Accurate description of thermodynamic, structural, and electronic properties for bulk and surfaces of ceria (CeO2) necessitates the inclusion of the Hubbard parameter (U) in the density functional theory (DFT) calculations to precisely account for the strongly correlated 4f electrons. Such treatment is a daunting task when attempting to draw a potential energy surface for CeO2-catalyzed reaction. This is due to the inconsistent change in thermo-kinetics parameters of the reaction in reference to the variation in the U values. As an illustrative example, we investigate herein the discrepancy in activation and reaction energies for steps underlying the partial and full hydrogenation of acetylene over the CeO2(111) surface. Overall, we find th

The influence of sensing element length of no-core fiber strain sensor has been studied and experimentally demonstrated, four different lengths of 125 μm diameter no-core fiber is fused between two standard single-mode fibers and bi-directionally strained, the highest obtained sensitivity was around 16.37 pm με -1 which was exhibited in the shortest no-core fiber segment, to the best of our knowledge this is the first study of the influence of no-core fiber strain sensors length on sensor sensitivity. The proposed sensor can be used in many opto-mechanical applications such as, structural health monitoring, aerospace vehicles and airplane components monitoring.

Hydrophobic silica aerogels were successfully preparation by an ambient pressure drying method from sodium silicate (Na2SiO3) with different pH values (5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10). In this study, acidic HCl (1M), a basic NH4OH (1M) were selected as a catalyst to perform the surface modification in a TMCS (trimethylchlorosilane) solution. The surface chemical modification of the aerogels was assured by the Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopic studies. Other physical properties, such as pore volume and pore size and specific surface area were determined by Brunauer-Emmett- Teller (BET) method. The effect of pH values on the bulk density of aerogel. The sol–gel parameter pH value in the sol, have marked effects on the physical proper

To reduce solar radiation transmittance into buildings through windows facing east or west during summer, a window inclination from vertical position is suggested. The inclination of the window glazing and the rate of unwanted solar radiation during summer can be calculated knowing the dialy inclination of the sun rays. The inclination of window glazing depends on the latitude of the position required. For instance in Baghdad which is at about 33o north latitude a slope of 15o for window glazing is sufficient to prevent about 419 MJ/m2 of total solar radiation energy from penetration during summer for clear glazing of window facing east. This value drops to about 96 MJ/m2 during winter. Therefore the ratio between the energy saved for co

Thin film technology is one of the most important technologies
that have contributed to the development of semiconductors and their
applications in several industrial fields. The Iron Oxides (Fe20) and
(Co3O4) thin films and their applications are of importance, in that these
two materials are considered as important industrial materials, and used
in spectrally selective coating, temperature sensors, resistive heaters, and
photo cells.
Thin films of Iron Oxide (Fe20,), Cobalt Oxide (Co304) and
their mixtures in different ratios (75:25, 50:50, 25:75) were prepared by
the method of chemical spray pyrolysis deposition at different thicknesses
(77s t S200) nm on cover-glass substrates: thickness of (1) mm at

  This paper is concerned with Double Stage Shrinkage Bayesian (DSSB) Estimator for lowering the mean squared error of classical estimator ˆ q for the scale parameter (q) of an exponential distribution in a region (R) around available prior knowledge (q0) about the actual value (q) as initial estimate as well as to reduce the cost of experimentations.         In situation where the experimentations are time consuming or very costly, a Double Stage procedure can be used to reduce the expected sample size needed to obtain the estimator. This estimator is shown to have smaller mean squared error for certain choice of the shrinkage weight factor y( ) and for acceptance region R. Expression for