Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Commons^™

Controlled Synthesis Of One Dimensional Nanostructured Materials And Their Applications As Catalyst Supports In Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells, Mohammad Norouzi Banis

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Nanomaterials have attracted significant interest in the past decade due to their unique structure and properties compared to their bulk counterparts. Nanomaterials-based solutions can address challenges in various technologies such as proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). PEMFC is an innovative energy conversion technology to directly convert chemical energy to electrical energy by using hydrogen as fuel. However, the current PEMFC system still faces significant technological roadblocks which have to be overcome before the system can become economically viable. A major impediment to the commercialization of PEMFC is the high cost of materials and manufacturing and stability, which is primarily …

Finite Element Analysis Of The Contact Deformation Of Piezoelectric Materials, Ming Liu

Theses and Dissertations--Chemical and Materials Engineering

Piezoelectric materials in the forms of both bulk and thin-film have been widely used as actuators and sensors due to their electromechanical coupling. The characterization of piezoelectric materials plays an important role in determining device performance and reliability. Instrumented indentation is a promising method for probing mechanical as well as electrical properties of piezoelectric materials.

The use of instrumented indentation to characterize the properties of piezoelectric materials requires analytical relations. Finite element methods are used to analyze the indentation of piezoelectric materials under different mechanical and electrical boundary conditions.

For indentation of a piezoelectric half space, a three-dimensional finite element …