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type:Journal Article, Energy is essential for economic development and growth. With the rapid growth of development and the drive to expand the economy, society demands more electricity. Coupled with the realisation that unsustainable energy production can have a detrimental effect on our environment. Solar energy is the most prolific method of energy capture in nature. The economic drive to make solar cells more cost effective and efficient has driven developments in many different deposition technologies, including dipping, plating, thick film deposition and thin film deposition. Typically, in order for solar energy to work efficiently and supply energy to a building, a very large amount of space is required, in the form of rooftops or land, in order to install solar panels; these solar panel space requirements are a large impediment to practical usage. This drawback drove researchers to come up with transparent solar cells (TSCs), which solves the problem by turning any sheet of glass into a photovoltaic solar cell. These cells provide power by absorbing and utilising unwanted light energy through windows in buildings and automobiles, which leads to an efficient use of architectural space. There are approximately nine transparent photovoltaic (TPV) technologies under development, and studies regarding these technologies aim to achieve high transparency along with electrical performance that is compatible with solar panels that are sold in the market. The main objective of this review paper is to state all the latest reported technologies from the year 2007 onwards on transparent photovoltaic technologies with at least 20% average transmission. This includes demonstrating the process used in each technology (including the materials and the methods) and explaining its advantages and disadvantages from a performance, aesthetic and financial perspective. Therefore, this study provides a crucial review on the latest developments in the field of TSCs., source:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2018.06.031

type:Journal Article, While the layered 122 iron arsenide superconductors are highly anisotropic, unconventional, and exhibit several forms of electronic orders that coexist or compete with superconductivity in different regions of their phase diagrams, we find in the absence of iron in the structure that the superconducting characteristics of the endmember BaPd2As2 are surprisingly conventional. Here we report on complementary measurements of specific heat, magnetic susceptibility, resistivity measurements, Andreev spectroscopy, and synchrotron high pressure x-ray diffraction measurements supplemented with theoretical calculations for BaPd2As2. Its superconducting properties are completely isotropic as demonstrated by the critical fields, which do not depend on the direction of the applied field. Under the application of high pressure, Tc is linearly suppressed, which is the typical behavior of classical phononmediated superconductors with some additional effect of a pressure-induced decrease in the electronic density of states and the electron-phonon coupling parameters. Structural changes in the layeredBaPd2As2 have been studied by means of angle-dispersive diffraction in a diamond-anvil cell. At 12 GPa and 24.2 GPa we observed pressure induced lattice distortions manifesting as the discontinuity and, hence discontinuity in the Birch-Murnaghan equation of state. The bulk modulus is B0 = 40(6) GPa below 12 GPa and B0 = 142(3) GPa below 27.2 GPa.

Background/Objectives: Environmentally-friendly construction material means the production and installation of the construction materials with reduced energy use and environmental load. The area includes environmentally-friendly construction finishing materials, energy-saving material technologies, etc. They try to make a growth in connection with regional industries by way of convergence industrialization of marine resource materials, getting out of the limit of utilizing the mud resource. Methods/Statistical analysis: Survey has been Step 4(Environmentally-friendly Materials, Insulation and Heat Storage Performance, Provides Comfortable Environment, Natural Deodorization Function) program. Findings: Environmentallyfriendly construction material markets grow continuously because the mud products may replace the role of red clay products in the construction material market, so we can expect demand for the mud products to be high in future. Improvements/Applications: Based on the awareness built up by the activation of mud festival, it is required to strengthen the competitiveness of the community industry using mud, the representative resource in Boryeong City, converting value added industry that is life care industry

type:Journal Article, [1] Computer simulations on transient luminous emissions in the mesosphere and lower ionosphere have been performed for realistic lightning modelings with fast-varying current surges (M components) superimposed on the lightning continuing current (CC). The algorithm used here is an electromagnetic (EM) code, which enables us to estimate self-consistently the reduced electric field, electron density, conductivity, and luminosity as a function of space and time by solving the Maxwell equations. It is found that M components in the CC with small amplitudes, but with a fast-varying EM effect, can initiate or enhance the occurrence of sprites. Even for a return stroke (RS) without CC, subsequent high-frequency current variations (like M components) are found to lead to dramatic changes in the sprite occurrence. The physics underlying these changes is studied by means of, e.g., temporal and spatial variations of luminosity, electron density, and conductivity. As the conclusion, the RS is a fundamental agency for spites, but high-frequency variations as EM effects exhibit an additional essential influence on sprite occurrence. These computational results are used to offer some useful ideas concerning the unsolved problems of sprites and halos, including polarity asymmetry, long-delay characteristics, and morphological shapes of sprites., source:http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2008JA013651/full

Wheel defects on trains, such as flat wheels and out-of-roundness, inevitably jeopardize the safety of railway operations. Regular visual inspection and checking by experienced workers are the commonly adopted practice to identify wheel defects. However, the defects may not be spotted in time. Therefore, an automatic, remote-sensing, reliable, and accurate monitoring system for wheel condition is always desirable. The paper describes a real-time system to monitor wheel defects based on fiber Bragg grating sensors. Track strain response upon wheel-rail interaction is measured and processed to generate a condition index which directly reflects the wheel condition. This approach is verified by extensive field test, and the preliminary results show that this electromagnetic-immune system provides an effective alternative for wheel defects detection. The system significantly increases the efficiency of maintenance management and reduces the cost for defects detection, and more importantly, avoids derailment timely.

We consider reduced-order and subspace state estimators for linear discrete-time systems with possibly time-varying dynamics. The reduced-order and subspace estimators are obtained using a finite-horizon minimization approach, and thus do not require the solution of algebraic Lyapunov or Riccati equations. Copyright ?? 2009 John Wiley and Sons Asia Pte Ltd and Chinese Automatic Control Society