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Single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) offer great potential for field-effect transistors and integrated circuit applications due to their extraordinary electrical properties. To date, as-made SWCNT transistors are usually p-type in air, and it still remains challenging for realizing n-type devices. Herein, we present efficient and reversible electron doping of semiconductor-enriched single-walled carbon nanotubes (s-SWCNTs) by firstly utilizing decamethylcobaltocene (DMC) deposited by a simple spin-coating process at room temperature as an electron donor. A n-type transistor behavior with high on current, large I on /I off ratio and excellent uniformity is obtained by surface charge transfer from the electron donor DMC to acceptor s-SWCNTs, which is further corroborated by the Raman spectra and the ab initio simulation results. The DMC dopant molecules could be reversibly removed by immersion in N, N-Dimethylformamide solvent, indicating its reversibility and providing another way to control the carrier concentration effectively as well as selective removal of surface dopants on demand. Furthermore, the n-type behaviors including threshold voltage, on current, field-effect mobility, contact resistances, etc. are well controllable by adjusting the surface doping concentration. This work paves the way to explore and obtain high-performance n-type nanotubes for future complementary CMOS circuit and system applications.

DNA and its conformational transition can be used to design nanometer-scale structures, nano-tweezers and nanomechanical devices. Experiments and molecular simulations have been used to study the concentration effect on the A-DNA→B-DNA conformational transition, but a systematical investigation on counterion effect on the dynamics of this transition has not been reported up to now. In present work, restrained and unrestrained molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been performed to characterize the stability of DNA conformations and the dynamics of A-DNA→B-DNA transitions in aqueous solutions with different alkali metal counterions. The DNA duplex d(CGCGAATTCGCG)2, coion Cl− and counterions Li+, Na+, K+, Rb+ and Cs+ as well as water molecule were considered using the PARM99 force field in the AMBER8 package. It was found that B-form DNA is more stable than A-form DNA in aqueous electrolyte solutions with different alkali metal counterions. Increasing KCl concentration in solution hinders the A-DNA→B-DNA transition and the transition times for different alkali metal counterions conform to neither the simple sequence related to naked ion size nor to hydrated diameter, but an apparently abnormal sequence of K+ < Rb+ < Cs+ < Na+ < Li+. This abnormal sequence can be well understood in terms of an electrostatic model based on the effective cation diameters and the modified mean-spherical approximation (MMSA). The present results provide valuable information for the design of DNA-based nanomaterials and nanodevices.

Unrestrained molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been carried out to characterize the stability of DNA conformations and the dynamics of A-DNA→B-DNA conformational transitions in aqueous RbCl solutions. The PARM99 force field in the AMBER8 package was used to investigate the effect of RbCl concentration on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition in the DNA duplex d(CGCGAATTCGCG)2. Canonical A- and B-form DNA were assumed for the initial conformation and the final conformation had a length per complete turn that matched the canonical B-DNA. The DNA structure was monitored for 3.0 ns and the distances between the C5′ atoms were obtained from the simulations. It was found that all of the double stranded DNA strands of A-DNA converged to the structure of B-form DNA within 1.0 ns during the unrestrained MD simulations. In addition, increasing the RbCl concentration in aqueous solution hindered the A→B conformational transition and the transition in aqueous RbCl solution was faster than that in aqueous NaCl solution for the same electrolyte strength. The effects of the types and concentrations of counterions on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition can be understood in terms of the variation in water activity and the number of accumulated counterions in the major grooves of A-DNA. The rubidium ion distributions around both fixed A-DNA and B-DNA were obtained using the restrained MD simulations to help explain the effect of RbCl concentration on the dynamics of the A→B conformational transition.

The effects of solid-fluid interactions on the vapor-liquid phase diagram, coexistence density, relative volatility and vaporization enthalpy have been investigated for confined binary systems of CO2-CH4, CO2-N2 and CH4-N2. The Gibbs ensemble Monte Carlo (GEMC) simulation results indicate that the confinement and the solid-fluid interaction have significant influences on the vapor-liquid equilibrium properties. The confinement and the strength of the solid-fluid interaction make the p-x i phase diagram move to higher pressure regions. They also make the two-phase region become narrower for each binary mixture. The strength of the solid-fluid interactions can cause increases in the coexistence liquid and vapor densities, and cause the decrease of the relative volatility and the vaporization enthalpy for the systems studied. As the pore width is decreased, the two-phase region of the binary mixture becomes narrower.

The self-diffusion coefficient of non-associating fluids at moderate density and high density were calculated by the hard-sphere chain (HSC) equation obtained by the Chapman–Enskog method of solution which is corrected by molecular dynamics simulation data. Compared with the data of experiments or molecular simulations, the result shows that most of the average absolute deviation of the self-diffusion coefficient calculated by this method is about 5% when the pressure is lower than 300 MPa and the temperature is higher than 100 K. An attempt is made in this work to combine the hard-sphere chain model of the self-diffusion coefficient with the statistical associating fluid theory (SAFT). The real non-spherical associating molecules are modeled as chains of tangent hard-sphere segments with an associating site. An equation for the self-diffusion coefficient in polyatomic associating fluids is presented as a product of a non-hydrogen-bond contribution and a hydrogen-bond contribution. The SAFT equation provides the density and temperature dependence of an average number of hydrogen bonds in a molecule, and the HSC equation is used to calculate the self-diffusion coefficient for a non-associating fluid. The equation reproduces the experimental self-diffusion coefficient with an average absolute deviation of about 7.5% for water, alcohols and hydrogen fluoride over wide ranges of temperature and pressure, including supercritical water.

The Lennard–Jones chain model, which was developed from the equation for the self-diffusion coefficient in a Lennard–Jones fluid and the molecular dynamics simulation data of a tangent hard-sphere chain fluid, is used to calculate the self-diffusion coefficient of n-alkanes. n-Alkanes are characterized by a Lennard–Jones segment diameter, a segment–segment interaction energy, and a chain length expressed as the number of segments. The equation represents the experimental self-diffusion coefficients with an average absolute deviation of 3.93% for 16 n-alkanes covering wide ranges of temperature and pressure. The correlated results are compared with those of the rough Lennard–Jones model. A generalized version of the Lennard–Jones chain model is presented which requires only the carbon number in order to predict n-alkane self-diffusivity.

In order to obtain the exact information of atomic number density in the ternary system of HNO3−UO2(NO3)2−H2O, the densities were measured with an Anton-Paar DMA60/602 digital density meter thermostated at 298.15±0.01 K. The apparent molal volumes for the systems were calculated from the experimental data. The present measured apparent molar volumes have been fitted to the Pitzer ion-interaction model, which provides an adequate representation of the experimental data for mixed aqueous electrolyte solutions up to 6.2 mol/kg ionic strength. This fit yields θV, and ψV, which are the first derivatives with respect to pressure of the mixing interaction parameters for the excess free energy. With the mixing parameters θV, and ψV, the densities and apparent molar volumes of the ternary system studied in this work can be calculated with good accuracy, as shown by the standard deviations.