Cyclic electrodeposition of platinum and copper enables the fabrication of high surface area electrodes (roughness factors of >3000) by multiple alternation of alloy co-deposition and dealloying of copper from the just-fabricated alloy layers. The underlying processes, resulting electrode structures, and their applicability to potentially implantable glucose fuel cells are discussed.

The growth of epitaxy of silicon–carbon (Si1−yCy) alloy layers on (1 0 0) silicon substrates by chemical vapour deposition (CVD) with a novel precursor, neopentasilane, as the silicon source gas and methylsilane as the carbon source is reported. High quality Si1−yCy alloy layers at growth rates of 18 nm min−1 and 13 nm min−1 for fully substitutional carbon levels of 1.8% and 2.1%, respectively,...

Traditional Sn-Pb solder alloys are being replaced, because of environmental and health concerns about lead toxicity. Among some alternative alloy systems, the Sn-Zn and Sn-Cu base alloy systems have been studied and reveal promising properties. The reliability of a solder joint is affected by the solder/substrate interaction and the nature of the layers formed at the interface. The solder/subs...

Pursuing a high power conversion efficiency with no sacrifice of cost-effectiveness has been a persistent objective for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). One promising solution to this impasse is increased light harvesting. Previous efforts in light harvesting have been made on setting blocking layers or reflecting layers, or adding a light harvester, resulting in tedious procedures without r...

Significant progress made in materials science, mainly in the technology of surface, allows for intentional modifications of metallic surfaces. Thin layers of modified surfaces separate metallic substrates from environment and prevent them from corrosion. However, a real opportunity to control the interaction of surface with surrounding tissues and body fluids, with respect to the anticipated a...

Laser cladding process was performed on a commercial Ti-6Al-4V (α + β) titanium alloy by means of tungsten carbide-nickel based alloy powder blend. Nd:YAG laser with a 2.2-KW continuous wave was used with coaxial jet nozzle coupled with a standard powder feeding system. Four-track deposition of a blended powder consisting of 60 wt % tungsten carbide (WC) and 40 wt % NiCrBSi was successfully mad...

(Fe0 7Co0 3)1 N (or FeCoN) alloy single layers and FeCoN film sandwiched between two very thin (5 nm) permalloy layers have been synthesized by RF diode sputtering. The saturation magnetization of the as-deposited FeCoN single layers was found to be around 24.5 kG, the same as the pure Fe0 7Co0 3 alloy; and the minimum hard-axis coercivity was 5 Oe. In contrast, the sandwiched FeCoN films have ...

Owing to excellent mechanical property and biodegradation, magnesium-based alloys have been widely investigated for temporary implants such as cardiovascular stent and bone graft; however, the fast biodegradation in physiological environment and the limited surface biocompatibility hinder their clinical applications. In the present study, magnesium alloy was treated by sodium hydroxide (NaOH) a...

Traveling along the [001] direction of a zincblende binary compound one finds cation and anion atoms in alternate layers. In the case of Zn1-xCdxSe ternary alloys we will find Se layers alternating with Zn1-xCdx layers; the cation fcc sublattice consists of a random distribution of Cd an Zn atoms and most of the optical, structural and electronic properties are correctly described by the virtua...

Surface hardening is a high temperature process that creates hard surface alloy layers that improve a metal’s wear resistance. The technique has been used for many years, however, precise control of the surface alloy composition is difficult since accurate control of the gas chemistry is challenging in these processes, which in turn makes it difficult to control the composition of the surface a...