In the recent years, there has been high interest in renewable energy and highly efficient devices, promoted by the need to stop changing weather patterns. One of the most interesting methods for this is using thermoelectric materials, which are low cost and highly durable. However, the need for higher efficiency values and a higher resistance to oxidation leads to a technological problem in the field of coating. Due to its diverse properties, glass coating has been proposed as a solution to both sublimation of the thermoelectric materials and oxidation. Lead silicate glasses with 30% PbO were doped with 0–5% of Na2O and B2O3 to produce glasses with different properties. Differential scanning calorimetry and dilatometry measurements showed that the glass temperature can vary between 428 and 505 °C. The softening temperature is varied between 493 and 560 °C. Below Tg, the coefficient of thermal expansion is varied between 5.9 and 9 ppm/K and above Tg it varied between 17 and 58 ppm/K. This allows the tuning of the glass composition for each thermoelectric material, such as 0.5% B and 1% Na doped PbO -SiO2 glass for skutterudites and 1% doped B and 1% Na doped for Mg2Si, PbTe, and GeTe.

Noble metal (Ag, Au) nanoparticles (NPs) deposited on the surface of three-dimensional (3D) materials are promising 3D surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrates. In this work, the authors reported the preparation of 3D wax/silica/Ag(Au) colloidosomes by sulfonic acid group–terminated silica spheres (SiO2–SO3H) combined with a Pickering emulsion technique, as well as seed-mediated growth method of noble metal NPs. The presence of –SO3H group on the silica spheres not only improves significantly the quality of wax/silica colloidosomes (forming perfect silica shell around wax droplet) but also can adsorb metal precursor ions via electrostatic attraction for further growth of metal NPs. The size and coverage of Ag(Au) NPs on wax/silica droplets can be facilely tuned, and relevant wax/silica/Ag(Au) colloidosomes and silica/Ag(Au) Janus particles are obtained via this strategy. The obtained wax/silica/Ag colloidosomes as 3D SERS substrates exhibited excellent SERS enhancement ability and detection limit of 4-aminothiophenol reached 10−9 M.

The development of stable and effective earth-abundant metal oxide electrocatalysts is very crucial to improve competence of water electrolysis. In this study, iron manganite (FeMnO3) nanomaterials were synthesized as an affordable electrocatalyst for water oxidation reactions. The structural and chemical properties of FeMnO3 nanomaterials were studied by transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray, X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectrometry, and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller analyses. The microscopy analyses show that the synthesized material has wire morphology, and assembly of approximately 70 nm nanocrystallites forms the wires. XRD patterns confirmed the bixbyite structure of FeMnO3. The potential utility of the synthesized FeMnO3 nanowires (NWs) as an electrocatalyst for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) was investigated in alkaline medium. The FeMnO3 NW modified fluorinated tin oxide (FTO) electrodes demonstrated promising OER activity with onset potential of 1.60 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode and overpotential of 600 mV at 10 mA/cm2 catalytic current density. FeMnO3 NW modified FTO electrode was also observed to be stable during long-term constant potential electrolysis. Therefore, this new material can be considered as a cost-effective alternative to noble metal electrocatalysts for water oxidation and other possible catalytic reactions.

A rigorous analysis of yield strength of pure iron over a wide grain size scale, using an extensive compilation of experimental data, indicates that the common Hall–Petch relationship is not obeyed with large deviations at the extremes of grain size. The author proposes here a phenomenological exponential function to represent the grain size effect on strength over multiple length scales. It is shown that the exponential function describes the grain size dependence of strength remarkably well, on the basis of a large set of experimental data for pure Fe. A nonlinear regression analysis indicated that the function provided a very high degree of correlation of data. The validity of the function is also supported by its conformation to physical boundary conditions at the extremes of grain size, that is, by asymptotically reaching the limiting stress for dislocation nucleation at infinitesimal grain size, and, the strength of single crystal at infinite grain size. The exponential form is a significant improvement over the Hall–Petch relationship and may be used as a guide to develop a reliable theory of grain size strengthening of iron.

Carbonate glasses can be formed routinely in the system K2CO3–MgCO3. The enthalpy of formation for one such 0.55K2CO3–0.45MgCO3 glass was determined at 298 K to be 115.00 ± 1.21 kJ/mol by drop solution calorimetry in molten sodium molybdate (3Na2O·MoO3) at 975 K. The corresponding heat of formation from oxides at 298 K was −261.12 ± 3.02 kJ/mol. This ternary glass is shown to be slightly metastable with respect to binary crystalline components (K2CO3 and MgCO3) and may be further stabilized by entropy terms arising from cation disorder and carbonate group distortions. This high degree of disorder is confirmed by 13C MAS NMR measurement of the average chemical shift tensor values, which show asymmetry of the carbonate anion to be significantly larger than previously reported values. Molecular dynamics simulations show that the structure of this carbonate glass reflects the strong interaction between the oxygen atoms in distorted carbonate anions and potassium cations.

A kind of n–p (SnO2)1.3/(α ∼ Bi2O3)x/(β ∼ Bi2O3)1−x nanocomposite (SB-15) was synthesized with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) as a template by solid state synthesis. XRD and HR-TEM confirmed the formation of n–p (SnO2)1.3/(α ∼ Bi2O3)x/(β ∼ Bi2O3)1−x. Particle size is found to be about 18 nm from HR-TEM images. FE-SEM clearly detected the boundary between SnO2 nanoparticles and Bi2O3 polyhedron particles. The special morphology and coexisting of α-Bi2O3 and β-Bi2O3 in SB-15 make it have a stronger visible light absorption range as far as 725 nm. PL and photocurrent test shows that the SB-15 has the best photocarriers separation capability. About 99% decolorization ratio of Rh.B was achieved in only 5 min. About 70% Cr6+ was degraded within 20 min and it is about 60% for tetracycline in the coexisting system (Te with Cr6+ solution), introducing it as a promising photocatalytic material. This work has addressed the method of phase-selective synthesis of n–p SnO2/α ∼ Bi2O3/β ∼ Bi2O3 by convenient solid state synthesis, which should be useful for the studies of other composites.

Differences in pipe wall microstructure at various positions throughout the wall thickness of high strength aluminum alloy thick-wall pipes produced by reverse hot extrusion were investigated. The microstructures of the inner wall (IW), outer wall (OW), and half wall (HW) were compared. Further, heterogeneity in the mechanical properties of the pipe throughout the wall thickness was also investigated. Results revealed that the volume fraction of precipitation was highest at the HW position because of the higher Zn and Mg contents. Further, approximately 26% of grains were recrystallized in the OW position due to the greater strain during extrusion, while the recrystallization fractions of the IW and HW positions were 13% and 21%, respectively. The effects of precipitation strengthening and deformation strengthening contribute to the highest ultimate tensile strength and Vickers hardness of the HW position, and to the higher elongation of the IW and OW positions.

This article reviews the state of the art in the gas-phase synthesis of graphene in atmospheric plasmas. The substrate-free process involves the delivery of a carbon-containing precursor into a microwave-generated Ar plasma. Factors that influence the synthesis of graphene include precursor composition, reactor design, and the flow rates of gases. These factors have elucidated the mechanisms of graphene formation in atmospheric plasmas. Gas phase–synthesized graphene is pure and highly ordered and possesses unique features that make the material useful in applications such as catalysis, energy storage, lubrication, and the transmission electron microscopy imaging of nanomaterials. However, the main challenge in the synthesis process is the low rate of graphene production. This article anticipates future research aimed at overcoming this challenge and compares the atmospheric plasma method with contemporary graphene production techniques.

In search of materials with better properties, polycrystalline materials are often found to be superior to their respective single crystalline counterparts. Reduction of grain size in polycrystalline materials can drastically alter the properties of materials. When the grain sizes reach the nanometer scale, the improved mechanical response of the materials make them attractive in many applications. Multicomponent solid-solution alloys have shown to have a higher radiation tolerance compared with pure materials. Combining these advantages, we investigate the radiation tolerance of nanocrystalline multicomponent alloys. We find that these alloys withstand a much higher irradiation dose, compared with nanocrystalline Ni, before the nanocrystallinity is lost. Some of the investigated alloys managed to keep their nanocrystallinity for twice the irradiation dose as pure Ni.

Intrinsic size effects in nanoglass plasticity have been connected to the structural length scales imposed by the interfacial network, and control over this behavior is critical to designing amorphous alloys with improved mechanical response. In this paper, atomistic simulations are employed to probe strain delocalization in nanoglasses with explicit correlation to the interfacial characteristics and length scales of the amorphous grain structure. We show that strength is independent of grain size under certain conditions, but scales with the excess free volume and degree of short-range ordering in the interfaces. Structural homogenization upon annealing of the nanoglasses increases their strength toward the value of the bulk metallic glass; however, continued partitioning of strain to the interfacial regions inhibits the formation of a primary shear band. Intrinsic size effects in nanoglass plasticity thus originate from biased plastic strain accumulation within the interfacial regions, which will ultimately govern strain delocalization and homogenous flow in nanoglasses.

Cordierite foams were prepared by thermo-foaming of alumina–microsilica–talc powder dispersions in molten D-glucose anhydrous followed by reaction sintering at 1400 °C, which exhibited an interconnected cellular morphology and three-dimensional porous cell walls. The cordierite foam had a porosity of up to 96%, and its corresponding thermal conductivity was as low as 0.057 W/(m·K). The foam structures showed a great promise for gas filtration and gas catalytic support. The formation of interconnected cellular morphology, the variations of cell wall thickness, and cell size were explained from the perspective of viscosity and weak points in this paper. The linear shrinkage of cordierite foams having a density of 0.102–0.226 g/cm3 was in the range of 13.0–6.9%. And the compressive strength (0.05–0.28 MPa) was determined by the large cell size (1.1–1.3 mm), ultra-high porosity (91–96%), and characteristic of cordierite.

In this paper, in situ Al4C3 and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) hybrid-reinforced aluminum matrix composites were prepared by a two-step ball milling (TSBM), consisting of a 24-h long-time ball milling (LTBM) and a 6-h short-time ball milling (STBM). During LTBM, most of the CNTs were seriously damaged, and many amorphous carbon atoms derived from these damaged defects would react with Al powder to form in situ Al4C3 nanorods. Subsequently, 1 wt% CNTs were added into the composite powders for STBM to uniformly disperse CNTs into the composite powders. Compared with that of the composite prepared by one-step ball milling, the comprehensive mechanical properties of the composite prepared by the TSBM are improved obviously due to the synergistic effects of in situ Al4C3 and CNTs, and the tensile strength and elongation reached 258 MPa and 19.5%, respectively. The strengthening mechanisms of TSBM composite include fine-grained strengthening, dispersion strengthening by in situ Al4C3, and load transfer from matrix to CNTs.