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Silicon-based carbon composites are believed as promising anodes in the near future due to their outstanding specific capacity and relatively lower volume effect compared to pure silicon anodes. Herein, a multilayer spherical core–shell (M-SCS) electrode with a graphite framework prepared with Si@O-MCMB/C nanoparticles is developed, which aims to realize chemically/mechanically stability during the lithiation/delithiation process with high specific capacity. An electrochemical-/mechanical-coupling model for the M-SCS structure is established with various chemical/mechanical boundary conditions. The simulation of finite difference method (FDM) has been conducted based on the proposed coupling model, by which the diffusion-induced stress along both the radial and the circumferential directions is determined. Moreover, factors that influence the diffusion-induced stress of the M-SCS structure have been discussed and analyzed in detail.

A modified two-dimensional phase field microelasticity model coupling the Cahn-Hillard equation is applied to investigate the microstructural evolution of interface migration and isothermal martensitic transformation accompanying carbon diffusion and redistribution during quenching and partitioning (QaP) process in a low-carbon steel. In the modelling, the Kim-Kim-Suzuki (KKS) model is adopted to depict the interface conditions for carbon diffusion, and the transformation behavior during partitioning is assumed as a displacive manner. Simulations were done for one-step QaP processes with various partitioning temperatures. Simulated results reveal that carbon enrichment within the untransformed austenite varies significantly with the local microstructural features formed during QaP process. With the proposed phase field model, isothermal martensite formation and migration of existing austenite-martensite interfaces during partitioning are realized by simulation. It is also revealed that the interface migration behavior during partitioning is strongly correlated with the spatial distribution of the local elastic strain energy inherited from quenching process. Furthermore, temperature dependence of isothermal martensitic transformation kinetics is also studied, with the competition between martensitic transformation and the reverse transformation during partitioning, a favorable partitioning temperature is found to have the maximum amount of isothermal martensite formed during partitioning.

The wrinkling of a silicon monoxide thin film on a compliant poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) substrate structure was experimentally investigated in this study. The self-expansion effect of PDMS during film deposition was utilized to impose a pretensile strain on the structure through a specially made fixture. A laser scanning confocal microscope (LSCM) system with an in situ heating stage was employed for the real-time measurement. The Young's modulus of the silicon monoxide thin film as well as the PDMS substrate was measured on the basis of the elasticity theory. Moreover, the effects of temperature variations on geometric parameters in the postbuckling state, such as wavelength and amplitude, were analyzed. It was proved that wavelength is relatively immune to thermal loads, while amplitude is much more sensitive.

There have been many approaches for three-dimensional (3D) deformation measurement at the macro-scale, but these methods are mostly not applicable to 3D deformation measurement at the micro-scale due to the low resolution. With the broad application of the scanning electron microscope (SEM) at micro-scale measurement, in-situ deformation measurement under SEM has been made feasible. The 3D deformation measurement method based on digital phase shifting and the SEM system is proposed in this paper. In the proposed method, two SEM images of a specimen grating at different tilting angles are required to solve the in-plane and out-of-plane displacement. The digital generated reference grating is superimposed with the SEM images of a the specimen grating at different tilting angles to form the digital moire. Using the digital phase-shifting method, the phase information of the grating at different tilting angles can be acquired. With the derived relationship between the phase of the grating at different tilting angles and the in-plane and out-of-plane displacement, 3D displacement can be obtained. To verify the feasibility and assess the accuracy, a numerical experiment is conducted to reverse the given in-plane and out-of-plane deformation. The proposed method is used to measure the out-of-plane deformation of aluminum film on a soft substrate. The successful results indicate that this method is feasible and has the potential to be applied in 3D deformation measurement at micro-scale.

This communication proposes a novel 3D SEM moire technique to apply to the inversion/reconstruction for micro objects with periodic structures on the surface. A revised geometric model was theoretically developed to enhance the accuracy and to simplify the calculation. Combined with the random phase-shifting technique, a theoretical relative uncertainty of 2.31% was realized, which was confirmed through a digital simulation. We selected the reflecting grating as a typical sample in the experiments, and auxiliary microscopic equipment was employed to evaluate the results from the proposed method. The measurement result agrees well with the results obtained from an atomic force microscope (AFM), and the experiments validate the feasibility of the method.

The dynamic buckling behavior of thin films from substrate is studied in this work. The experimental results show that the buckling morphology of the constantan film lines from the polymer substrate is inconsistent and non-sinusoidal, which is different from the sinusoidal form of the buckling morphology under static loads. The plastic deformation of the film lines results in the non-sinusoidal buckling morphology and residual deformation when unloaded. Finite element modeling results with regard to the plastic dissipation of the constantan film lines reveal that the plastic dissipation suppresses the buckling-driven delaminating under impact loads. This study will give some new perspectives on the buckling behavior of thin film from substrate.

The geometric phase analysis (GPA) method based on the local high resolution discrete Fourier transform (LHR-DFT) for deformation measurement, defined as LHR-DFT GPA, is proposed to improve the measurement accuracy. In the general GPA method, the fundamental frequency of the image plays a crucial role. However, the fast Fourier transform, which is generally employed in the general GPA method, could make it difficult to locate the fundamental frequency accurately when the fundamental frequency is not located at an integer pixel position in the Fourier spectrum. This study focuses on this issue and presents a LHR-DFT algorithm that can locate the fundamental frequency with sub-pixel precision in a specific frequency region for the GPA method. An error analysis is offered and simulation is conducted to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method; both results show that the LHR-DFT algorithm can accurately locate the fundamental frequency and improve the measurement accuracy of the GPA method. Furthermore, typical tensile and bending tests are carried out and the experimental results verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.

An integrated measurement method for micro 3D surface shape by a combination of stereovision technology in a scanning electron microscope (SEM) and grids-processing methodology is proposed. The principle of the proposed method is introduced in detail. By capturing two images of the tested specimen with grids on the surface at different tilt angles in an SEM, the 3D surface shape of the specimen can be obtained. Numerical simulation is applied to analyze the feasibility of the proposed method. A validation experiment is performed here. The surface shape of the metal-wire/polymer-membrane structures with thermal deformation is reconstructed. By processing the surface grids of the specimen, the out-of-plane displacement field of the specimen surface is also obtained. Compared with the measurement results obtained by a 3D digital microscope, the experimental error of the proposed method is discussed