Natural geomaterials exhibit a wide range in size, physical properties, chemical properties, and mechanical behaviors. Soils that are composed of mixtures of particles with different physical and chemical properties pose a challenge to characterization and quantification of the engineering properties. This study examined the behavior of particulate mixtures composed of differently sized silica particles, mixtures composed of aluminosilicate and organic carbon particles, and mixtures composed of particles with approximately three orders of magnitude difference in particle size. This experimental investigation used elastic, electromagnetic, and thermal waves to characterize and to quantify the small to intermediate strain behavior of the mixtures. The mechanical property of stiffness of mixed materials (e.g. binary mixtures of silica particles and fly ashes with various carbon and biomass contents) was evaluated through the stiffness of active grain contacts, and the stiffness of particles which carry applied load, using the physical concepts of intergranular void ratio and interfine void ratio. Additionally, the change in both contact mode/stiffness and electrical property due to the presence of nano-sized particles (i.e., iron oxides) on the surface of soil grains was evaluated according to applied stress, packing density, iron coating density, and substrate sand particle size. Finally, the biomass fraction and total organic carbon content of mixtures was used to quantify the electrical and thermal conductivities when particulate organic was mixed with aluminosilicate particles.

No description available.

No description available.

Superconductivity Centennial Conference 2011- EUCAS–ISEC–ICMC (18-23 Sep 2011, The Hague, The Netherlands)

There are high demands on flexographic print quality to be sufficiently high and consistent in order to create a competitive packaging. At the same time the production efficiency need to be high. Printers thus need to achieve the same quality every time and quickly start-up new printing jobs. To accomplish this, one needs to gain a thorough understanding of how the liquid packaging board interacts with the ink and impacts the print quality. This thesis focuses on water-based ink absorption of liquid packaging boards and particularly on a) how uniformity of ink absorption can be measured and b) to what extent the absorption characteristics contribute to print mottle in flexographic printing. The work encompasses two parts. First, an absorption non-uniformity test method has been developed using a staining technique. This method is unique as it measures how unevenly an aqueous solution is absorbed, in a short time period and without impact from surface roughness. Moreover, the contributions from white-top mottle and absorption non-uniformity can be quantified simultaneously from one single measurement. Second, a method to independently study the effects of absorption non-uniformity on print quality has been established. This is achieved by introducing artificial absorption non-uniformities with well-controlled barrier patterns. A barrier pattern may modify local pore structure and/or surface energy, hence lead to lateral absorption variations. By these means, it is possible to produce a substrate property-matrix; encompassing absorption non-uniformity and for example surface roughness. It was demonstrated that non-uniform absorption indeed has a negative impact on print quality, both on smoother and rougher boards. Low absorption made print density decrease and uneven absorption caused print mottle. This was the case when other properties of the samples were kept within a narrow range; otherwise surface roughness appeared to determine print mottle ranking.

Since the discovery of the high temperature superconductor YBa2Cu3O7-δ (YBCO), with transition temperature (Tc = 77 K), above liquid nitrogen point in 1987 many research projects have been dedicated to enhancing the high field performance of this material for practical applications. The 2nd generation YBCO-based coated conductors are believed to be the most promising approach for commercial applications including power transmission, motors, generators, and high field magnets. With the advances of nanotechnologies, different nanoengineering methods have been demonstrated to enhance the performance of YBCO thin films, include doping with 0-dimensional (0-D) self-assembled nanoparticles, 1-dimensional (1-D) nanorods, and 2-dimensional (2-D) nanolayers. Furthermore, dopants with ferromagnetic properties are also reported to provide enhanced pinning effects by Lorentz force, especially under high-applied magnetic fields. The principle of these methods is to generate high-density defects at the heterogeneous interfaces as artificial pinning centers in an effort to improve the flux-pinning properties. The morphology and dimensions of the nanoinclusions play an important role in pining enhancement. Optimized pinning structures are likely to be located at energetically favorable vortex cores, which form a triangular lattice with dimensions close to the YBCO coherence length ξ (ξab ~ 4 nm; ξc ~ 0.5 nm at 77 K.) However, it is challenging to achieve small dimensional nanodopants in the vapor deposited YBCO thin films. The purpose of this research is to utilize nanoengineering methods to produce optimized pinning structure in YBCO thin films. In this thesis, we systematically study the effects of different nanoinclusions on the flux-pinning properties of YBCO thin films. The 0-D ferromagnetic Fe2O3 and CoFe2O4 nanoparticles, 2-D CeO2 multilayers, and tunable vertically aligned nanocomposites (VAN) of (Fe2O3)x:(CeO2)1-x and (CoFe2O4)x:(CeO2)1-x systems are introduced into the YBCO matrix as artificial pinning centers. Results suggest that all nanoinclusions showed significant enhancement in the superconducting properties of YBCO. The ferromagnetic pinning centers dominate at high field and low temperature regimes, however, the defect pinning centers dominate at low field and high temperature regimes. The uniquely arranged VAN structure of alternating magnetic and non-magnetic nanophases, which incorporates both high defect density and tunable distribution of magnetic dopants, is believed to be an ideal solution for flux-pinning enhancement.

Pinning landscapes in modern second generation coated conductors are excellent candidates for studies of vortex pinning. The ability to produce engineered defects in thin films of high temperature superconductors allows one to investigate representative distinct pinning sites, with the objective of understanding how different pinning centers contribute, compete and evolve under varying conditions of magnetic field strength and orientation, and temperature.New contact-free methods were developed specifically to investigate this system in new ways, especially the dependence of the critical current density Jc on orientation of the magnetic field. A superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID)-based magnetometer was used to determine angular critical current density profiles. The induced currents produced in contact-free methods allow one to investigate a range of temperatures that is difficult to access by traditional transport measurements.Materials with three distinctive pinning landscapes were investigated: Specifically, samples were studied that were dominated by columnar defects, by isotropic defects, or a mixture of these two types of pins. These studies over an expanded temperature-field-orientation phase-space clearly show competition between not only strong and weak pinning centers, but also between the angularly selective and nonselective pinning. This evidence is seen in critical current density profiles, the α [alpha]-values describing the falloff of Jc with magnetic field, and matching field effects in the three samples studied.

Diss. (sammanfattning) Umeå : Univ., 2004. / Härtill 3 uppsatser.

Stuttgart, Univ., Diss., 2006.

Thesis (Ph.D.). / Written for the Dept. of Biochemistry. Title from title page of PDF (viewed 2009/06/09). Includes bibliographical references.