No Arabic abstract
Structural characteristics are considered to be the dominant factors in determining the effective properties of granular media, particularly in the scope of transport phenomena. Towards improved heat management, thermal transport in granular media requires an improved fundamental understanding. In this study, the effects of packing structure on heat transfer in granular media are evaluated at macro- and grain-scales. At the grain-scale, a gas-solid coupling heat transfer model is adapted into a discrete-element-method to simulate this transport phenomenon. The numerical framework is validated by experimental data obtained using a plane source technique, and the Smoluschowski effect of the gas phase is found to be captured by this extension. By considering packings of spherical SiO2 grains with an interstitial helium phase, vibration induced ordering in granular media is studied, using the simulation methods developed here, to investigate how disorder-to-order transitions of packing structure enhance effective thermal conductivity. Grain-scale thermal transport is shown to be influenced by the local neighbourhood configuration of individual grains. The formation of an ordered packing structure enhances both global and local thermal transport. This study provides a structure approach to explain transport phenomena, which can be applied in properties modification for granular media.
We have investigated the grain boundary scattering effect on the thermal transport behavior of uranium dioxide (UO$_2$). The polycrystalline samples having different grain-sizes (0.125, 1.8, and 7.2 $mu$m) have been prepared by spark plasma sintering technique and characterized by x-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), and Raman spectroscopy. The thermal transport properties (the thermal conductivity and thermoelectric power) have been measured in the temperature range 2-300~K and the results were analyzed in terms of various physical parameters contributing to the thermal conductivity in these materials in relation to grain-size. We show that thermal conductivity decreases systematically with lowering grain-size in the temperatures below 30 K, where the boundary scattering dominates the thermal transport. At higher temperatures more scattering processes are involved in the heat transport in these materials, making the analysis difficult. We determined the grain boundary Kapitza resistance that would result in the observed increase in thermal conductivity with grain size, and compared the value with Kapitza resistances calculated for UO$_2$ using molecular dynamics from the literature.
We experimentally measure the static stress at the bottom of a granular chains column with a precise and reproducible method. The relation, between the filling mass and the apparent mass converted from the bottom stress, is investigated on various chain lengths. Our measurements reconfirm that the scaling behavior of the stress saturation curves is in accord with the theoretical expectation of the Janssen model. Additionally, the saturation mass is displayed as a nonmonotonic function of the chain length, where a distinguishing transition of the saturation mass is found at the persistence length of the granular chain. We repeat the measurement with another measuring methodology and a silo with different size, respectively, the position of the peak maintains robust. In order to understand the transition of the saturation mass, the friction coefficient and the volume fraction of granular chains are also measured, from which Janssen parameter can be calculated. Finally, we preliminarily measure the bottom stress for two distinct packing structures of long chains, find the effect of the entanglements on the bottom stress, and argue that the entanglements might be responsible for the transition of the saturation mass.
We present a systematic investigation of the distribution of normal forces at the boundaries of static packings of spheres. A new method for the efficient construction of large hexagonal-close-packed crystals is introduced and used to study the effect of spatial ordering on the distribution of forces. Under uniaxial compression we find that the form for the probability distribution of normal forces between particles does not depend strongly on crystallinity or inter-particle friction. In all cases the distribution decays exponentially at large forces and shows a plateau or possibly a small peak near the average force but does not tend to zero at small forces.
We present a theoretical analysis of the environment effects on charge transport in double-stranded synthetic poly(G)-poly(C) DNA molecules attached to two ideal leads. Coupling of the DNA to the environment results in two effects: (i) localization of carrier functions due to the static disorder and (ii) phonon-induced scattering of the carrier between these localized states, resulting in hopping conductivity. A nonlinear Pauli master equation for populations of localized states is used to describe the hopping transport and calculate the electric current as a function of the applied bias. We demonstrate that, although the electronic gap in the density of states shrinks as the disorder increases, the voltage gap in the $I-V$ characteristics becomes wider. Simple physical explanation of this effect is provided.
We report a record low thermal conductivity in polycrystalline MoS2 obtained by varying grain sizes and orientations in ultrathin films. By optimizing the sulphurisation parameters of nanometre-thick Mo layer, we could grow MoS2 films with tuneable morphologies. The thermal conductivity is extracted from a Raman laser power-dependent study on suspended samples. The lowest value of thermal conductivity of 0.27 Wm-1K-1, which reaches a similar value as teflon, is obtained in a polycrystalline sample formed by a combination of horizontally and vertically oriented grains, with respect to the bulk (001) monocrystal. Analysis by means of molecular dynamics and finite element method simulations confirm that such grain arrangement leads to lower grain boundary conductance. We discuss the possible use of these thermal insulating films in the context of electronics and thermoelectricity.