Lifetime materials

The development of high-performance electrode and electrolyte materials for SOFC is an important step towards reducing the fuel cell operation temperature to the low and intermediate range (500 - 700 °C). As the operating temperature is reduced, many cell ports, such as the auxiliary components can be easily and cost-efficiently produced. To meet long operational lifetime, material compatibility and thermomechanical resistance would be less critical as the range of possibilities for lower temperature increases. To that end, recent research at UFRN, Natal, Brazil has successfully focused on novel synthesis processes based on microwave-assisted combustion and modified polymeric precursor methods in order to synthesize high performance cobaltite-based composite cathodes for low-intermediary-temp>erature SOFCs. 

Arzhaev A T, Kiselyov VA., Badalyan V.G., Vopilkin A.Kb., Strelkov B.R,Vanukov V.N., Aladinsky V. V, Makhanev V.O. Field application of Augur)> ultrasonic system during RBMK NPP Unit ISI and its impact on pressure boundary integrity. In Ageing of Materials and Methods for the Assessment of Lifetimes of Engineering Plant, R K. Penny (Ed.), 1997, pp. 97-104. 

The importance of polymer composites arises largely from the fact that such low density materials can have unusually high elastic modulus and tensile strength. Polymers have extensive applications in various fields of industry and agriculture. They are used as constructional materials or protective coatings. Exploitation of polymers is of special importance for products that may be exposed to the radiation or temperature, since the use of polymers make it possible to decrease the consumption of expensive (and, sometimes, deficient) metals and alloys, and to extent the lifetime of the whole product. 

The energetics and kinetics of film formation appear to be especially important when two or more solutes are present, since now the matter of monolayer penetration or complex formation enters the picture (see Section IV-7). Schul-man and co-workers [77, 78], in particular, noted that especially stable emulsions result when the adsorbed film of surfactant material forms strong penetration complexes with a species present in the oil phase. The stabilizing effect of such mixed films may lie in their slow desorption or elevated viscosity. The dynamic effects of surfactant transport have been investigated by Shah and coworkers [22] who show the correlation between micellar lifetime and droplet size. More stable micelles are unable to rapidly transport surfactant from the bulk to the surface, and hence they support emulsions containing larger droplets. 

Especially with LTG GaAs, materials became available that were nearly ideal for time-resolved THz spectroscopy. Due to the low growth temperature and the slight As excess incorporated, clusters are fonned which act as recombination sites for the excited carriers, leading to lifetimes of <250 fs [45], With such recombination lifetunes, THz radiators such as dipole anteimae or log-periodic spirals placed onto optoelectronic substrates and pumped with ultrafast lasers can be used to generate sub-picosecond pulses with optical bandwidths of 2-4 THz. Moreover, coherent sub-picosecond detection is possible, which enables both... 

For CW applieations of optieal-heterodyne eonversion, two laser fields are applied to the optoeleetronie material. The non-linear nature of the eleetro-optie effeet strongly suppresses eontimious emission relative to ultrashort pulse exeitation, and so most of the CW researeh earried out to date has used photoeonduetive anteimae. The CW mixing proeess is eharaeterized by the average drift veloeity t and earrier lifetime Xq of the mixing material, typieally... 

The situation is very different in indirect gap materials where phonons must be involved to conserve momentum. Radiative recombination is inefficient, resulting in long lifetimes. The minority carrier lifetimes in Si reach many ms, again in tire absence of defects. It should be noted tliat long minority carrier lifetimes imply long diffusion lengtlis. Minority carrier lifetime can be used as a convenient quality benchmark of a semiconductor. 

If tlie level(s) associated witli tlie defect are deep, tliey become electron-hole recombination centres. The result is a (sometimes dramatic) reduction in carrier lifetimes. Such an effect is often associated witli tlie presence of transition metal impurities or certain extended defects in tlie material. For example, substitutional Au is used to make fast switches in Si. Many point defects have deep levels in tlie gap, such as vacancies or transition metals. In addition, complexes, precipitates and extended defects are often associated witli recombination centres. The presence of grain boundaries, dislocation tangles and metallic precipitates in poly-Si photovoltaic devices are major factors which reduce tlieir efficiency. 

Fatigue. Engineering components often experience repeated cycles of load or deflection during their service fives. Under repetitive loading most metallic materials fracture at stresses well below their ultimate tensile strengths, by a process known as fatigue. The actual lifetime of the part depends on service conditions, eg, magnitude of stress or strain, temperature, environment, surface condition of the part, as well as on the microstmcture. 

Thushigh internal quantum efficiency requires short radiative and long nonradiative lifetimes. Nonradiative lifetimes are generally a function of the semiconductor material quaUty and are typically on the order of microseconds to tens of nanoseconds for high quahty material. The radiative recombination rate, n/r, is given by equation 4 ... 

The failure rate changes over the lifetime of a population of devices. An example of a failure-rate vs product-life curve is shown in Figure 9 where only three basic causes of failure are present. The quaUty-, stress-, and wearout-related failure rates sum to produce the overall failure rate over product life. The initial decreasing failure rate is termed infant mortaUty and is due to the early failure of substandard products. Latent material defects, poor assembly methods, and poor quaUty control can contribute to an initial high failure rate. A short period of in-plant product testing, termed bum-in, is used by manufacturers to eliminate these early failures from the consumer market. 

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