No description available.

No description available.

This research is directed towards understanding the mechanisms associated with the manufacture of solid microspheres less than 100 [micrometers], from liquid droplets with nanosuspensions in a microfluidic T-junction, which are heated downstream of the channel. Preliminary material characterization tests on colloidal suspensions of alumina and copper oxide demonstrate promising temperature dependent viscosity results indicating solidification in the temperature range of 40°C-50°C. The solidification mechanism is referred to as Temperature Induced Forming and is described by polymeric bridges formed between nanoparticles in suspension at elevated temperatures, resulting in a solid structure. The polymer network results from the ionization of alumina at elevated temperatures whereby polymeric binders adhere to newly formed charged sites on the alumina particle. This study aims to investigate the aspects of manufacturing microstructures in microfluidic Tjunctions, droplet morphology, size and frequency of production. Preliminary low solid concentration experiments (1%-10% volume concentration of alumina in H2O) have indicated solidification and a regression in droplet diameter when heated near the saturation temperature of the water used to disperse the particles. The microstructures from this solidification process are uniform and are estimated to be 30 [micrometers] in size.

No description available.

Large-scale and cost-effective manufacturing of ceramic micro devices based on tape stacking requires the development of inspection systems to perform high-resolution in-process quality control of embedded manufactured cavities, metal structures and defects. In this work, alumina ceramic samples are evaluated by optical coherence tomography (OCT) operating at 1.3μm wavelength and some dimensional data are obtained by dedicated image processing and segmentation. Layer thicknesses can be measured and laser-machined channels can be verified embedded at around 100μm depth. Moreover, detection of internal defects is enabled. Monte Carlo ray tracing simulations are employed to analyze the abilities of OCT in imaging of the embedded channels. The light scattering mechanism is studied for the alumina ceramics, and different scattering origins and models are discussed. The scattering parameters required as input data for simulations are evaluated from the integrating sphere measurements of collimated and diffuse transmittance spectra using a reconstruction algorithm based on refined diffusion approximation approach. / <p>QC 20120628</p>