Models of activated recrystallization on isolated grain boundaries in polycrystals

New phenomenological models of recrystallization of a polycrystalline material in two regimes are proposed taking into account the finite width of grain boundaries. The solutions are obtained in an analytical form for the initial-boundary value problems formulated. They describe the distributions of the concentration of impurities diffusing from the surface coating, both in the grain boundary and in the grain itself in the recrystallized region. The speed of the recrystallization front movement is indicated, which agrees with the types of the corresponding kinetic dependences observed in experiments.

Bridgman growth and electrical properties of Nd-doped PMN-PT single crystal with ultrahigh piezoelectricity

Using the polycrystalline material with a nominal composition of Nd0.01Pb0.985[(Mg1/3Nb2/3)0.70Ti0.30]O3, a Nd-doped PMN-PT single crystal has been grown successfully by vertical Bridgman process. The perovskite structure and the crystalline phase...

Platinum Based Nanoparticles Produced by a Pulsed Spark Discharge as a Promising Material for Gas Sensors

We have applied spark ablation technology for producing nanoparticles from platinum ingots (purity of 99.97 wt. %) as a feed material by using air as a carrier gas. A maximum production rate of about 400 mg/h was achieved with an energy per pulse of 0.5 J and a pulse repetition rate of 250 Hz. The synthesized nanomaterial, composed of an amorphous platinum oxide PtO (83 wt. %) and a crystalline metallic platinum (17 wt. %), was used for formulating functional colloidal ink. Annealing of the deposited ink at 750 °C resulted in the formation of a polycrystalline material comprising 99.7 wt. % of platinum. To demonstrate the possibility of application of the formulated ink in printed electronics, we have patterned conductive lines and microheaters on alumina substrates and 20 μm thick low-temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) membranes with the use of aerosol jet printing technology. The power consumption of microheaters fabricated on LTCC membranes was found to be about 140 mW at a temperature of the hot part of 500 °C, thus allowing one to consider these structures as promising micro-hotplates for metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) gas sensors. The catalytic activity of the synthesized nanoparticles was demonstrated by measuring the resistance transients of the non-sintered microheaters upon exposure to 2500 ppm of hydrogen.

The Modification of Optical Properties of the Surfaces by the Glancing Angle Deposition Technique

The paper considers the optical properties and structure of thin films of titanium dioxide formed by the glancing angle deposition method. It was show that this method allows the formation of coatings having a significantly lower refractive index than that of the initial material. Thus, the experimentally obtained value of the refractive index of thin films of titanium dioxide was ~1.2, which is almost two times less than that of a polycrystalline material. This allows you to use this method to produce the coatings with a variable refractive index using only one material, changing the geometry of the deposition process only.

Microstructure and electrical conductivity of 3Y-TZ/Al2O3 composites

Various amounts of Al2O3 (0.25, 0.5 and 1.0mol%) were added to tetragonal polycrystalline material (3YTZP), prepared using the hydrothermal crystallization method. The effects of the added amount as well as the sintering temperature on the microstructure and electrical properties of the 3Y-TZP/Al2O3 composites were investigated. The alumina addition was found to affect the microstructure of the 3Y-TZP samples obtained after sintering at 1400 or 1500?C only to a slight extent. The lowest values of the blocking factor, which represents the contribution of grain boundary resistivity to the total resistivity of a polycrystal, were observed for the 3Y-TZP with Al2O3 additions of 0.25 or 0.5mol% at measurement temperatures of 550 and 600 ?C. The study proves that the 3Y-TZP/Al2O3 should be taken into consideration as solid electrolyte in the intermediatetemperature solid oxide fuel cells.