Software Development for Distributed System of Russian Databases for Electronics Materials

Current state of Russian databases for substances and materials properties was considered. A brief review of integration methods of given information systems was prepared and a distributed databases integration approach based on metabase was proposed. Implementation details were mentioned on the posed database on electronics materials integration approach. An operating pilot version of given integrated information system implemented at IMET RAS was considered.

Model Construction and Research using System Compositional Approach on Natural Hierarchical Neural Networks. Development of Computer Toolbox

System compositional approach to model construction and research of informational processes, which take place in biological hierarchical neural networks, is being discussed. A computer toolbox has been successfully developed for solution of tasks from this scientific sphere. A series of computational experiments investigating the work of this toolbox on olfactory bulb model has been carried out. The well-known psychophysical phenomena have been reproduced in experiments.

Embedded heat pipes in cofired ceramic substrates for enhanced thermal management of electronics

A novel and new thermal management technology for advanced ceramic microelectronic packages has been developed incorporating miniature heat pipes embedded in the ceramic substrate. The heat pipes use an axially grooved wick structure and water as the working fluid. Prototype substrate/heat pipe systems were fabricated using high temperature co-fired ceramic (alumina). The heat pipes were nominally 81 mm in length, 10 mm in width, and 4 mm in height, and were charged with approximately 50–80 μL of water. Platinum thick film heaters were fabricated on the surface of the substrate to simulate heat dissipating electronic components. Several thermocouples were affixed to the substrate to monitor temperature. One end of the substrate was affixed to a heat sink maintained at constant temperature. The prototypes were tested and shown to successful and reliably operate with thermal loads over 20 Watts, with thermal input from single and multiple sources along the surface of the substrate. Temperature distributions are discussed for the various configurations and the effective thermal resistance of the substrate/heat pipe system is calculated. Finite element analysis was used to support the experimental findings and better understand the sources of the system's thermal resistance. ^

Enhanced zinc oxide and graphene nanostructures for electronics and sensing applications

Zinc oxide and graphene nanostructures are important technological materials because of their unique properties and potential applications in future generation of electronic and sensing devices. This dissertation investigates a brief account of the strategies to grow zinc oxide nanostructures (thin film and nanowire) and graphene, and their applications as enhanced field effect transistors, chemical sensors and transparent flexible electrodes. Nanostructured zinc oxide (ZnO) and low-gallium doped zinc oxide (GZO) thin films were synthesized by a magnetron sputtering process. Zinc oxide nanowires (ZNWs) were grown by a chemical vapor deposition method. Field effect transistors (FETs) of ZnO and GZO thin films and ZNWs were fabricated by standard photo and electron beam lithography processes. Electrical characteristics of these devices were investigated by nondestructive surface cleaning, ultraviolet irradiation treatment at high temperature and under vacuum. GZO thin film transistors showed a mobility of ∼5.7 cm2/V·s at low operation voltage of <5 V and a low turn-on voltage of ∼0.5 V with a sub threshold swing of ∼85 mV/decade. Bottom gated FET fabricated from ZNWs exhibit a very high on-to-off ratio (∼106) and mobility (∼28 cm2/V·s). A bottom gated FET showed large hysteresis of ∼5.0 to 8.0 V which was significantly reduced to ∼1.0 V by the surface treatment process. The results demonstrate charge transport in ZnO nanostructures strongly depends on its surface environmental conditions and can be explained by formation of depletion layer at the surface by various surface states. A nitric oxide (NO) gas sensor using single ZNW, functionalized with Cr nanoparticles was developed. The sensor exhibited average sensitivity of ∼46% and a minimum detection limit of ∼1.5 ppm for NO gas. The sensor also is selective towards NO gas as demonstrated by a cross sensitivity test with N2, CO and CO2 gases. Graphene film on copper foil was synthesized by chemical vapor deposition method. A hot press lamination process was developed for transferring graphene film to flexible polymer substrate. The graphene/polymer film exhibited a high quality, flexible transparent conductive structure with unique electrical-mechanical properties; ∼88.80% light transmittance and ∼1.1742Ω/sq k sheet resistance. The application of a graphene/polymer film as a flexible and transparent electrode for field emission displays was demonstrated.

Embedded Heat Pipes in Cofired Ceramic Substrates for Enhanced Thermal Management of Electronics

A novel and new thermal management technology for advanced ceramic microelectronic packages has been developed incorporating miniature heat pipes embedded in the ceramic substrate. The heat pipes use an axially grooved wick structure and water as the working fluid. Prototype substrate/heat pipe systems were fabricated using high temperature co-fired ceramic (alumina). The heat pipes were nominally 81 mm in length, 10 mm in width, and 4 mm in height, and were charged with approximately 50-80 mL of water. Platinum thick film heaters were fabricated on the surface of the substrate to simulate heat dissipating electronic components. Several thermocouples were affixed to the substrate to monitor temperature. One end of the substrate was affixed to a heat sink maintained at constant temperature. The prototypes were tested and shown to successful and reliably operate with thermal loads over 20 Watts, with thermal input from single and multiple sources along the surface of the substrate. Temperature distributions are discussed for the various configurations and the effective thermal resistance of the substrate/heat pipe system is calculated. Finite element analysis was used to support the experimental findings and better understand the sources of the system's thermal resistance.

Physical oceanography during SONNE cruise SO248 (BacGeoPac)

The data presented here were collected during the cruise SO248 (Project BacGeoPac) with the RV Sonne from Auckland, New Zealand to Dutch Harbor, Alaska/USA. The cruise lasted from May 1, 2016 to June 3, 2016 and 19 vertical CTD-hauls were conducted. The CTD system used during this cruise was a Sea-Bird Electronics Inc. SBE 911plus probe (SN 09-1266). The CTD was attached to a SBE 32 Carousel Water Sampler (SN 32-1119) containing 24 20-liter Ocean Test Equipment Inc. bottles. The system was equipped with double temperature (SBE 3) and conductivity sensors (SBE 4), a pressure sensor (Digiquartz) an oxygen (Aanderaa Optode 4831F) and, an altimeter (Bentos) and a chlorophyll fluorometer combined with a turbidity sensor (FluoroWetlabECO _AFL FL). The sensors were pre-calibrated by the manufacturers. The data were recorded with the Seasave V 7.23.2 software and processed using the SeaBird SBE Data Processing and the ManageCTD-software. The data were processed in the following way: Data obtained during adaptation of the CTD to ambient water conditions were removed manually. The "wildedit", "loopedit", "despike", "binavg" routines were applied. The data were also visually checked and a double sensor check was conducted. The accuracy of the double sensors derived from 56 data sets were: Temperature T = 0.0007 °C; Conductivity: C = 0,0071 mS/cm; Salinity S = 0.0081 psu. The salinity data (S by unsing pss78) were converted to absolute Salinity (SA) by using the TEOS 10 toolbox. The ship position data were derived from the shipboard GPS-system linked to the CTD data. The time zone is given in UTC. The oxygen CTD data were validated by additional measurements of 98 water samples using the Winkler titration method.

Nowhere Landscape, for Clarinets, Trombones, Percussion, Violins, and Electronics and “The Map and the Territory: Documenting David Dunn’s Sky Drift”

1. nowhere landscape, for clarinets, trombones, percussion, violins, and electronics

nowhere landscape is an eighty-minute work for nine performers, composed of acoustic and electronic sounds. Its fifteen movements invoke a variety of listening strategies, using slow change, stasis, layering, coincidence, and silence to draw attention to the sonic effects of the environment—inside the concert hall as well as the world outside of it. The work incorporates a unique stage set-up: the audience sits in close proximity to the instruments, facing in one of four different directions, while the musicians play from a number of constantly-shifting locations, including in front of, next to, and behind the audience.

Much of nowhere landscape’s material is derived from a collection of field recordings

made by the composer during a road trip from Springfield, MA to Douglas, WY along US- 20, a cross-country route made effectively obsolete by the completion of I-90 in the mid- 20th century. In an homage to artist Ed Ruscha’s 1963 book Twentysix Gasoline Stations, the composer made twenty-six recordings at gas stations along US-20. Many of the movements of nowhere landscape examine the musical potential of these captured soundscapes: familiar and anonymous, yet filled with poignancy and poetic possibility.

2. “The Map and the Territory: Documenting David Dunn’s Sky Drift”

In 1977, David Dunn recruited twenty-six musicians to play his work Sky Drift in the

Anza-Borrego Desert in Southern California. This outdoor performance was documented with photos and recorded with four stationary microphones to tape. A year later, Dunn presented the work in New York City as a “performance/documentation,” playing back the audio recording and projecting slides. In this paper I examine the consequences of this kind of act: what does it mean for a recording of an outdoor work to be shared at an indoor concert event? Can such a complex and interactive experience be successfully flattened into some kind of re-playable documentation? What can a recording capture and what must it exclude?

This paper engages with these questions as they relate to David Dunn’s Sky Drift and to similar works by Karlheinz Stockhausen and John Luther Adams. These case-studies demonstrate different solutions to the difficulty of documenting outdoor performances. Because this music is often heard from a variety of equally-valid perspectives—and because any single microphone only captures sound from one of these perspectives—the physical set-up of these kind of pieces complicate what it means to even “hear the music” at all. To this end, I discuss issues around the “work itself” and “aura” as well as “transparency” and “liveness” in recorded sound, bringing in thoughts and ideas from Walter Benjamin, Howard Becker, Joshua Glasgow, and others. In addition, the artist Robert Irwin and the composer Barry Truax have written about the conceptual distinctions between “the work” and “not- the-work”; these distinctions are complicated by documentation and recording. Without the context, the being-there, the music is stripped of much of its ability to communicate meaning.

The Philippines in the Electronics & Electrical Global Value Chain

This report uses the Duke CGGC global value chain (GVC) framework to examine the role of the Philippines in the global electronics & electrical (E&E) industry and identify opportunities to upgrade. Electronics and electrical equipment have played an important role in the Philippine economy since the 1970s and form the foundation of the country’s export basket today. In 2014, these sectors accounted for 47% of total exports from the Philippines at US$28.8 billion, of which 41% was from electronics, and 6% from electrical products. From a global perspective, while the Philippines is not the leading exporter in any particular product category, it is known for its significant number of semiconductor assembly and test (A&T) facilities. The global economic crisis (2008-09), combined with the exit of Intel (2009), had a significant negative impact on electronics exports and, although steadily increasing, they have not yet rebounded to pre-crisis levels. Nonetheless, investment in the E&E industries has picked up since 2010; in the past five years, there have been 110 new investments in these sectors. Another positive sign is the low exit rate; with the exception of Intel, companies that have invested in the Philippines have stayed, with several operations dating back to the late 1970s and 1980s. These firms have not only stayed, but have continued to grow and expand in the country due to the quality of the workforce and satisfaction with the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA) environment. The growth of the industry has significantly benefited from foreign investment and close ties with Japanese firms.

The SUGAR Toolbox - Version 7

The SUGAR Toolbox contains scripts coded in MATLAB for calculating various thermodynamic, kinetic, and geologic properties of substances occurring in the marine environment, particularly gas hydrate and seep systems. Brief descriptions of the toolbox scripts and some notes on the underlying basic theory as well as tables of additional property values can be found in the accompanying documentation.

Epitaxial growth of molecular crystals on van der Waals substrates for high-performance organic electronics

Epitaxial van der Waals (vdW) heterostructures of organic and layered materials are demonstrated to create high-performance organic electronic devices. High-quality rubrene films with large single-crystalline domains are grown on h-BN dielectric layers via vdW epitaxy. In addition, high carrier mobility comparable to free-standing single-crystal counterparts is achieved by forming interfacial electrical contacts with graphene electrodes.

Applications of a Collaborative Open Object Oriented Learning Environment to Electronics, Computing and Mathematics Education

A lightweight Java application suite has been developed and deployed allowing collaborative learning between students and tutors at remote locations. Students can engage in group activities online and also collaborate with tutors. A generic Java framework has been developed and applied to electronics, computing and mathematics education. The applications are respectively: (a) a digital circuit simulator, which allows students to collaborate in building simple or complex electronic circuits; (b) a Java programming environment where the paradigm is behavioural-based robotics, and (c) a differential equation solver useful in modelling of any complex and nonlinear dynamic system. Each student sees a common shared window on which may be added text or graphical objects and which can then be shared online. A built-in chat room supports collaborative dialogue. Students can work either in collaborative groups or else in teams as directed by the tutor. This paper summarises the technical architecture of the system as well as the pedagogical implications of the suite. A report of student evaluation is also presented distilled from use over a period of twelve months. We intend this suite to facilitate learning between groups at one or many institutions and to facilitate international collaboration. We also intend to use the suite as a tool to research the establishment and behaviour of collaborative learning groups. We shall make our software freely available to interested researchers.

Development of a toolbox for the reduction of hordeins in barley malt beers

Gluten sensitive consumers and people suffering from coeliac disease account for up to 6% of the general population (Catassi et al., 2013). These consumers must avoid foods which contain gluten and related proteins found in wheat, rye or barley. Beer is produced from barley malt and therefore contains hordeins, (gluten like proteins). Beers labelled as gluten-free must contain below 10 mg/kg hordeins (10 mg/kg hordeins = 20 mg/kg gluten under current regulations) to be considered safe for gluten sensitive consumers. Currently there are a limited number of methods available for reducing beer hordeins, the studies outlined in this thesis provide a range of tools for the beverage industry to reduce the hordein content of beer It is well known, that during malting and brewing hordeins are reduced, but they still remain in beer at levels above 10 mg/kg. During malting, hordeins are broken down to form new proteins in the growing plant. Model malting and brewing systems were developed and used to test, how the modification of the malting process could be used to reduce beer hordeins. It was shown, that by using a controlled malting and brewing regime, a range of barley cultivars produced beer with significant differences in levels of hordeins. Beer hordeins ranged from 10 mg/kg to 60 mg/kg. Another study revealed that when malting was prolonged, to maximise breakdown of proteins, beer hordeins can be reduced by up to 44%. The natural breakdown of hordein during malting enhanced in a further study, when a protease was added to support the hordein degradation during steeping and germination. The enzyme addition resulted in a 46% reduction in beer hordeins 2 when compared to the control. All of the malt treatments had little or no impact on malt quality. The hordein levels can also be reduced during the beer stabilisation process. Levels of beer hordein were tested after stabilisation using two different concentrations of silica gel and tannic acid. Silica gel was very effective in reducing beer hordeins, 90% of beer hordeins were removed compared to the control beer. Beer hordeins could be reduced to below 10 mg/kg and the beer qualities such as foam, colour and flavour were not affected. Tannic acid also reduced beer hordein by up to 90%, but it reduced foam stability and affected beer flavours. A further study described treatment of beer with microbial transglutaminase (mTG), to create bonds between hordein proteins, which increased particle size and allowed removal during filtration. The addition of the mTG led to a reduction of the beer hordein by up to 96% in beer, and the impact on the resulting beer quality was minimal. These studies provide the industry with a toolbox of methods leading to the reduction of hordein in the final beer without negatively affecting beer quality.

POLYMER-NANOPARTICLE COMPOSITES FOR APPLICATIONS IN FLEXIBLE ELECTRONICS

The aim of this dissertation was to investigate flexible polymer-nanoparticle composites with unique magnetic and electrical properties. Toward this goal, two distinct projects were carried out. The first project explored the magneto-dielectric properties and morphology of flexible polymer-nanoparticle composites that possess high permeability (µ), high permittivity (ε) and minimal dielectric, and magnetic loss (tan δε, tan δµ). The main materials challenges were the synthesis of magnetic nanoparticle fillers displaying high saturation magnetization (Ms), limited coercivity, and their homogeneous dispersion in a polymeric matrix. Nanostructured magnetic fillers including polycrystalline iron core-shell nanoparticles, and constructively assembled superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles were synthesized, and dispersed uniformly in an elastomer matrix to minimize conductive losses. The resulting composites have demonstrated promising permittivity (22.3), permeability (3), and sustained low dielectric (0.1), magnetic (0.4) loss for frequencies below 2 GHz. This study demonstrated nanocomposites with tunable magnetic resonance frequency, which can be used to develop compact and flexible radio frequency devices with high efficiency. The second project focused on fundamental research regarding methods for the design of highly conductive polymer-nanoparticle composites that can maintain high electrical conductivity under tensile strain exceeding 100%. We investigated a simple solution spraying method to fabricate stretchable conductors based on elastomeric block copolymer fibers and silver nanoparticles. Silver nanoparticles were assembled both in and around block copolymer fibers forming interconnected dual nanoparticle networks, resulting in both in-fiber conductive pathways and additional conductive pathways on the outer surface of the fibers. Stretchable composites with conductivity values reaching 9000 S/cm maintained 56% of their initial conductivity after 500 cycles at 100% strain. The developed manufacturing method in this research could pave the way towards direct deposition of flexible electronic devices on any shaped substrate. The electrical and electromechanical properties of these dual silver nanoparticle network composites make them promising materials for the future construction of stretchable circuitry for displays, solar cells, antennas, and strain and tactility sensors.