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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 451 records · Page 25
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2014

Identification of nitrogen- and host-related deep-level traps in n-type GaNAs and their evolution upon annealing

Deep level traps in as-grown and annealed n-GaNAs layers (doped with Si) of various nitrogen concentrations (N=0.2%, 0.4%, 0.8%, and 1.2%) were investigated by deep level transient spectroscopy. In addition, optical properties of GaNAs layers were studied by photoluminescence and contactless electroreflectance. The identification of N- and host-related traps has been performed on the basis of band gap diagram [Kudrawiec, Appl. Phys. Lett. 101, 082109 (2012)], which assumes that the activation energy of electron traps of the same microscopic nature decreases with the rise of nitrogen concentration in accordance with the N-related shift of the conduction band towards trap levels. The application of this diagram has allowed to investigate the evolution of donor traps in GaNAs upon annealing. In general, it was observed that the concentration of N- and host-related traps decreases after annealing and PL improves very significantly. However, it was also observed that some traps are generated due to annealing. It explains why the annealing conditions have to be carefully optimized for this material system.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Shock wave compression of hexagonal-close-packed metal single crystals: Time-dependent, anisotropic elastic-plastic response of beryllium

Understanding and modeling the response of hcp metals to high stress impulsive loading is challenging because the lower crystal symmetry, compared to cubic metals, results in a significantly more complex material response. To gain insight into the inelastic deformation of hcp metals subjected to high dynamic stresses, shock wave compression of single crystals provides a useful approach because different inelastic deformation mechanisms can be examined selectively by shock compression along different crystal orientations. As a representative example, we report, here, on wave propagation simulations for beryllium (Be) single crystals shocked along the c-axis, a-axis, and several low-symmetry directions to peak stresses reaching 7 GPa. The simulations utilized a time-dependent, anisotropic material model that incorporated dislocation dynamics, deformation twinning, and shear cracking based descriptions of inelastic deformation. The simulation results showed good overall agreement with measured wave profiles for all the different crystal orientations examined [Pope and Johnson, J. Appl. Phys. 46, 720 (1975)], including features arising from wave mode coupling due to the highly anisotropic inelastic response of Be. This good agreement demonstrates that the measured profiles can be understood in terms of dislocation slip along basal, prismatic, and pyramidal planes, together with deformation twinning along (101{sup ¯}2) planes. Our results show that the response of shocked Be single crystals involves the simultaneous operation of multiple, distinct inelastic deformation mechanisms for all orientations except the c-axis. For shocked c-axis Be, the measured wave profiles do not provide good discrimination between pyramidal slip and other inelastic deformation mechanisms, such as shear cracking. The findings presented here provide insight into the complex inelastic deformation response of shocked Be single crystals and are expected to be useful for other hcp crystals. More broadly, the present work demonstrates the potential of shock wave propagation along low-symmetry directions to examine, and discriminate between, different inelastic deformation mechanisms in crystalline solids.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Resonant nature of intrinsic defect energy levels in PbTe revealed by infrared photoreflectance spectroscopy

Step-scan Fourier-transform infrared photoreflectance and modulated photoluminescence spectroscopy were used to characterize the optical transitions of the epitaxial PbTe thin film grown by molecular beam epitaxy on BaF{sub 2} (111) substrate in the vicinity of energy gap of lead telluride at 77 K. It is found that the intrinsic defect energy levels in the electronic structure are of resonant nature. The Te-vacancy energy level is located above the conduction band minimum by 29.1 meV. Another defect (V{sub X}) energy level situated below valance band maximum by 18.1 meV is also revealed. Whether it is associated with the Pb vacancy is still not clear. It might also be related to the misfit dislocations stemming from the lattice mismatch between PbTe and BaF{sub 2} substrate. The experimental results support the theory prediction (N. J. Parada and G. W. Pratt, Jr., Phys. Rev. Lett. 22, 180 (1969), N. J. Parada, Phys. Rev. B 3, 2042 (1971)) and are consistent with the reported Hall experimental results (G. Bauer, H. Burkhard, H. Heinrich, and A. Lopez-Otero, J. Appl. Phys. 47, 1721 (1976)).

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Investigation of in-plane- and z-polarized intersubband transitions in pyramid-shaped InAs/GaAs quantum dots coupled to wetting layer: Size and shape matter

In this work, the effects of the shape and size on the intersubband electronic and optical properties of three-dimensional self-assembled pyramid-shaped InAs/GaAs quantum dots (QDs) were investigated in detail. More precisely, in-plane- and z-polarized transitions dipole moment (TDM), oscillator strength (OS), and absorption coefficients of P-to-S, WL-to-P, and WL-to-S transitions were studied as a function of the QD height. The P-to-S TDM showed to be strong and purely in-plane-polarized transition dominating two others. However, the TDMs and OSs of WL-to-P and WL-to-S transitions which are in-plane- and z-polarized transitions, respectively, showed a competition behavior for short and tall QDs. The former dominates for short QDs, and the latter for tall QDs. The physical reasons behind these interesting phenomena were also explained using the probability of finding the carriers in the pyramid region attached to the WL. The theoretical results are in good agreement with experimental data reported for short QDs [Appl. Phys. Lett. 82, 630 (2003)].

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Field effect in the quantum Hall regime of a high mobility graphene wire

In graphene-based electronic devices like in transistors, the field effect applied thanks to a gate electrode allows tuning the charge density in the graphene layer and passing continuously from the electron to the hole doped regime across the Dirac point. Homogeneous doping is crucial to understand electrical measurements and for the operation of future graphene-based electronic devices. However, recently theoretical and experimental studies highlighted the role of the electrostatic edge due to fringing electrostatic field lines at the graphene edges [P. Silvestrov and K. Efetov, Phys. Rev. B 77, 155436 (2008); F. T. Vasko and I. V. Zozoulenko, Appl. Phys. Lett. 97, 092115 (2010)]. This effect originates from the particular geometric design of the samples. A direct consequence is a charge accumulation at the graphene edges giving a value for the density, which deviates from the simple picture of a plate capacitor and also varies along the width of the graphene sample. Entering the quantum Hall regime would, in principle, allow probing this accumulation thanks to the extreme sensitivity of this quantum effect to charge density and the charge distribution. Moreover, the presence of an additional and counter-propagating edge channel has been predicted [P. Silvestrov and K. Efetov, Phys. Rev. B 77, 155436 (2008)] giving a fundamental aspect to this technological issue. In this article, we investigate this effect by tuning a high mobility graphene wire into the quantum Hall regime in which charge carriers probe the electrostatic potential at high magnetic field close to the edges. We observe a slight deviation to the linear shift of the quantum Hall plateaus with magnetic field and we study its evolution for different filling factors, which correspond to different probed regions in real space. We discuss the possible origins of this effect including an increase of the charge density towards the edges.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2014

Electromagnetic model for near-field microwave microscope with atomic resolution: Determination of tunnel junction impedance

An electrodynamic model is proposed for the tunneling microwave microscope with subnanometer space resolution as developed by Lee et al. [Appl. Phys. Lett. 97, 183111 (2010)]. Tip-sample impedance Z{sub a} was introduced and studied in the tunneling and non-tunneling regimes. At tunneling breakdown, the microwave current between probe and sample flows along two parallel channels characterized by impedances Z{sub p} and Z{sub t} that add up to form overall impedance Z{sub a}. Quantity Z{sub p} is the capacitive impedance determined by the near field of the probe and Z{sub t} is the impedance of the tunnel junction. By taking into account the distance dependences of effective tip radius r{sub 0}(z) and tunnel resistance R{sub t}(z) = Re[Z{sub t}(z)], we were able to explain the experimentally observed dependences of resonance frequency f{sub r}(z) and quality factor Q{sub L}(z) of the microscope. The obtained microwave resistance R{sub t}(z) and direct current tunnel resistance R{sub t}{sup dc}(z) exhibit qualitatively similar behavior, although being largely different in both magnitude and the characteristic scale of height dependence. Interpretation of the microwave images of the atomic structure of test samples proved possible by taking into account the inductive component of tunnel impedance ImZ{sub t} = ωL{sub t}. Relation ωL{sub t}/R{sub t} ≈ 0.235 was obtained.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Mean field limit for bosons with compact kernels interactions by Wigner measures transportation

We consider a class of many-body Hamiltonians composed of a free (kinetic) part and a multi-particle (potential) interaction with a compactness assumption on the latter part. We investigate the mean field limit of such quantum systems following the Wigner measures approach. We prove in particular the propagation of these measures along the flow of a nonlinear (Hartree) field equation. This enhances and complements some previous results of the same type shown in Z. Ammari and F. Nier and Fröhlich et al. [“Mean field limit for bosons and propagation of Wigner measures,” J. Math. Phys. 50(4), 042107 (2009); Z. Ammari and F. Nier and Fröhlich et al., “Mean field propagation of Wigner measures and BBGKY hierarchies for general bosonic states,” J. Math. Pures Appl. 95(6), 585–626 (2011); Z. Ammari and F. Nier and Fröhlich et al., “Mean-field- and classical limit of many-body Schrödinger dynamics for bosons,” Commun. Math. Phys. 271(3), 681–697 (2007)].

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2014

Spin decoherence in n-type GaAs: The effectiveness of the third-body rejection method for electron-electron scattering

We study the spin decoherence in n-type bulk GaAs for moderate electronic densities at room temperature using the Ensemble Monte Carlo method. We demonstrate that a technique called “third-body rejection method” devised by B. K. Ridley, J. Phys. C: Solid State Phys. 10, 1589 (1977) can be successfully adapted to Ensemble Monte Carlo method and used to tackle the problem of the electron-electron contribution to spin decoherence in the parameter region under study, where the electron-electron interaction can be reasonably described by a Yukawa potential. This scattering technique is employed in a doping region where one can expect that multiple collisions may play a role in carrier dynamics. By this technique, we are able to calculate spin relaxation times which are in very good agreement with the experimental results found by Oertel et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 93, 13 (2008). Through this method, we show that the electron-electron scattering is overestimated in Born approximation, in agreement with previous results obtained by C. A. Kukkonen and H. Smith, Phys. Rev. B 8, 4601 (1973).

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

A numerical study of crack initiation in a bcc iron system based on dynamic bifurcation theory

Crack initiation under dynamic loading conditions is studied under the framework of dynamic bifurcation theory. An atomistic model for BCC iron is considered to explicitly take into account the detailed molecular interactions. To understand the strain-rate dependence of the crack initiation process, we first obtain the bifurcation diagram from a computational procedure using continuation methods. The stability transition associated with a crack initiation, as well as the connection to the bifurcation diagram, is studied by comparing direct numerical results to the dynamic bifurcation theory [R. Haberman, SIAM J. Appl. Math. 37, 69–106 (1979)].

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Turbulent mixing in a precessing sphere

By numerically simulating turbulent flows at high Reynolds numbers in a precessing sphere, we propose a method to enhance the mixing of a fluid confined within a smooth cavity by its rotational motion alone. To precisely evaluate the mixing efficiency, we extend the quantification method proposed by Danckwerts [“The definition and measurement of some characteristics of mixtures,” Appl. Sci. Res. A 3, 279–296 (1952)] to the case in which only a finite number of fluid particle trajectories can be known. Our accurate numerical tracking of fluid particles in the flow, which is controlled by the Reynolds number (an indicator of the spin rate) and the Poincaré number (the precession rate), shows the following results. First, the mixing process on the time scale normalized by the spin period is independent of the Reynolds number as long as it is high enough for the flow to be developed turbulence. Second, fastest mixing is achieved under weak precession (Poincaré number ≈0.1); in such cases, perfect mixing requires only 10–15 spins of the container. Third, the power to sustain turbulence is a weakly increasing function of the Poincaré number, and the energy efficiency of the mixing is also maximized when the Poincaré number is about 0.1. Fourth, efficient mixing driven by the weak precession arises from the effective cooperation of complex large-scale flow and small-scale turbulence, which itself is sustained by the large-scale flow.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2014

Hard magnetic property enhancement of Co{sub 7}Hf-based ribbons by boron doping

Hard magnetic property enhancement of melt spun Co{sub 88}Hf{sub 12} ribbons by boron doping is demonstrated. B-doping could not only remarkably enhance the magnetic properties from energy product ((BH){sub max}) of 2.6 MGOe and intrinsic coercivity ({sub i}H{sub c}) of 1.5 kOe for B-free Co{sub 88}Hf{sub 12} ribbons to (BH){sub max} = 7.7 MGOe and {sub i}H{sub c} = 3.1 kOe for Co{sub 85}Hf{sub 12}B{sub 3} ribbons but also improve the Curie temperature (T{sub C}) of 7:1 phase. The (BH){sub max} value achieved in Co{sub 85}Hf{sub 12}B{sub 3} ribbons is the highest in Co-Hf alloy ribbons ever reported, which is about 15% higher than that of Co{sub 11}Hf{sub 2}B ribbons spun at 16 m/s [M. A. McGuire, O. Rios, N. J. Ghimire, and M. Koehler, Appl. Phys. Lett. 101, 202401 (2012)]. The structural analysis confirms that B enters the orthorhombic Co{sub 7}Hf (7:1) crystal structure as interstitial atoms, forming Co{sub 7}HfB{sub x}, in the as-spun state. Yet B may diffuse out from the 7:1 phase after post-annealing, leading to the reduction of Curie temperature and the magnetic properties. The uniformly refined microstructure with B-doping results in high remanence (B{sub r}) and improves the squareness of demagnetization curve. The formation of interstitial-atom-modified Co{sub 7}HfB{sub x} phase and the microstructure refinement are the main reasons to give rise to the enhancement of hard magnetic properties in the B-containing Co{sub 7}Hf-based ribbons.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2014

Balancing high gain and bandwidth in multilayer organic photodetectors with tailored carrier blocking layers

We present detailed studies of the high photocurrent gain behavior in multilayer organic photodiodes containing tailored carrier blocking layers we reported earlier in a Letter [W. T. Hammond and J. Xue, Appl. Phys. Lett. 97, 073302 (2010)], in which a high photocurrent gain of up to 500 was attributed to the accumulation of photogenerated holes at the anode/organic active layer interface and the subsequent drastic increase in secondary electron injection from the anode. Here, we show that both the hole-blocking layer structure and layer thickness strongly influence the magnitude of the photocurrent gain. Temporal studies revealed that the frequency response of such devices is limited by three different processes with lifetimes of 10 μs, 202 μs, and 2.72 ms for the removal of confined holes, which limit the 3 dB bandwidth of these devices to 1.4 kHz. Furthermore, the composition in the mixed organic donor-acceptor photoactive layer affects both gain and bandwidth, which is attributed to the varying charge transport characteristics, and the optimal gain-bandwidth product is achieved with approximately 30% donor content. Finally, these devices show a high dynamic range of more than seven orders of magnitude, although the photocurrent shows a sublinear dependence on the incident optical power.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2014

Interpreting the behavior of a quarter-wave transmission line resonator in a magnetized plasma

The quarter wave resonator immersed in a strongly magnetized plasma displays two possible resonances occurring either below or above its resonance frequency in vacuum, f{sub o}. This fact was demonstrated in our recent articles [G. S. Gogna and S. K. Karkari, Appl. Phys. Lett. 96, 151503 (2010); S. K. Karkari, G. S. Gogna, D. Boilson, M. M. Turner, and A. Simonin, Contrib. Plasma Phys. 50(9), 903 (2010)], where the experiments were carried out over a limited range of magnetic fields at a constant electron density, n{sub e}. In this paper, we present the observation of dual resonances occurring over the frequency scan and find that n{sub e} calculated by considering the lower resonance frequency is 25%–30% smaller than that calculated using the upper resonance frequency with respect to f{sub o}. At a given magnetic field strength, the resonances tend to shift away from f{sub o} as the background density is increased. The lower resonance tends to saturate when its value approaches electron cyclotron frequency, f{sub ce}. Interpretation of these resonance conditions are revisited by examining the behavior of the resonance frequency response as a function of n{sub e}. A qualitative discussion is presented which highlights the practical application of the hairpin resonator for interpreting n{sub e} in a strongly magnetized plasma.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2014

Monoxides of small terbium clusters: A density functional theory investigation

To investigate the effect of oxygen atom on the geometrical structures, electronic, and magnetic properties of small terbium clusters, we carried out the first-principles calculations on Tb{sub n}O (n = 1-14) clusters. The capping of an oxygen atom on one trigonal-facet of Tb{sub n} structures is always favored energetically, which can significantly improve the structural stability. The far-infrared vibrational spectroscopies are found to be different from those of corresponding bare clusters, providing a distinct signal to detect the characteristic structures of Tb{sub n}O clusters. The primary effect of oxygen atom on magnetic properties is to change the magnetic orderings among Tb atoms and to reduce small of local magnetic moments of the O-coordinated Tb atoms, both of which serve as the key reasons for the experimental magnetic evolution of an oscillating behavior. These calculations are consistent with, and help to account for, the experimentally observed magnetic properties of monoxide Tb{sub n}O clusters [C. N. Van Dijk et al., J. Appl. Phys. 107, 09B526 (2010)].

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2015

Low Mach number fluctuating hydrodynamics of multispecies liquid mixtures

We develop a low Mach number formulation of the hydrodynamic equations describing transport of mass and momentum in a multispecies mixture of incompressible miscible liquids at specified temperature and pressure, which generalizes our prior work on ideal mixtures of ideal gases [Balakrishnan et al., “Fluctuating hydrodynamics of multispecies nonreactive mixtures,” Phys. Rev. E 89 013017 (2014)] and binary liquid mixtures [Donev et al., “Low mach number fluctuating hydrodynamics of diffusively mixing fluids,” Commun. Appl. Math. Comput. Sci. 9(1), 47-105 (2014)]. In this formulation, we combine and extend a number of existing descriptions of multispecies transport available in the literature. The formulation applies to non-ideal mixtures of arbitrary number of species, without the need to single out a “solvent” species, and includes contributions to the diffusive mass flux due to gradients of composition, temperature, and pressure. Momentum transport and advective mass transport are handled using a low Mach number approach that eliminates fast sound waves (pressure fluctuations) from the full compressible system of equations and leads to a quasi-incompressible formulation. Thermal fluctuations are included in our fluctuating hydrodynamics description following the principles of nonequilibrium thermodynamics. We extend the semi-implicit staggered-grid finite-volume numerical method developed in our prior work on binary liquid mixtures [Nonaka et al., “Low mach number fluctuating hydrodynamics of binary liquid mixtures,” http://arxiv.org/abs/1410.2300 (2015)] and use it to study the development of giant nonequilibrium concentration fluctuations in a ternary mixture subjected to a steady concentration gradient. We also numerically study the development of diffusion-driven gravitational instabilities in a ternary mixture and compare our numerical results to recent experimental measurements [Carballido-Landeira et al., “Mixed-mode instability of a miscible interface due to coupling between Rayleigh–Taylor and double-diffusive convective modes,” Phys. Fluids 25, 024107 (2013)] in a Hele-Shaw cell. We find that giant nonequilibrium fluctuations can trigger the instability but are eventually dominated by the deterministic growth of the unstable mode, in both quasi-two-dimensional (Hele-Shaw) and fully three-dimensional geometries used in typical shadowgraph experiments.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2015

Investigation of therapeutic potentials of some selected medicinal plants using neutron activation analysis

Series of attempts were made to investigate concentrations of trace elements and their therapeutic properties in various medicinal plants. In this study, samples of some commonly used plants were collected from Bauchi State, Nigeria. They includes leaves of azadirachta indica (neem), Moringa Oleifera (moringa), jatropha curcas (purgin Nut), guiera senegalensis (custard apple) and anogeissus leiocarpus (African birch). These samples were analyzed for their trace elements contents with both short and long irradiation protocols of Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA) at Nigerian Research Reactor-1 (NIRR-1) of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria. The level of trace elements found varies from one sample to another, with some reported at hundreds of mg/Kg dry weight. The results have been compared with the available literature data. The presence of these trace elements indicates promising potentials of these plants for relief of certain ailments.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2015

Electrotransport-induced unmixing and decomposition of ternary oxides

A general expectation is that in a uniform oxygen activity atmosphere, cation electrotransport induces a ternary or higher oxide, e.g., AB{sub 1+ξ}O{sub 3+δ}, to kinetically unmix unless the electrochemical mobilities of, say, A{sup 2+}and B{sup 4+} cations are identically equal, and eventually to decompose into the component oxides AO and BO{sub 2} once the extent of unmixing exceeds the stability range of its nonmolecularity ξ. It has, however, earlier been reported [Yoo et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 92, 252103 (2008)] that even a massive cation electrotransport induces BaTiO{sub 3} to neither unmix nor decompose even at a voltage far exceeding the so-called decomposition voltage U{sub d}, a measure of the standard formation free energy of the oxide (|ΔG{sub f}{sup o}| = nFU{sub d}). Here, we report that as expected, NiTiO{sub 3} unmixes at any voltage and even decomposes if the voltage applied exceeds seemingly a threshold value larger than U{sub d}. We demonstrate experimentally that the electrochemical mobilities of Ni{sup 2+} and Ti{sup 4+} should be necessarily unequal for unmixing. Also, we show theoretically that equal cation mobilities appear to be a sufficiency for BaTiO{sub 3} only for a thermodynamic reason.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗