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<p>South Africa s coal and platinum mineral resources are crucial resources towards creating an alternative and environmentally sustainable energy system. The beneficiation of these natural resources can help to enhance a sustainable and effective clean energy base infrastructure and further promote their exploration and exportation for economics gains. By diversification of these resources, coal and the platinum group metals (PGMs) especially palladium market can be further harnessed in the foreseeable future hence SA energy security can be guaranteed from the technological point of view. The South Africa power industry is a critical sector, and has served as a major platform in the South African socio-economic development. This sector has also been identified as a route towards an independent energy base, with global relevance through the development of membrane technologies to effectively and economically separate and purify hydrogen from the gas mixtures released during coal gasification. The South Africa power industry is a critical sector, and has served as a major platform in the SA&rsquo / s socio-economic development. This sector has also been identified as a route towards an independent energy base, with global relevance through the development of membrane technologies to effectively and economically separate and purify hydrogen from the gas mixtures released during coal gasification. Coal gasification is considered as a source of hydrogen gas and the effluent gases released during this process include hydrogen sulphide, oxides of carbon and nitrogen, hydrogen and other particulates. In developing an alternative hydrogen gas separating method, composite membrane based on organic-inorganic system is being considered since the other available methods of hydrogen separation are relatively expensive.<br /> &nbsp / </p>

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The work described by this thesis is a comparison of pore opening geometry for true surface microfilters. True surface microfilters can be thought of as very fine sieves, with pore sizes less than 10 microns. All other types of so-called microfiltration membranes do not rely on sieving, but obtain their pore retention rating by particle collection mechanisms similar to depth filters. Particle deposition within such microfilters results in permeate flow rate dechne, for a fixed pressure filtration, or pressure drop rise, for a fixed rate filtration. The true surface microfilter pore geometnes considered were circular and slotted, and microfilters with filtering dimension of less than 10 microns were used. The slotted pore microfilters are not commercially available and had to be made in the laboratory as part of this study. The technique used was to plate nickel onto an existing substrate, thereby reducing the pore dimension until It was within the microfiltration range. The plating was by electroless nickel solution and not by galvanic means. Significant development of the electroless platmg technique led ultimately to the successful manufacture of process scale slotted surface microfilters.

In this work, all-copper connections between silicon microchips and substrates are developed. The semiconductor industry advances the transistor density on a microchip based on the roadmap set by Moore's Law. Communicating with a microprocessor which has nearly one billion transistors is a daunting challenge. Interconnects from the chip to the system (i.e. memory, graphics, drives, power supply) are rapidly growing in number and becoming a serious concern. Specifically, the solder ball connections that are formed between the chip itself and the package are challenging to make and still have acceptable electrical and mechanical performance. These connections are being required to increase in number, increase in power current density, and increase in off-chip operating frequency. Many of the challenges with using solder connections are limiting these areas. In order to advance beyond the limitations of solder for electrical and mechanical performance, a novel approach to creating all-copper connections from the chip-to-substrate has been developed. The development included characterizing the electroless plating and annealing process used to create the connections, designing these connections to be compatible with the stress requirements for fragile low-k devices, and finally by improving the plating/annealing process to become process time competitive with solder. It was found that using a commercially available electroless copper bath for the plating, followed by annealing at 180 C for 1 hour, the shear strength of the copper-copper bond was approximately 165 MPa. This work resulted in many significant conclusions about the mechanism for bonding in the all-copper process and the significance of materials and geometry on the mechanical design for these connections.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--McMaster University (Canada), 1991. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-02, Section: B, page: 1040.

Thesis (PhD) - Swinburne University of Technology, School of Engineering and Science, 2008. / A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, School of Engineering and Science, Swinburne University of Technology, 2008. Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-204).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Flinders University, Dept. of Chemistry. / Typescript bound. Includes bibliographical references. Also available online.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2004. / Supervisor: Michael D. Bryant. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.