect on the sequence reversal of the crystallization reaction. It has been shown that the sequence reversal of transformation stages occurs due to the large difference in the activation energy of crystallization of MSI and MSII. In addition, the change in the morphology of the crystals obtained by annealing the amorphous alloy below and above the glass transition temperature, T g, is reported.

Chemical potentials of oxygen for fayalite-quartz-lron and fayalite-quartz-magnetite equilibria

The oxygen potentials corresponding to fayalite-quartz-iron (FQI) and fayalite-quartz-magnetite (FQM) equilibria have been determined using solid-state galvanic cells: Pt,Fe + Fe2SiO4 + SiO2/(Y2O3)ZrO2/Fe + \r"FeO,\l"Pt and Pt, Fe3O4 + Fe2SiO4 + SiO2/(Y2O3)ZrO2/Ni + NiO, Pt in the temperature ranges 900 to 1400 K and 1080 to 1340 K, respectively. The cells are written such that the right-hand electrodes are positive. Silica used in this study had the quartz structure. The emf of both cells was found to be reversible and to vary linearly with temperature. From the emf, Gibbs energy changes were deduced for the reactions: 0.106Fe (s) + 2Fe0.947O (r.s.) + SiO2 (qz) → Fe2SiO4 (ol) δG‡= -39,140+ 15.59T(± 150) J mol-1 and 3Fe2SiO4 (ol) + O2 (g) → 2Fe3O4 (sp) + 3SiO2 (qz) δG‡ = -471,750 + 160.06 T±} 1100) J mol-1 The “third-law≓ analysis of fayalite-quartz-wustite and fayalite-quartz-magnetite equilibria gives value for δH‡298 as -35.22 (±0.1) and -528.10 (±0.1) kJ mol-1, respectively, independent of temperature. The Gibbs energy of formation of the spinel form of Fe2SiO4 is derived by com-bining the present results on FQI equilibrium with the high-pressure data on olivine to spinel transformation of Fe2SiO4.

Robust/optimal temperature profile control using neural networks

An approximate dynamic programming (ADP) based neurocontroller is developed for a heat transfer application. Heat transfer problem for a fin in a car's electronic module is modeled as a nonlinear distributed parameter (infinite-dimensional) system by taking into account heat loss and generation due to conduction, convection and radiation. A low-order, finite-dimensional lumped parameter model for this problem is obtained by using Galerkin projection and basis functions designed through the 'Proper Orthogonal Decomposition' technique (POD) and the 'snap-shot' solutions. A suboptimal neurocontroller is obtained with a single-network-adaptive-critic (SNAC). Further contribution of this paper is to develop an online robust controller to account for unmodeled dynamics and parametric uncertainties. A weight update rule is presented that guarantees boundedness of the weights and eliminates the need for persistence of excitation (PE) condition to be satisfied. Since, the ADP and neural network based controllers are of fairly general structure, they appear to have the potential to be controller synthesis tools for nonlinear distributed parameter systems especially where it is difficult to obtain an accurate model.

High temperature mechanical properties of thermal barrier coated superalloy applied to combustor liner of aero engines

High temperature load controlled fatigue, hot tensile and accelerated creep properties of thermal barrier coated (TBC) Superni C263 alloy used as a candidate material in combustor liner of aero engines are highlighted in this paper. Acoustic emission technique has been utilised to characterise the ductile-brittle transition teperature the bond coat. Results revealed that the DBTT (ductile to brittle transition temperature) of this bond coat is around 923 K, which is in close proximity to the value reported for CoCrAlY type of bond coat. Finite element technique, used for analysing the equivalent stresses in the bond coat well within the elastic limit, revealed the highest order of equivalent stress at 1073 K as the bond coat is ductile above 923 K. The endurance limit in fatigue and the life of TBC coated composite under accelerated creep conditions are substantially higher than those of the substrate material. Fractographic features at high stresses under fatigue showed intergranular cleavage whereas those at low stresses were transgranular and ductile in nature. Delamination of the bond coat and spallation of the TBC at high stresses during fatigue was evident. Unlike in the case of fatigue, the mode of fracture in the substrate at very high stresses was transgranular whereas that at low stresses was intergranular in creep.

Effectiveness of a Differential Temperature Controller on a Solar Water Heating System: An Experimental Study

A differential temperature controller is incorporated in a solar water heating system to study the influence of its set points on system performance. The effectiveness of the controller set points DeltaT ON and DeltaT OFF on the pump cycling and energy collection has been studied experimentally and the results are presented in this paper.

Epitaxial growth of Co3O4 films by low temperature, low pressure chemical vapour deposition

The growth of strongly oriented or epitaxial thin films of metal oxides generally requires relatively high growth temperatures or infusion of energy to the growth surface through means such as ion bombardment. We have grown high quality epitaxial thin films of Co3O4 on different substrates at a temperature as low as 400 degreesC by low-pressure metalorganic chemical vapour deposition (MOCVD) using cobalt(II) acetylacetonate as the precursor. With oxygen as the reactant gas, polycrystalline Co3O4 films are formed on glass and Si (100) in the temperature range 400-550 degreesC. Under similar conditions of growth. highly oriented films of Co3O4 are formed on SrTiO3 (100) and LaAlO3 (100). The activation energy for the growth of polycrystalline films on glass is significantly higher than that for epitaxial growth on SrTiO3 (100). The film on LaAlO3 (100) grown at 450 degreesC shows a rocking curve FWHM of 1.61 degrees, which reduces to 1.32 degrees when it is annealed in oxygen at 725 degreesC. The film on SrTiO3 (100) has a FWHM of 0.33 degrees (as deposited) and 0.29 (after annealing at 725 degreesC). The phi -scan analysis shows cube-on-cube epitaxy on both these substrates. The quality of epitaxy on SrTiO3 (100) is comparable to the best of the perovskite-based oxide thin films grown at significantly higher temperatures. A plausible mechanism is proposed for the observed low temperature epitaxy. (C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.