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Full-Text Articles in Physics

Observation Of Novel Liquid-Crystalline Phase Above The Bulk-Melting Temperature, Keshav Gautam, Satyendra Kumar, Didier Wermeille, Doug Robinson, Ali Dhinojwala Apr 2014

Observation Of Novel Liquid-Crystalline Phase Above The Bulk-Melting Temperature, Keshav Gautam, Satyendra Kumar, Didier Wermeille, Doug Robinson, Ali Dhinojwala

Ali Dhinojwala

In this paper, we show that a noncrystalline but ordered smectic-like phase exists above the bulk-melting temperature (T-m) at poly(n-alkyl acrylates)-air interface. The surface ordered phase is one monolayer thick and undergoes a sharp transition from order to disorder 10degreesC above T-m for n=22. The presence of a surface phase that does not exist in the bulk has important implications in the design of thermally responsive adhesives.


Fabrication Of Robust Superconducting Granular Aluminium/Palladium Bilayer Microbolometers With Sub-Nanosecond Response, Thomas E. Wilson Feb 2014

Fabrication Of Robust Superconducting Granular Aluminium/Palladium Bilayer Microbolometers With Sub-Nanosecond Response, Thomas E. Wilson

Thomas E. Wilson

We provide a convenient recipe for fabricating reliable superconducting microbolometers as acoustic phonon detectors with sub-nanosecond response, using imagereversal optical lithography and dc-magnetron sputtering, and our recipe requires no chemical or plasma etching. Our approach solves the traditional problem for granular aluminium bolometers of unreliable (i.e., non-Ohmic) electrical contacts by sequentially sputtering the granular aluminium film and then a palladium capping layer. We use dc calibration data, the method of Danilchenko et al. [1], and direct nanosecond-pulsed photoexcitation to obtain the microbolometer’s characteristic current, thermal conductance, characteristic relaxation time, and heat capacity. We also demonstrate the use of the deconvolution …


Fundamental Studies Of Supported Graphene Interfaces : Defect Density Of States In Graphene Field Effect Transistors (Fets) And Ideal Graphene - Silicon Schottky Diodes, Dhiraj Sinha Jan 2014

Fundamental Studies Of Supported Graphene Interfaces : Defect Density Of States In Graphene Field Effect Transistors (Fets) And Ideal Graphene - Silicon Schottky Diodes, Dhiraj Sinha

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The physics of transport in atomically thin 2D materials is an active area of research, important for understanding fundamental properties of reduced dimensional materials and for applications. New phenomena based on graphene may include properties of topologically protected insulators. Applications of these materials are envisioned in electronics, optoelectronics and spintronics.