Electric potentials as a function of distance were calculated for a model of the double layer on clays in which a surface zone a few water molecules thick has a low dielectric constant. This zone is followed by bulk water with a normal dielectric constant. The double layer potentials were found to be lower than those obtained from the Gouy model, in which water has a normal dielectric constant throughout the double layer.

Reported in this paper is a study of the influence of pore fluid composition on sediment volume of kaolinite suspensions. Laboratory tests have been conducted with kaolinite in water with NaCl, CaCl2 and A1C13 of different concentrations and in 10 types of organic liquids of varying values of static dielectric constant. The types of tests performed include regular suspension tests and leaching and cyclic leaching tests on kaolinite sediments. In the leaching tests, sediments formed during the regular suspension tests in water of low salt concentration were subsequently leached with water of high salt concentration. In the cyclic leaching tests, the salt concentration was increased and then decreased. The purpose of the leaching and cyclic leaching tests was to study the change in existing equilibrium fabric caused by subsequent changes in the concentration of salt in pore fluid. Results of the suspension tests indicate that sediment volume of a water suspension decreases with increase in ion concentration and increase in valence of cation. Leaching and cyclic leaching tests indicate that substantial change in salt concentration is required to change the existing fabric. The effect of dielectric constant of pore fluid on sediment volume is somewhat complex. As the dielectric constant increases from 1.9 for heptane to 110 for formamide, sediment volume first decreases, assuming a minimum at 24 for ethanol, increases with a maximum at 80 for water, and decreases again until 110 for formamide. An approximate physico-chemical analysis model is used to interpret some of the data in a quantitative manner. In the analysis model, recently developed theories of double-layer repulsive and van der Waals attractive forces are combined to simulate the behavior of suspensions.

Calcium-sodium exchange on Wyoming bentonite in methanol, ethanol and acetone-water systems were investigated at 0.03 N Cl and at room temperature. Calcium-sodium exchange isotherms were plotted at cosolvent concentrations ranging from 0 to 70% wt./wt. using Ca and Na ionic activities before and after correction for CaCl+ formation. In both cases and in all treatments, a greater selectivity of bentonite surfaces for Ca ions was observed. When compared to water, different trends were observed among and within cosolvents. These trends varied depending on whether or not CaCl+ formation was accounted for. Ignoring the formation of CaCl+, the preference of bentonite for Ca increased in methanolwater systems with increased percent methanol at low equivalent Ca fraction (<0.2). At higher Ca fractions, this preference matched that of water. In ethanol-water, no increased preference of the surface for Ca was observed. In acetone-water, increasing cosolvent concentration decreased the preference of the surface for Ca. The magnitude of this decrease was larger at low equivalent Ca fraction (<0.2). After correction for CaCl+, both in solution and on the surface, the preference of bentonite for Ca2+ was larger in methanol- and ethanol-water systems. In acetone-water, increased surface preference for Ca was only apparent at low acetone fractions (<50%). At higher acetone fractions, there was evidence of increased Na loading but no increase in Ca2+ selectivity. Clearly, ion-pair formation and its effects on Ca-Na exchange reactions cannot be ignored in mixtures of aqueous-organic solvents. After accounting for this effect, Ca-Na exchange in the studied solvents appears to be more of a surface- than a solution-controlled phenomenon that involves both electrostatic and specific solvent-surface types of interactions that have not been elucidated.

In this paper, we propose a frequency-reconfigurable antenna structure consisting of a dielectric resonator (DR) topped by a superstrate material. Two metasurfaces (MSs) are placed upon the DR and the superstrate, where these two MSs are utilized to synthesize a localized reduction of the dielectric constant of the DR. By placing switches into one of the MSs, the distribution of dielectric constant of the DR can be switched to one of two predefined distributions, which is equivalent to switching the DR length to two different lengths. Consequently, the frequency response of the proposed structure can be tuned to one of two operating bands. The excited modes inside the proposed antenna were obtained analytically and through simulations. Also, the dielectric constant value of substrates topped by MSs was analyzed. The antenna was fabricated and measured, and good agreement between simulation and measurement was attained. The antenna bandwidths are 7–8.1 GHz (14.7%) and 8.5–9.2 GHz (8%) and the gains are 5.1 and 7.8 dB, in the cases of having switches off and on, respectively.

Radio-echo sounding techniques are very useful for fast profiling of seasonal snowpack. Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) is used widely for various cryospheric applications, such as snow/glacier depth estimation, snow layer identification and snow water equivalent assessment. The dielectric constant of snow is an important input parameter for the acquisition and interpretation of GPR data from the snowpack. In this study, snow dielectric constant was measured along with physical properties of snow using a snow fork operating at 1 GHz frequency. Experiments were conducted at field observatories of the Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment located in different Himalayan ranges: Patseo (Greater Himalayan range), Dhundhi and Solang (Pir Panjal range). Interseasonal spatial and temporal variations in snow dielectric constant and associated snowpack properties were analysed for five winter seasons (2010-14). The mean seasonal snow dielectric constant is higher at Dhundhi (1.82 ±0.02) than at Patseo (1.69 ±0.02). The measured snow dielectric constant was used to derive snow density and liquid-water content (LWC). A better correlation between snow dielectric constant and LWC is observed for high-density snow (>300kgm-3; R2 = 0.95) than for low-density snow (<200kgm-3; R2 = 0.73). Snow-fork-derived snow density was in good agreement with manually measured values. The snow dielectric constant database generated during this study can be used as a reference for various field applications of GPR in snow-related studies.

Propagation of Gaussian X-ray laser beam is presented in collisional quantum plasma and the beam width oscillation is studied along the propagation direction. It is noticed that due to energy absorption in collisional plasma, the laser energy drops to an amount less than the critical value of the self-focusing effect and consequently, the laser beam defocuses. It is found that the oscillation amplitude of the laser spot size enhances while passing through collisional plasma. For the greater values of collision frequency, the beam width oscillates with higher amplitude and defocuses in a shallower plasma depth. Also, it is realized that in a dense plasma environment, the laser self-focusing occurs earlier with the higher oscillation amplitude, smaller laser spot size and more oscillations.

Many molecular events are associated with small or large conformational changes occurring in the corresponding proteins. Modeling such changes is a challenge and requires significant amount of computing time. From point of view of electrostatics, these changes can be viewed as a reorganization of local charges and dipoles in response to the changes of the electrostatic field, if the cause is insertion or deletion of a charged amino acid. Here we report a large scale investigation of modeling the changes of the folding energy due to single mutations involving charged group. This allows the changes of the folding energy to be considered mostly electrostatics in origin and to be calculated with DelPhi assigning residue-specific value of the internal dielectric constant of protein. The predicted energy changes are benchmarked against experimentally measured changes of the folding energy on a set of 257 single mutations. The best fit between experimental values and predicted changes is used to find out the effective value of the internal dielectric constant for each type of amino acid. The predicted folding free energy changes with the optimal, amino acid specific, dielectric constants are within RMSD=0.86 kcal/mol from experimentally measured changes.

In this paper characterization of dielectric materials in liquid and powder phase using concentric closed and split ring resonators of length λ, λ/2, and λ/4 is reported. Experimental results have been validated by simulations and theoretically modeling. Sensitivity of the resonator with closed rings was maximum. Experimentally extracted values of dielectric constant of ferrite ranged from 14.05 to 15.1 with closed ring resonators and from 13.6 to 14.02 with split ring resonator, respectively. For spirulina platensis the dielectric constant was lying in the range 1.78–1.93 and 1.74–2.04 with closed ring and split ring resonators, respectively. The values extracted experimentally are in good agreement with simulation and theoretically found values. However, the values obtained from closed ring resonator were in agreement with the dielectric constant values of ferrite and spirulina platensis.

Identifying candidate materials to replace SiO2 as the gate dielectric for complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) applications is a difficult task. Proper assessment of the critical materials requirements is essential, and it is important to devise an approach to predict materials properties without having to make many unnecessary measurements on high-ĸ materials. Such an approach helps to eliminate unlikely candidates and focus on the most promising ones. Clearly, this type of modeling approach requires an understanding of several physical and chemical characteristics, including the bonding and electronic structure, band alignment with Si, and the nature of the dielectric constant and interface properties. We present a critical assessment of some existing methods and models of materials properties, as well as a comparison of the present modeling approach with some experimentally determined values.

In this paper, UV-induced large area growth of high dielectric constant (Ta2O5, TiO2and PZT) and low dielectric constant (polyimide and porous silica) thin films by photo-CVD and sol-gel processing using excimer lamps, as well as the effect of low temperature LW annealing, are discussed. Ellipsometry, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), UV spectrophotometry, atomic force microscope (AFM), capacitance-voltage (C-V) and current-voltage (I-V) measurements have been employed to characterize oxide films grown and indicate them to be high quality layers. Leakage current densities as low as 9.0×10−8 Acm−2 and 1.95×10−7 Acm−2 at 0.5 MV/cm have been obtained for the as-grown Ta2O5 films formed by photo-induced sol-gel processing and photo-CVD. respectively - several orders of magnitude lower than for any other as-grown films prepared by any other technique. A subsequent low temperature (400°C) UV annealing step improves these to 2.0×10−9 Acm−2 and 6.4× 10−9 Acm−2, respectively. These values are essentially identical to those only previously formed for films annealed at temperatures between 600 and 1000°C. PZT thin films have also been deposited at low temperatures by photo-assisted decomposition of a PZT metal-organic sol-gel polymer using the 172 nm excimer lamp. Very low leakage current densities (10−7 A/cm2) can be achieved, which compared with layers grown by conventional thermal processing. Photo-induced deposition of low dielectric constant organic polymers for interlayer dielectrics has highlighted a significant role of photo effects on the curing of polyamic acid films. I-V measurements showed the leakage current density of the irradiated polymer films was over an order of magnitude smaller than has been obtained in the films prepared by thermal processing. Compared with conventional furnace processing, the photo-induced curing of the polyimide provided both reduced processing time and temperature, A new technique of low temperature photo-induced sol-gel process for the growth of low dielectric constant porous silicon dioxide thin films from TEOS sol-gel solutions with a 172 nm excimer lamp has also been successfully demonstrated. The dielectric constant values as low as 1.7 can be achieved at room temperature. The applications investigated so far clearly demonstrate that low cost high power excimer lamp systems can provide an interesting alternative to conventional UV lamps and excimer lasers for industrial large-scale low temperature materials processing.

Unlike most protein crystals, form IX of bovine pancreatic ribonuclease A diffracts well when severely dehydrated. Crystal structures have been solved after 2.5 and 4 days of desiccation with CaSO4, at 1.9 and 2.0 Å resolution, respectively. The two desiccated structures are very similar. An RMS displacement of 1.6 Å is observed for main-chain atoms in each structure when compared to the hydrated crystal structure with some large rearrangements observed in loop regions. The structural changes are the result of intermolecular contacts formed by strong electrostatic interactions in the absence of a high dielectric medium. The electron density is very diffuse for some surface loops, consistent with a very disordered structure. This disorder is related to the conformational changes. These results help explain conformational changes during the lyophilization of protein and the associated phenomena of denaturation and molecular memory.