A simple selective etching process easily removed a 2nd anodized TiO(2) nanotubes (TNTs) layer from a physically stable 1st anodized TNTs layer to produce noncurling, freestanding, large-area aligned doubly open-ended TNTs. These TNTs were easily transferred to a conducting glass for use in fabricating front-illuminated dye sensitized solar cells.

A new and facile strategy to fabricate composite thin films with tunable morphologies via self-assembly of block copolymer molecules at the air/liquid interface is first reported. The morphologies (parallel nanowires and foams) of these freestanding thin films can be tuned by varying the molecular structure or other experimental conditions.

Abstract A method for small-scale testing and imaging of freestanding, microtomed polymer films using a push-to-pull device is presented. Central to this was the development sample preparation technique which utilized solvents at cryogenic temperatures transfer deposit delicate thin onto microfabricated devices. The focused ion beam (FIB)-milled tensile specimens enabled quantitative in situ TE...

BACKGROUND Hospital-based outpatient departments traditionally charge higher prices for ambulatory procedures, compared with freestanding surgery centers. Under emerging reference-based benefit designs, insurers establish a contribution limit that they will pay, requiring the patient to pay the difference between that contribution limit and the actual price charged by the facility. The purpose ...

Measuring the elastic modulus of in-situ rock masses over scales of tens of meters remains an important challenge in experimental rock mechanics. We present a new approach using ambient resonance measurements of freestanding rock masses to identify vibrational modes, which are then matched with numerical models implementing bulk, globally representative material properties. The result is an exp...

Organic-inorganic hybrid hydrogel electrolytes were prepared by mixing hydrotalcite, cross-linked potassium poly(acrylate) and 6 M KOH solution. The organicinorganic hybrid hydrogel electrolytes had high ionic conductivity (0.456–0.540 S cm) at 30 °C. Moreover, the mechanical strength of the hydrogel electrolytes was high enough to form a 2–3 mm thick freestanding membrane because of the reinfo...

This communication presents a novel kind of silicon nanomaterial: freestanding Si nanowire arrays (Si NWAs), which are synthesized facilely by one-step template-free electro-deoxidation of SiO2 in molten CaCl2. The self-assembling growth process of this material is also investigated preliminarily.

Light-emitting conjugated polymer nanowires are vertically grown and remotely manipulated into a freestanding straight or curved structure in three-dimension. This approach enabled us to eliminate substrate coupling, a critical issue in nanowire photonics in the past decade. We for the first time accomplished characterization of propagation and bending losses of nanowires completely decoupled f...

Low-energy, distortion-free femtosecond pulse laser inscription in coated freestanding fiber is demonstrated for the first time. Methodology features radial plane beamshaping to achieve optimal focusing and spot-like inscription within the fiber. Strong, firstorder fiber Bragg grating is achieved in coated single-mode fiber using only 50nJ pulse energy.

An in situ quantitative tensile testing platform is developed to enable the uniform in-plane loading of a freestanding membrane of 2D materials inside a scanning electron microscope. The in situ tensile testing reveals the brittle fracture of large-area MoSe2 crystals and measures their fracture strength for the first time.