The impact of road dust emissions on PM10 and PM2.5 (atmospheric particulate matter with diameteer < 10 μm and 2.5 μm mass concentrations recorded from 2003 to 2010 at 11 locations (rural, urban and industrial) in southern Spain was estimated based on the chemical characterization of PM and the use of a constrained Positive Matrix Factorization, where the chemical profile of local road dust sam...

To achieve sustainable range management and avoid or minimize environmental contamination, the Army needs to know the amount of explosives deposited on ranges from different munitions and how these are degraded and transported under different geological and climatic conditions. The physical form of the deposited explosives has a bearing on this problem, yet the shapes and size distributions of ...

A metal (Ag, Au, Pd, Sn, Bi, In, Co, Al) layer directly deposited onto a liquid-crystalline lipid membrane resulted in different morphologies, ranging from a monolayer of discrete particles to a continuous film, depending on the metal's oxidation tendency.

This is the second of series on the impact of dust. It focuses on the physical, chemical and physiological effects of dust particles and aerosols. Plants of all types and classes (from algae to forest trees and everything in between) are adversely affected either directly through abrasion by airborne particles or through interference with plant physiology or indirectly through the impact on soi...

Thin films composed of titanium nitride doped with silver were deposited by DC reactive sputtering, with Ag contents varying between 0 and 50 at.%. The as-deposited samples were subjected to vacuum annealing treatments, with a range of temperatures varying from 200 to 500°C, in order to study the morphological and structural changes that may occur. The as-deposited samples showed three main zon...

Nanostructured silicon carbide films have been deposited on molybdenum substrates by hypersonic plasma particle deposition. In this process a thermal plasma with injected reactants (SiCl4 and CH4) is expanded through a nozzle leading to the nucleation of ultrafine particles. Particles entrained in the supersonic flow are then inertially deposited in vacuum onto a temperature-controlled substrat...

Submicrometer aerosol size number distributions have been measured in downtown Rome with 1 s time resolution. From these data, the particle deposition in the human respiratory system has been assessed for infants, children and adults under different exercise levels. The estimates are reported as size segregated percentages and as total particle numbers deposited. The greatest percentages of par...

The catalytic effect of gold seed particles deposited on a substrate prior to zinc oxide (ZnO) thin film growth by magnetron sputtering was investigated. For this purpose, selected ultra thin gold layers, with thicknesses close to the percolation threshold, are deposited by thermal evaporation in ultra high vacuum (UHV) conditions and subsequently annealed to form gold nanodroplets. The ZnO str...

A novel approach for direct electroless (EL) patterning of copper films without catalysts has been developed. In a special electroless solution employed in the present study, the formation of copper particles was observed and the negatively charged surfaces were confirmed by zeta potential measurements. The conditions of the solution (ionic strength, pH, temperature, additives etc.) greatly aff...