Acknowledgements First, I would like to express my gratitude to my promoter prof. K. Neyts, for giving me the privilege to conduct this PhD work under his supervision. Throughout this research, he provided me with continuous scientific help, valuable advice and lots of new ideas, which inspired and motivated my work. His great talent to explain things clearly and simply helped me to understand ...

Fine zinc oxide particles were electrophoretically deposited  on alumino-ferro-chrome substrates. The deposition was carried out in a cylindrical ZnO/acetone electrophoresis cell. The deposits were dried and sintered at 1030³C in air. The process resulted a porous polycrystalline ZnO cladding over the alloy core. Comb shaped silver electrodes were formed and fired at 350³C. The variation of dev...

We discuss synthetic receptors for haptic sensing. These are based on magnetic field sensors (Hall effect structures) fabricated using standard CMOS technologies. These receptors, biased with a small permanent magnet can detect the presence of ferro or ferri-magnetic objects in the vicinity of the sensor. They can also detect the magnitude and direction of the magnetic field.

Hyphal budding bacteria were observed by electron microscopy in thin sections of surface material from Baltic Sea ferromanganese concretions. Similar bacteria were also observed in and isolated from enrichment cultures prepared from the same concretion material. Three morphologically similar strains of Mn-Fe-depositing budding bacteria were isolated from the enrichment cultures. Strain B-4 poss...

BACKGROUND Manganese (Mn) plays a vital role in brain growth and development, yet excessive exposure can result in neurotoxicity. Marietta, Ohio, is home to the nation's longest-operating ferromanganese refinery, and community concern about exposure led to the development of the research study. OBJECTIVES Our overall goal was to address the community's primary research question: "Does Mn affe...