Record high efficient frequency doublers in periodically poled silica fibres are demonstrated for light generation at 532 nm and 775 nm. The onset of nonlinear conductivity is shown to limit the maximum  (2) in glass. OCIS codes: (190.2620) Harmonic generation and mixing; (190.4360) Nonlinear optics, devices; (190.4370) Nonlinear optics, fibers

Polymer composites based on natural fillers are currently attracting great attention as alternative materials to glass or synthetic fibre reinforced plastics in several applications, mostly for automotive, appliance and packaging products. The main advantage of employing natural fibres is that these are biodegradable and renewable, and exhibit low cost, low density and high toughness. However t...

The changes in antioxidant status of rat lung after intratracheal instillation of stone-wool and glass fibres were studied. The animals were exposed to 2 or 8 mg of fibres for 4 or 16 weeks, the bronchoalveolar lavage was performed and the activity of superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase and the total amount of glutathione was estimated both in tissue and in cell free fraction of bronch...

This research examines the friction and dry wear behaviours of glass fibre-reinforced epoxy (GFRE) polyester (GFRP) composites. Three fibre orientations—parallel orientation (P–O), anti-parallel (AP–O), normal (N–O)—and various sliding distances from 0–15 km were examined. The experiments carried out using a block-on-ring configuration at room temperature, an applied load 30 N, velocity 2.8 m/s...

Porous materials in general have received great attention from the last century. The development of new porous materials and the preparation of new composites based on porous materials is a subject of interest. The development of porous silicon based optical composite materials opened up new ways of incorporating optically active sol-gel materials into porous silicon. High purity silica optical...

In plants there is no universal protocol for RNA extraction, since optimizations are required depending on the species, tissues and developmental stages. Some plants/tissues are rich in secondary metabolites or synthesize thick cell walls, which hinder an efficient RNA extraction. One such example is bast fibres, long extraxylary cells characterized by a thick cellulosic cell wall. Given the ec...

Strain and thermal sensitivities of germanate and tellurite glass fibres were measured using a fibre Fabry-Perot (FFP) interferometer and fibre Bragg gratings (FBG). The strain phase sensitivity for germanate and tellurite fibre were 5900×10 rad/m and 5600×10 rad/m respectively at a central wavelength of 1540nm using FFP interferometer, which is consistent with the value of 1.22pm/με obtained f...

THE description of the microscopic structure of individual trabecular fibres given by Salzmann (1912) has been accepted for many years, and it is only as a result of recent electron microscopic studies that his classical concepts have had to be modified. The principle modification concerns the finer structure of the "clear" zone which lies beneath the trabecular endothelium and surrounds the ce...

Retaining a robust fibre-matrix interface in an aqueous environment has been enduring challenge for fibre-reinforced biocomposites. This study addresses the issue by applying polydopamine coating as coupling agent to annealed and non-annealed phosphate-based glass fibres. The presence of was confirmed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy Raman techniques. thickness increased with treatment ti...

This paper presents the results of an initial investigation into the potential for monitoring water absorption and chemical degradation in epoxy matrix composites using evanescent wave spectroscopy. While conventional silica glasses have too low a refractive index and too short an IR transmission window to be useful as unclad sensing elements in most resin systems, chalcogenide glasses offer su...