The ability of dairy cows to discriminate between floors with a smooth epoxy resin surface or with surface-applied bauxite aggregates of mean diameters 0.5 mm, 1.2 mm or 2.5 mm (having coefficients of static friction of 0.35, 0.42, 0.49 and 0.74, respectively) was recorded when they were offered the opportunity to walk down paired floor surfaces to receive a food reward. Following training, one half of the cows were rewarded when they selected the floor with the greater friction and the other half were rewarded when they selected the floor with the least friction. The cows were able to distinguish between the different floor surfaces — even between surfaces with 0.5 mm and 1.2 mm aggregates, which humans found difficult to distinguish. Eight similar cows were then offered a choice of walking down passageways of paired floors with an equal reward at the end of each passageway. There were no consistent preferences for floor type, and when the reward was offered only on the side least favoured by each cow in the initial test, the random pattern of selection was still evident. A final choice test offered the cows the opportunity to traverse passageways of either wet concrete or concrete covered with excreta. All cows avoided the passageway with excreta completely, even when the reward was increased in this passageway and removed from the wet concrete passageway. This avoidance was attributed to the cows’ lack of contact with slurry, as they were at pasture for most of the day, in contrast to the cows used in previous work, which were housed in buildings with passageways covered in excreta and showed little avoidance behaviour of such passageways.

Organic carbon (C) plays an essential role in the denitrification process as it supplies energy for N2O, N2 and CO2 producing reactions. The objectives of this study were to: (i) rank the reactivity of different C compounds found in manures based on their availability for denitrification and (ii) explore C-quality in different C sources based on their capacity to promote denitrification. Evaluation of different C-sources in promoting denitrification was conducted based on the molar ratio of CO2 production to NO3− reduction after incubation. Results of the first experiment (a 12-day investigation) showed that glucose and glucosamine were highly reactive C compounds with all applied NO3− being exhausted by day 3, and glucosamine had significantly high amount of NH4+-N present at end of the experiment. The glucose and glucosamine treatments resulted in significantly greater cumulative CO2 production, compared to the other treatments. In the second experiment (a 9-day investigation), all NO3− had been depleted by day 6 and 9 from acetic acid and glucose, respectively, and the greatest cumulative CO2 production was from acetic acid. The CO2 appearance to NO3− molar ratios revealed that glucose and glucosamine were compounds with highly available C in the first experiment. In the second experiment, the pig slurry and acetic acid were found to be C-sources that promoted potential denitrification. The application of slurry to soil results in the promotion of denitrification and this depends on the availability of the C compounds it contains. Understanding the relationship between C availability and denitrification potential is useful for developing denitrification mitigation strategies for organic soil amendments.

Biogas digesters convert waste matter into a natural gas-like fuel and a nutrient-rich digestate by-product. This digestate has the potential to be used as a soil amendment to benefit crop production with or without biochar, a purported nutrient sponge. In a greenhouse study of several crop species, the effects of digestate fertilization on crop growth, photosynthetic efficiency, vegetable production and chemical nutrient levels were tested. Results indicate that increasing potency of the applied digestate fosters higher growth and fruit production rates of several studied plants but to a lesser degree than a conventional fertilizer. More potent digestate application increases antioxidant capacity, total phenolics content and ascorbic acid levels in kale compared to the control chemical fertilizer test groups but has confounding results on legume nutrient levels. Additionally, the combined application of biochar and biogas digestate added to compost and used as potting media positively impacts crop germination. This work has relevance to agrarian communities that could benefit from recycling livestock and food waste into fuel and a renewable fertilizer.

To reduce competition with human-edible feed resources, it is of interest to incorporate by-products from the food industry in animal feeds. The current research investigated the effect of including increasing amounts of tofu by-product (TF) in practical pig diets on animal performance, nitrogen balance and ammonia emissions from manure. Two experiments were conducted including a control diet without TF, containing 160 g/kg dietary non-starch polysaccharides (NSPs) and three diets including 122, 246 and 360 g TF/kg DM (TF122, TF246 and TF360, respectively) to reach 220, 280 and 360 g/kg NSP. All diets had the same level of CP and protein digestible in the small intestine which particularly was realized by replacing rice bran with TF. Animal performance was assessed in a first experiment with 40 growing barrows with initial BW of 26.6 ± 1.80 kg (M ± SD) being allocated to the 4 treatments, during 2 growth phases (i.e. until 50 kg BW and from 50 to 80 kg BW). In the growth phase until 50 kg, feed intake and average daily gain (ADG) were linearly reduced by dietary TF inclusion, while this negative impact disappeared during the second growth phase (50 to 80 kg BW). Tofu by-product inclusion even positively affected the feed conversion ratio during this second growth phase (3.4 to 2.7 kg feed/kg ADG for 0 to 360 g/kg dietary TF). Over the entire growth period, performance and feed intake were negatively affected at the highest dietary TF level. Experiment 2 was conducted to assess digestibility, nitrogen balance and ammonia emission from manure. For this purpose, 16 pigs with BW of 62.8 ± 3.6 kg (M ± SD) were assigned to either 1 of the 4 treatments. There was no difference in total tract apparent digestibility of dietary organic matter or CP, while NDF digestibility increased with increasing TF level, suggesting increasing importance of the hindgut fermentation when digesting diets with increasing TF levels. Nevertheless, this was not reflected in increasing levels of faecal volatile fatty acids or purines, nor in reduced manure pH. As a result, ammonia emission from slurry was not reduced through dietary TF inclusion, despite the linear decrease in urinary nitrogen. In conclusion, TF can be included in pigs’ diets up to an inclusion rate of 25% without risk of impaired animal performance; however, this dietary strategy fails to mitigate ammonia emission from slurry.

A novel synchronous rolling-casting for metal (SRCM) process for producing metal components is developed. In this paper, the microstructure evolution and mechanical property of ZLl04 alloy with different pouring temperatures by SRCM are investigated. In the process, the pouring temperature has great effects on the microstructure and mechanical property primarily through the crystal change in the rolling-casting area. Temperature of liquids and solids of ZL104 alloy is measured by differential scanning calorimetry. Distribution and characteristics of the microstructure of samples are examined by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy equipped with energy dispersive spectrometer. The results show that the samples fabricated by SRCM present uniform structure and good performance with the pouring temperature at 620 °C when the velocity of the substrate is at 10 cm/s. The tensile strength of ZLl04 alloy reaches 211.89 Mpa, while the average vickers hardness is 81.5 HV.

Removing residual moisture in lithium-ion battery electrodes is essential for desired electrochemical performance. In this manuscript, the residual moisture in LiNi0.5Mn0.3Co0.2O2 cathodes produced by conventional solvent-based and aqueous processing is characterized and compared. The electrochemical performance has also been investigated for various residual moisture contents. It has been demonstrated that the residual moisture lowers the first cycle coulombic efficiency, but its effect on short term cycle life is insignificant.

Electrochemical ceramic cells such as solid-oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) are typically operated at 700–800°C in order to realize practical performances that, in turn, result in higher efficiencies compared to that of other types of electrochemical cells. High-temperature operation, on the other hand, leads to increased system cost and limits application. Thus, lowering the operating temperature is expected to solve such problems. This article shows the effectiveness of redesigning the cell structure for reduction of the operating temperature to 650°C or lower using conventional SOFC materials. A microtubular cell design is found to be one means of lowering the operating temperature of SOFCs. Such developments in fabrication technology are key to realizing high-performance cells with a thin electrolyte and controlled electrode microstructures.

The 0.6(Bi0.85La0.15)FeO3-0.4PbTiO3 (BLF-PT) ceramics were prepared by tape casting method. Effects of binder (polyvinylbutyl dibutyl PVB), plasticizer (phthalate-polyethylene glycol DBP-PEG) and dispersant (triethylolamine, TEA) concentration on the rheological properties of BLF-PT slurry were investigated. The optimized component ratio for ceramics powders, binder, plasticizer, dispersant and solvent (ethanol, EtOH) in the slurry was 50 wt.%, 4 wt.%, 6 wt.%, 1 wt.% and 39 wt.%. The dielectric constant εr, loss tanδ, and remnant polarization Pr of BLF-PT ceramics laminated from the tapes were 525 (1 kHz), 1.7% (1 kHz) and 30 μC/cm2 (45 kV/cm), respectively, which were comparable to those of BLF-PT ceramics prepared by traditional solid state reaction method.

A new technology to size nanoparticles in liquids is presented. The technique is based on aerosol technology coupled to a nanoparticle nebulizer. This allows number concentration measurements in the size range ca. 5 to 500 nm with high peak resolution.

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of dietary levels of crude protein (CP), close to the range used commercially and to the European Commission recommended values, on the nitrogen (N) balance, ammonia (NH3) emission and pollutant characteristics of the slurry from growing and finishing pigs. Three feeding programmes with different CP levels were compared during the growing and the finishing periods of fattening. Diets were formulated to be isoenergetic and for the digestible lysine : metabolisable energy ratio to be similar in all the diets for each phase, but differed in CP concentration (160, 150 and 140 g CP/kg for the growing phase and 155, 145 and 135 g CP/kg for the finishing phase). Faeces and urine from barrows (eight replicates per diet) allocated in metabolism cages were collected separately for 5 days to calculate the N balance and for 2 days to measure NH3 emission in a laboratory system for 240 h. Excreta were analysed for pH, volatile fatty acids (VFA), total N, electrical conductivity (EC), total solids (TS), volatile solids (VS), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD5), chemical oxygen demand (COD) and NH4-N reduction of dietary CP content led to a linear decrease of urinary (P < 0.05) and total (P < 0.05) N excretion, and N excretion/feed intake (P < 0.001). The emission of NH3 was similar in all diets (P > 0.05) during the 240 h of study. However, in the growing phase, the NH3-N level in slurry was lower (P < 0.05) for the low-CP diet. In addition, the CP level had no significant effect (P > 0.05) on total VFA, EC, TS, VS, COD or BOD5 contents of excreta. These parameters were higher (P < 0.05) in slurry from the finishing phase than from the growing phase. However, NH4-N in the slurry decreased (P < 0.05) by 20.3% and 28.4% when the CP level was decreased by 9.30 or 21.40 g/kg, respectively. It is concluded that lowering dietary CP levels even by small amounts and using CP levels close to these used in commercial diets and close to the European Commission recommended values will decrease urinary and total N excretion in the slurry of growing-finishing pigs. The slurry from finishing pigs is more concentrated than that from growing pigs.

Ruminant husbandry constitutes the most important source of anthropogenic methane (CH4). In addition to enteric (animal-derived) CH4, excreta are another source of CH4, especially when stored anaerobically. Increasing the proportion of dietary concentrate is often considered as the primary CH4 mitigation option. However, it is unclear whether this is still valid when diets to be compared are energy-balanced. In addition, non-structural carbohydrates and side effects on nitrogen (N) emissions may be important. In this experiment, diet types representing either forage-only or mixed diets were examined for their effects on CH4 and N emissions from animals and their slurries in 18 lactating cows. Apart from a hay-only diet, treatments included two mixed diets consisting of maize stover, pelleted whole maize plants and gluten or barley straw and grain and soy bean meal. The diets were balanced in crude protein and net energy for lactation. After adaptation, data and samples were collected for 8 days including a 2-day CH4 measurement in respiratory chambers. Faeces and urine, combined proportionately according to excretion, were used to determine slurry-derived CH4 and N emissions. Slurry was stored for 15 weeks at either 14°C or 27°C, and temperatures were classified as ‘cool’ and ‘warm’, respectively. The low-starch hay-only diet had high organic matter and fibre digestibility and proved to be equally effective on the cows’ performance as mixed diets. The enteric CH4 formation remained unaffected by the diet except when related to digested fibre. In this case emission was lowest with the hay-only diet (61 v. 88 to 101 g CH4/kg digested NDF). Feeding the hay diet resulted in the highest slurry-CH4 production after 7 weeks of storage at 14°C and 27°C, and after 15 weeks at 14°C. CH4 emissions were, in general, about 10-fold higher at 27°C compared with 14°C but only after 15 weeks of storage. Urinary N losses were highest with the barley diet and lowest with the maize diet. There was a trend towards similar differences in N losses from the slurry of these cows (significant at 14°C). However, contrary to CH4, slurry-N emissions seemed to be temperature-independent. In conclusion, energetically balanced diets proved to be widely equivalent in their emission potential when combining animal and their slurry, this even at a clearly differing forage : concentrate ratio. The variation in CH4 emission from slurry stored shortly or at cold temperature for 15 weeks was of low importance as such conditions did not support methanogenesis in slurry anyway.

In this work we propose a particle agglomeration model for chemical mechanical planarization (CMP) under the primary motivation of understanding the creation and behavior of the agglomerated slurry abrasive particles during the CMP process, which are a major cause of defectivity and poor consumable utility due to sedimentation.

The proposed model considers the slurry composition as a colloidal suspension of charged colloidal silica in an electrically neutral aqueous electrolyte. First, a theoretical relationship between the measurable chemical parameters of the slurry's aqueous electrolyte, the surface potential of the abrasive particles, and corresponding zeta potential between the agglomerated abrasive particles is presented. Secondly, this zeta potential is used in a modified DVLO interaction potential model to determine the particle interaction potentials due to both the attractive van Der Waals forces and repulsive electrostatic interactions. Finally, the total interaction potential created is then used to define a stability ratio for slow versus fast agglomeration and corresponding agglomeration rate equations between particles; these are used in a discrete population balance framework to describe the final particle size distribution with respect to time and agglomerate composition.

The proposed model will provide both a qualitative and quantitative description of agglomeration of abrasive slurry particles during CMP that can be extended to account for slurry composition or abrasive particle type, enabling more accurate process control, increased consumable utility, and possible defectivity reduction.

In this study, the effect of the addition of electrolytes in a given ionic strength to various high-purity silica suspensions was investigated by measurement of the removal rates (RR's) in CMP processes on oxide layers under the same experimental conditions. As so-called slurries the following suspensions were used: i) silica sols produced by the Stöber process, ii) conventional silica sols based on alkali silicate as well as iii) suspensions of fumed silica, with the same SiO2 concentration in each suspension. Ionic strength of the added electrolyte was adjusted to e.g. 0.065 mol/l, with the electrolytes being HCl, NH4Cl, KOH, or binary mixtures of these substances.

These investigations revealed significant differences of the polishing behaviour between the different types of silica dispersions as slurries. While for the Stöber sols investigated, the RR's are highest in the acidic range and almost negligible in the alkaline pH range, fumed silica suspensions show an entirely different behaviour: RR is very low for acidic pH-values, and increases with the alkalinity of the slurry. In contrast to these observations, the RR's of slurries based on conventional silica sols are highest around the neutral point, and show a decrease for both more alkaline and acidic pH-values. In comparison to the other two types of material, these suspensions have a high amount of electrolyte background, originating from their manufacturing process.

A model is developed to explain these results in a comprehensive manner. It involves effects of the electrolyte type and the ionic strengths as well as influences of the particle size.

Large particles in fumed silica dispersions were characterized by sedimentation, light scattering techniques, Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), and lacunarity. Applying centrifugation to fumed silica dispersions generated differences in sedimentation rates of large particles. The sedimentation rates of the large particles were affected by morphological differences and the particles remaining in the supernatant displayed buoyant behavior. The large particle morphology varied from branch like aggregates containing large primary particles to particles comprised of highly coalesced, tightly packed small primary particles. The results indicate the presence of different types of large particles in fumed silica dispersions to which conventional large particle characterization is unable to distinguish.

In this paper, the authors introduce and present some findings on an alternative non-contact material removal technique. Material removal is made possible by utilizing the electrokinetic and hydrodynamic effects of suspended particles to manipulate their trajectories to impact onto the surface of the workpiece. The research was previously demonstrated and reported where the removal rate can be precisely controlled by varying the electrical field and the flow rate of the slurry across the surface of the workpiece. New findings are reported on the application of the technique to different materials that will highlight the attractiveness of this alternative approach to producing surfaces with roughness in the order of nanometres.

In 3D packaging, Through Silicon Vias (TSVs) with high aspect ratios and depths measuring tens of microns are filled by advanced Cu electroplating processes. Today's 300mm TSV plating platforms are intended to produce bottom-up via fill, no seam voids, and minimal, controlled overburden. To achieve this, the preceding Cu-seed coverage must be continuous at a constant resistance, and the plating chemistries optimized. However, other factors such as hardware configurations and simple depletion of the plating formulations during the extended TSV process can lead to high Cu overburden thickness requiring a high removal rate (HRR) chemical-mechanical polish (CMP) process to remove the thick Cu layer.

Presented here are CMP results of a thick Cu overburden (~6um) resulting from the fill of 5 x 25um TSVs on 300mm wafers. The goal is to uniformly polish the overburden and utilize the tool's endpoint system at Cu clear before the next step of conventional barrier CMP. Slurries were screened for removal rate, uniformity, planarization ability, and defectivity. This study focuses on achieving a removal rate of >2.5um/min through evaluation of several commercial slurries in a multi-step polish application. Cross-sections post-plating show the Cu overburden, barrier and liner layer. Cross-sections post-CMP quantify Cu recess, dielectric loss, and presence/absence of seam defects. The process selected is demonstrated to achieve good planarization results with low occurrence of polish defects, at a rate and selectivity suitable for emerging 3D TSV Cu CMP applications.

In situ investigations of the chemical and mechanical mechanisms during CMP processes require analytical access to the wafer surface while interacting with the slurry and the pad under polishing conditions. In this study me make use of novel, specifically prepared, and self-designed Si wafer called microstructured single reflection elements (mSRE) utilizing the IR transparency of silicon [1]. The mSRE's enable in and ex situ attenuated total reflection (ATR) Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) investigations at the interface between silicon and the ambient with an enhanced usable spectral range. So, a thin silicon oxide layer or the polishing slurry can be investigated in the entire mid and far infrared spectral region. These mSRE wafers were placed at a simple reflection accessory of a FTIR spectrometer and either wet etched by a buffered oxide etch or polished using a CMP equivalent polishing configuration. During CMP the change of typical vibration bands of SiO2 layers and slurry constituents are observed. It was shown that the sensitivity as well as the surface selectivity of the experimental setup enables slurry and thin-film characterisations within the thickness range of monolayers. Surprisingly, the spectral features of the pad have not been observed during the polishing investigations.

3D interconnect wafer-to-wafer or die-to-wafer integration requires a wafer thinning operation to expose copper (Cu)-filled through-silicon vias (TSVs) from the backside of the wafer. The wafer thinning flow uses edge trim, backgrind, backpolish, and chemical mechanical polishing (CMP). This paper presents an overview of the wafer grinding process. We have demonstrated the capability to edge-trim and backgrind 300 mm TSV and non-TSV wafers down to 30 microns (μm) while bonded to a handle wafer. TSV wafers were further processed on a CMP tool to remove the last few microns of Si, exposing the Cu-filled TSVs. Metrology techniques were used to inspect and measure the wafer edge trim and final thinned wafer thickness. The quality of the thinned wafer was characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM) to observe surface roughness and by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) to quantify crystalline damage below the surface of the thinned wafer. Further characterization included measuring wafer thickness, total thickness variation (TTV), bow, and warp. Exposed TSVs were characterized by laser microscope to measure the height of Cu protrusions. These critical elements of a manufacturing-worthy 300 mm wafer thinning process for 3D are discussed.

A total of 200 crossbred pigs (castrated males and females) were used in five replicates to evaluate the influence of rearing conditions for fattening pigs on growth performance, manure production and gaseous emissions. Approximately at 36 kg body weight (BW), littermates were allocated to either a conventional (fully slatted floor, 0.65 m2/pig, considered as control, CON) or an alternative (sawdust bedding, 1.3 m2/pig, with free access to an outdoor area 1.1 m2/pig, OUT) system, until slaughter at approximately 115 kg BW. Pigs had free access to standard growing and finishing diets. Manure was stored as slurry below the slatted floor in the CON system and as litter, for the inside area, or slurry and liquid, for the outside area, in the OUT system. The amount and composition of manure were determined at the end of each replicate. Ammonia emission from the rooms was measured continuously. Dust and odour concentrations were measured in replicates 1 and 2, and CH4, N2O and CO2 emissions were measured in replicate 3. Compared with the CON, the OUT pigs exhibited a faster growth rate (+8%, P < 0.001) due to their greater feed intake (+0.21 kg/day, P < 0.01), resulting in a heavier BW (+7.3 kg, P < 0.001) and a lower lean meat content (−1.6% points, P < 0.001) at slaughter. The total amount of manure produced per pig was similar in both systems (380 kg/pig), but because of the contribution of sawdust, dry matter (DM) content was higher (P < 0.001) and concentrations in N, P, K, Cu and Zn in DM were lower (P < 0.001) in manure from the OUT than from the CON system. In the OUT system, most of the manure DM (70%) was collected indoor, corresponding mostly to the contribution of the sawdust, and most of the manure water (70%) was collected outdoor. Pigs excreted indoor about 60% and 40% of urine and faeces, respectively. Ammonia emission from the room was lower for the OUT system, whereas total NH3 emissions, including the outdoor area, tended to be higher (12.0 and 14.1 g/day N-NH3 per pig for CON and OUT, respectively). Nitrous oxide emission was higher (1.6 and 4.6 g/day N-N2O per pig for CON and OUT, respectively) and methane emission was lower (12.1 and 5.9 g/day per pig for CON and OUT, respectively), for the OUT compared with the CON system.