National Institute Of Materials Physics - Romania

The Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detector is described. The detector operates at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. It was conceived to study proton-proton (and lead-lead) collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 14 TeV (5.5 TeV nucleon-nucleon) and at luminosities up to 10(34)cm(-2)s(-1) (10(27)cm(-2)s(-1)). At the core of the CMS detector sits a high-magnetic-field and large-bore superconducting solenoid surrounding an all-silicon pixel and strip tracker, a lead-tungstate scintillating-crystals electromagnetic calorimeter, and a brass-scintillator sampling hadron calorimeter. The iron yoke of the flux-return is instrumented with four stations of muon detectors covering most of the 4 pi solid angle. Forward sampling calorimeters extend the pseudo-rapidity coverage to high values (vertical bar eta vertical bar <= 5) assuring very good hermeticity. The overall dimensions of the CMS detector are a length of 21.6 m, a diameter of 14.6 m and a total weight of 12500 t.

Carbon Nanotubes are exotic low-dimensional systems, and due to their remarkable properties, are promising components for technological applications. The electronic and vibrational signatures raising from their existence as individual entities or associated in bundles, is still a controversed subject. A careful analysis of the G (similar to 1600 cm(-1)) and RBM (100-200 cm(-1)) band features as: profile, peak position and intensity in the Raman spectra may be a valuable indication about their dispersion state. The UV-VIS-NIR absorption spectrum comes to support this assumption. Observing the absorption spectra associated to resonant excitation of semiconducting and metallic nanotubes, may reveal complementary informations concerning the individualization procedure efficiency.

Angle-resolved X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (ARXPS) has been performed on (100) Si surfaces in different conditions as regards the oxides nature - native oxides, thermally formed oxides, and also after a cleaning procedure by Ar+ ion sputtering (e.g. E= 2 keV). The most sensitive angle to surface oxidation states (Si1+, Si2+, Si3+, Si4+) was the take-off-angle (TOA): 25 degrees. Native oxides and thermally oxide phases on Si surfaces consists in a mixture of Si2O, SiO, Si2O3 and SiO2. The XPS measurements have putted into evidence a higher concentration of suboxides in high oxidation state (Si3+) on naturally oxidized Si substrates. The thermally oxidized Silicon surfaces contain suboxides in a low oxidation state (Si1+). The Ar+ ion sputtering removed rapidly the superficial silicon oxides. The analysis and computation of SiO2 film thickness on crystalline Silicon was done in the frame of modified Bethe equation for Electron inelastic mean free path (IMFP) and taking into account the intensity of SiO2 peak and Si peak together with the TOA in the XPS measurement. Native oxide thickness for SiO2 was d(oxy) similar to 24 angstrom and for thermally oxidized sample was d(oxy) similar to 27 angstrom. Due to the slightly difference in the nature oxidation states it is suggested that the silicon dioxide appeared from two different kinetics in the oxidation processes.

TiAlZrCN superhard coatings, in which Ti and Al were additions to ZrCN base compound, were prepared by the cathodic arc method. The films were deposited on Si, plain carbon steel and high-speed steel substrates in a mixture of N-2 and CH4 gases. Elemental and phase composition, chemical bondings, texture, surface roughness, hardness, adhesion, tribological characteristics and erosive-corrosive resistance were investigates as a function of gas composition and total gas flow rate, using XPS, GDOES and XRD techniques, surface profilometry, microhardness and scratch adhesion measurements, tribological and erosive tests. It was shown that the properties and performance of the coatings were strongly dependent on the CH4/(CH4+N-2) flow rate and also on the total gas flow. The tribological and anti-erosive characteristics of the TiAlZrCN coatings were found to be superior to those of reference films (ZrN, ZrC, ZrCN, and TiAlCN). Maximum hardness values (42-45 GPa) were obtained for the films prepared at CH4/(CH4+N2) ratios ranging from 0.2 to 0.4. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Composites based on zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles and single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) were investigated by photoluminescence (PL) and Raman scattering. The room temperature PL spectrum of ZnO at the excitation wavelength of 335 nm displays a narrow excitonic band, peaking at 368 nm (3.36eV), and a wide one, disclosing two components with maxima at about 444 nm (2.79eV) and 560 nm (2.21eV) which are associated to the local oxygen vacancies and oxygen excess, respectively. Regardless the preparation method of the ZnO/SWNTs compound (electrochemical, mechanicochemical and hydrothermal synthesis), PL spectra reveal an increased quenching tendency with the concentration of nanotubes in the composite mass. As distinct feature in the PL spectra of ZnO/SWNTs composites are two bands, one at 450 nm (2.75 nm) and another one attributed to the formation of a donor-acceptor complex at 680 nm (1.82eV). The role of the dispersion of carbon nanotubes in the ZnO/SWNTs composite is observed by Raman scattering with the excitation wavelength of 676 nm. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Angle-resolved X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (ARXPS) analysis has been performed on GaAs (10 0) surfaces in different conditions as naturally oxidized, Ar+ ion sputtering (E = 1-5 keV) and chemical etching in H2SO4/H2O2/H2O(3: 1: 1). The most sensitive angle to the surface compositional changes was the take-off angle (TOA): 25 degrees. Native oxide phases on GaAs consist of a mixture of Ga2O3, As2O3 and As2O5. Ar+ ion sputtering procedure modifies the surface composition, in the altered layer where the concentration ratio C-Ga/C-As tends to 1.5-1.6. Wet chemical etching removes the oxide layer and the As-rich region from the surface. In the experiment combining chemical etching with Ar+ ion sputtering for cleaning purpose, the native oxides are removed from the surface and C-Ga/C-As tends to stoichiometry. The experiment on native oxide reconstruction after storage in high-vacuum conditions (P similar to 10(-8) Torr) provides evidence of the high reactivity of GaAs (10 0) surfaces. We have observed the presence of an As oxide (BE = 43 eV) within a concentration range of 2-3%. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Leakage currents determine bumps in the capacitance-voltage characteristics of metal-oxide-semiconductor-type heterostructures with capacitance values larger than the insulator capacitance. A nearly parallel shift with frequency is also observed. These aspects are connected with the presence of a high density of interface states. We illustrate these effects for the case of nano-PbS/SiO2/Si heterostructures. The phenomena were simulated and we propose a method to quickly estimate the interface state density level of a heterostructure when leakage channels are present. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.

Photoluminescence (PL) properties of the composites based on zinc oxide (ZnO) and single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) prepared by hydrothermal synthesis are studied in this paper. The emission and excitation spectra of nanometric ZnO powder are dramatically influenced by the adsorption of different molecules coming from the environment. Therefore, a special attention is given to reveal the influences of adsorption/de-sorption process on photoluminescence properties of zinc oxide nanoparticles. A quenching effect of the intrinsic PL is observed regularly when the ZnO is synthesized in the presence of SWNTs, i.e. when a ZnO/SWNTs composite is formed. A distinct feature of the ZnO/SWNTs composite, is an emission band with a maximum at 405-450 nm.

Intercalated PbI2 compounds were prepared by exposing crystalline films and crystalline powders of lead iodide to pyridine or iodine vapor at room temperature. Correlated studies of optical absorption, Raman scattering and low temperature photoluminescence (PL) reveal different properties in comparison with those of pure crystalline PbI2 powder. Depending of the nature of intercalated molecules (organic or inorganic) the basic semiconducting properties of PbI2 are dramatically modified. The main signature of iodine intercalated PbI2 consists in a luminescence band peaking at 2.24 eV appearing at 77 K under 350 nm excitation light. In the case of pyridine intercalated PbI2 a new intense band at about 3.3 eV in the absorption spectrum is observed. The the PL spectra of pyridine intercalated PbI2 at 77 K change substantially when the excitation wavelength. The Raman spectra confirm the presence of pyridine between the PbI2 layers.

in the last decade, considerable research effort was directed to the deposition of multilayer films with layer thicknesses in the nanometer range (superlattice coatings), in order to increase the performance of various cutting tools and machine parts. The goal of the present work was to investigate the main microstructural, mechanical and wear resistance characteristics of a superlattice coating, consisting of alternate multilayer ZrN/TiAIN films, with various bilayer periods (5 divided by 20 nm). The coatings were deposited by the cathodic arc method on Si, plain carbon steel and high speed steel substrates to be used as wear resistance surfaces. The multilayer structures were prepared by using shutters placed in front of each cathode (Zr and Ti + Al). The characteristics of multilayer structures (elemental and phase composition, texture, Vickers microhardness, thickness, adhesion, and wear resistance) were determined by using various techniques (AES, XPS, XRD, microhardness measurements, scratch, and tribological tests). A comparison with the properties of ZrN and TiAIN single-layer coatings was carried out.