Computational Analysis of Flow through a Multiple Nozzle Driven Laser Cavity and Diffuser

Computations have been carried out for simulating supersonic flow through a set of converging-diverging nozzles with their expanding jets forming a laser cavity and flow patterns through diffusers, past the cavity. A thorough numerical investigation with 3-D RANS code is carried out to capture the flow distribution which comprises of shock patterns and multiple supersonic jet interactions. The analysis of pressure recovery characteristics during the flow through the diffusers is an important parameter of the simulation and is critical for the performance of the laser device. The results of the computation have shown a close agreement with the experimentally measured parameters as well as other established results indicating that the flow analysis done is found to be satisfactory.

Advances in Light-Emitting Doped Semiconductor Nanocrystals

Insertion of just a few impurity atoms in a host semiconductor nanocrystal can drastically alter its phase, shape, and physical properties. Such doped nanomaterials now constitute an important class of optical materials that can provide efficient, stable, and tunable dopant emission in visible and NIR spectral windows. Selecting proper dopants and inserting them in appropriate hosts can generate many new series of such doped nanocrystals with several unique and attractive properties in order to meet current challenges in the versatile field of luminescent materials. However, the synthesis of such doped nanomaterials with a specific dopant in a predetermined host at a desired site leading to targeted optical properties requires fundamental understanding of both the doping process as well as the resulting photophysical properties. Summarizing up to date literature reports, in this Perspective we discuss important advances in synthesis methods and in-depth understanding of the optical properties, with an emphasis on the most widely investigated Mn-doped semiconductor nanocrystals.

Coordination-driven self-assembly of 2D-metallamacrocycles using a shape-selective Pt(2)(II)-organometallic 90 degrees acceptor: design, synthesis and sensing study

Synthesis of a series of two-dimensional metallamacrocycles via coordination-driven self-assembly of a shape-selective Pt(2)(II)-molecular building unit incorporating carbazole-ethynyl functionality is described. An equimolar (1 : 1) combination of a Pt(2)(II)-organometallic 90 degrees acceptor, 1, with rigid linear ditopic donors (L(a) and L(b)) afforded [4 + 4] self-assembled octanuclear molecular squares, 2 and 3, in quantitative yields, respectively [L(a) = 4,4'-bipyridine; L(b) = trans-1,2-bis(4-pyridyl)ethylene]. Conversely, a similar treatment of 1 with an amide-based unsymmetrical flexible ditopic donor, L(c), resulted in the formation of a [2 + 2] self-sorted molecular rhomboid (4a) as a single product [L(c) = N-(4-pyridyl)isonicotinamide]. Despite the possibility of several linkage isomeric macrocycles (rhomboid, triangle and square) due to the different connectivity of L(c), the formation of a single and symmetrical molecular rhomboid (4a) as the only product is an interesting observation. All the self-assembled macrocycles (2, 3 and 4a) were fully characterized by multinuclear NMR ((1)H and (31)P) and ESI-MS analysis. Further structural insights about the size and shape of the macrocycles were obtained through energy minimization using density functional theory (DFT) calculations. Decoration of the starting carbazole building unit with Pt-ethynyl functionality enriches the assemblies to be more p-electron rich and luminescent in nature. Macrocycles 2 and 3 could sense the presence of electron deficient nitroaromatics in solution by quenching of the initial intensity upon gradual addition of picric acid (PA). They exhibited the largest quenching response with high selectivity for nitroaromatics compared to several other electron deficient aromatics tested.

A Method of Evaluating Electrical Response of Solion Diodes

A method of evaluating the transient electrical response of a solion diode when excited by different current stimuli is given. This method is extended to obtain the transient response of the solion when connected in a circuit. To illustrate the utility of this method a circuit incorporating a solion diode has been analyzed.

Simulation-driven design of helmets for head impact protection using an injury-based criterion

The current paper suggests a new procedure for designing helmets for head impact protection for users such as motorcycle riders. According to the approach followed here, a helmet is mounted on a featureless Hybrid 3 headform that is used in assessing vehicles for compliance to the FMVSS 201 regulation in the USA for upper interior head impact safety. The requirement adopted in the latter standard, i.e. not exceeding a threshold HIC(d) limit of 1000, is applied in the present study as a likely criterion for adjudging the efficacy of helmets. An impact velocity of 6 m/s (13.5 mph) for the helmet-headform system striking a rigid target can probably be acceptable for ascertaining a helmet's effectiveness as a countermeasure for minimizing the risk of severe head injury. The proposed procedure is demonstrated with the help of a validated LS-DYNA model of a featureless Hybrid 3 headform in conjunction with a helmet model comprising an outer polypropylene shell to the inner surface of which is bonded a protective polyurethane foam padding of a given thickness. Based on simulation results of impact on a rigid surface, it appears that a minimum foam padding thickness of 40 mm is necessary for obtaining an acceptable value of HIC(d).

Barrier Inhomogeneity and Electrical Properties of InN Nanodots/Si Heterojunction Diodes

The electrical transport behavior of n-n indium nitride nanodot-silicon (InN ND-Si) heterostructure Schottky diodes is reported here, which have been fabricated by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy. InN ND structures were grown on a 20 nm InN buffer layer on Si substrates. These dots were found to be single crystalline and grown along [0 0 0 1] direction. Temperature-dependent current density-voltage plots (J-V-T) reveal that the ideality factor (eta) and Schottky barrier height (SBH) (Phi(B)) are temperature dependent. The incorrect values of the Richardson constant (A**) produced suggest an inhomogeneous barrier. Descriptions of the experimental results were explained by using two models. First one is barrier height inhomogeneities (BHIs) model, in which considering an effective area of the inhomogeneous contact provided a procedure for a correct determination of A**. The Richardson constant is extracted similar to 110 A cm(-2) K(-2) using the BHI model and that is in very good agreement with the theoretical value of 112 A cm(-2) K(-2). The second model uses Gaussian statistics and by this, mean barrier height Phi(0) and A** were found to be 0.69 eV and 113 A cm(-2) K(-2), respectively.

Modeling of room temperature current-voltage measurements on homo-junction HgCdTe diodes exhibiting nonequilibrium effects

HgCdTe mid wave infrared (MWIR) n(+)/nu/p(+) homo-junction photodiodes with planar architecture are designed, fabricated, and measured at room temperature. An improved analytical I-V model is reported by incorporating trap assisted tunneling and electric field enhanced Shockley-Read-Hall generation recombination process due to dislocations. Tunneling currents are fitted before and after the Auger suppression of carriers with energy level of trap (E-t), trap density (N-t), and the doping concentrations of n(+) and nu regions as fitting parameters. Values of E-t and N-t are determined as 0.79 E-g and similar to 9 x 10(14) cm(-3), respectively, in all cases. Doping concentration of nu region was found to exhibit nonequilibrium depletion from a value of 2 x 10(16) to 4 x 10(15) cm(-3) for n(+) doping of 2 x 10(17) cm(-3). Pronounced negative differential resistance is observed in the homo-junction HgCdTe diodes. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3682483]

Coordination-Driven Self-Assembly of 2D-Metallamacrocycles Using a New Carbazole-Based Dipyridyl Donor: Synthesis, Characterization, and C-60 Binding Study

A new carbazole-based 90 degrees dipyridyl donor 3,6-di(4-pyridylethynyl)carbazole (L) containing carbazole-ethynyl functionality is synthesized in reasonable yield using the Sonagashira coupling reaction. Multinuclear NMR, electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry (ESI-MS), including single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis characterized this 90 degrees building unit. The stoichiometry combination of L with several Pd(II)/Pt(II)-based 90 degrees acceptors (1a-1d) yielded 2 + 2] self-assembled metallacycles (2a-2d) under mild conditions in quantitative yields 1a = cis-(dppf)Pd(OTf)(2); 1b = cis-(dppf)Pt(OTf)(2); 1c = cis-(tmen)Pd(NO3)(2); 1d = 3,6-bis{trans-Pt(C C) (PEt3)(2)(NO3))carbazole]. All these macrocycles were characterized by various spectroscopic techniques, and the molecular structure of 2a was unambiguously determined by single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. Incorporation of ethynyl functionality to the carbazole backbone causes the resulted macrocycles (2a-2d) to be pi-electron rich and thereby exhibit strong emission characteristics. The macrocycle 2a has a large internal concave aromatic surface. The fluorescence quenching study suggests that 2a forms a similar to 1:1 complex with C-60 with a high association constant of K-sv = 1.0 X 10(5) M-1.

Pt/CdTe/Pt asymmetric nano-Schottky diodes from colloidal quantum dots

We have fabricated nano-Schottky diodes of CdTe QDs with platinum metal electrodes in metal-semiconductor-metal planar configuration by drop-casting. The observed high value of ideality factor (13.3) of the diode was possibly due to the presence of defects in colloidal QDs. We observed asymmetry and non-linear nature of I-V characteristics between forward and reverse directions, which has been explained in terms of size distributions of quantum dots due to coffee ring effect. Copyright 2011 Author(s). This article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. doi:10.1063/1.3669408]

A 10 tesla table-top controlled waveform magnet

Controlled waveform magnets (CWMs) are a class of pulsed magnets whose pulse shape with time can be programmed by the user. With a CWM, the user gains control not only over the magnitude of the field but also over its rate of change. In this work we present a table-top CWM, driven by a capacitor bank, capable of producing virtually any user-shaped magnetic field waveform up to 10 tesla. Insulated gate bipolar transistor chips have been paralleled to form the high current switch and paralleled chips of SiC Schottky diodes form the crowbar diode module. Sample controlled waveforms including flat-tops up to 10 tesla and some triangular magnetic field pulses have been successfully generated for 10-20 ms with a ripple < 1%. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.3699316]

Critical behavior at depinning of driven disordered vortex matter in 2H-NbS2

We report unusual jamming in driven ordered vortex flow in 2H-NbS2. Reinitiating movement in these jammed vortices with a higher driving force and halting it thereafter once again with a reduction in drive leads to a critical behavior centered around the depinning threshold via divergences in the lifetimes of transient states, validating the predictions of a recent simulation study Reichhardt and Olson Reichhardt, Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 168301 (2009)] which also pointed out a correspondence between plastic depinning in vortex matter and the notion of random organization proposed Corte et al., Nat. Phys. 4, 420 (2008)] in the context of sheared colloids undergoing diffusive motion.

Structural-modulation-driven low-temperature glassy behavior in SrRuO3

We present a critical investigation on the structural, magnetic, and magnetotransport properties of two sets of polycrystalline SrRuO3 samples with uniquely defined ferromagnetic transition temperatures. The ac magnetic susceptibility study exhibits the remarkable memory effect, a distinct characteristic of glassy behavior, at low temperatures. The transport study suggests a crossover from Fermi-liquid to non-Fermi-liquid behavior. Most strikingly, the temperature-dependent magnetoresistance exhibits two distinct dips (one around ferromagnetic ordering temperature and the other around 50 K), resembling a double-well potential in appearance. In addition, the temperature-dependent coercive field shows a plateau around 50 K. An attempt has been made to employ neutron diffraction to understand the genesis of such unusual low-temperature magnetic features. From the neutron-diffraction study, we find the evidence for changes in the unit-cell lattice parameters around 60 K and, thus, believe that the low-temperature anomalous magnetic response is closely intertwined to lattice-parameter change.

Crowd Sourcing a New Paradigm for Interactome Driven Drug Target Identification in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

A decade since the availability of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) genome sequence, no promising drug has seen the light of the day. This not only indicates the challenges in discovering new drugs but also suggests a gap in our current understanding of Mtb biology. We attempt to bridge this gap by carrying out extensive re-annotation and constructing a systems level protein interaction map of Mtb with an objective of finding novel drug target candidates. Towards this, we synergized crowd sourcing and social networking methods through an initiative `Connect to Decode' (C2D) to generate the first and largest manually curated interactome of Mtb termed `3interactome pathway' (IPW), encompassing a total of 1434 proteins connected through 2575 functional relationships. Interactions leading to gene regulation, signal transduction, metabolism, structural complex formation have been catalogued. In the process, we have functionally annotated 87% of the Mtb genome in context of gene products. We further combine IPW with STRING based network to report central proteins, which may be assessed as potential drug targets for development of drugs with least possible side effects. The fact that five of the 17 predicted drug targets are already experimentally validated either genetically or biochemically lends credence to our unique approach.