Sharif Digital Repository

A transparent layer containing acrylic resin, graphene oxide and Fe3O4 have been studied based on its potential application including photocatalytically active and self-cleaning coatings. In this study, a transparent and superhydrophilic acrylic resin@graphene oxide-Fe3O4 (PA@GO-Fe3O4) composite coating has been successfully deposited on a glass substrate by dip coating technique to provide a thin film with a self-cleaning and photocatalytically active surface. The prepared samples were characterized by field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM), atomic force microscope (AFM), fourier transform infrared (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, UV–vis diffused... 

The durability of novel metallic artifacts and buildings is an open issue, and the role of smart protecting coatings in extending these artifacts’ lifetimes is crucial. In this paper, the role of γ-Fe2 O3 nanoparticles and reduced graphene oxide (rGO) nanosheets on enhancing the self-cleaning properties of composite TiO2 films and reducing metal alterations due to contact with acid rain and pollutants is investigated. The photocatalytic assessment of the TiO2 based films indicates that there are optimum contents for γ-Fe2 O3 and rGO, which confer the film lower bandgap and tune the TiO2 anatase/rutile ratio. By adding a proper content of γ-Fe2 O3, wettability is reduced both in dark and... 

A novel nanohybrid composite of TiO2, SiO2, γ-Fe2O3, and reduced graphene oxide (TiO2@Si:Fe:rGO) is fabricated by the sol-gel method. The properties of the coated film were examined by structural and self-cleaning analyses using simulated discoloration/soiling and roofing tests. The fabricated transparent TiO2@Si:Fe:rGO composite showed excellent photoactivity and wettability, behaving well in self-cleaning applications. The addition of SiO2 improved the crystalline structure and surface hydroxylation of TiO2 nanoparticles. γ-Fe2O3 decreased the recombination rate of e-/h+ pairs, and significantly improved photocatalytic activity under visible light. Moreover, rGO sheets as excellent... 

This study describes the synthesis of TiO2/WO3 composite systems with a varying concentration of WO3 by a glucose-template assisted method and demonstrates their round-the-clock photoactivity performance towards the degradation of methanol (MeOH) under illumination and dark conditions. XRD results indicated a biphasic anatase-rutile nature of TiO2, with tunable concentrations with respect to the WO3 loading. WO3 incorporation extended the light absorption of the system towards visible light, increasing the observed photoactivity. The obtained results were further validated using photo-electrochemical investigations such as photocurrent measurements and the impedance response of the systems.... 

This study demonstrates the glucose-template assisted synthesis of hydrogen-treated Pt: TiO2/WO3 composites, and their round-the-clock photoactivity towards methanol (MeOH) degradation under light illumination and in dark. XRD indicated increasing rutile fraction in TiO2 as a function of template removal, WO3 crystallinity and H2 treatment process. The presence of oxygen vacancies in WO3 was confirmed by XPS. Lower recombination rate and higher surface area were observed in the optimized H2-Pt-G:TiO2/WO3 catalyst. The presence of oxygen vacancies and optical enhancements due to the synergistic interactions of the multi-system (TiO2, WO3 and Pt) extended the visible light absorption of the... 

For the first time this work reports a new idea to develop a round-the-clock self-cleaning coating which was successfully applied to preserve cultural heritage and modern artifacts under sunlight illumination and at night. To fabricate this structure, namely, H2:TiO2/WO3@Pt, soft templating and hydrogen treatment approaches were selected to enhance the performance of TiO2/WO3 photocatalyst, together with the addition of Pt plasmonic nanoparticles. The coating can be photochemically charged in the presence of sacrificial electron donors and keep its stability, benefiting from the remained electrons stock for over 10 h to clean the surface from aggressive pollution also at night, in absence of... 

Using multiple antennas at the transmit and receive sides of a passive radar brings both the benefits of MIMO radar and passive radar. However one of the obstacles arisen in such configuration is the receive antennas placement in proper positions so that the radar performance is improved. Here we just consider the case of positioning one receiver among multiple illuminators of opportunity. Indeed it is a start for the solution of optimizing the geometry of the multiple receivers in a passive radar  

SbCl3 supported on montmorillonite K-10 is an efficient catalyst for the ring opening of epoxides with aromatic amines under solvent-free conditions and microwave irradiation to give the corresponding b-amino alcohols in high yields with high regioselectivity  

In this paper, we consider an integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) system with wireless power transfer (WPT) where an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-based radar serves a group of energy-limited communication users in addition to its sensing functionality. In this architecture, the radar senses the environment in phase 1 (namely sensing phase) and mean-while, the communications users (nodes) harvest and store the energy from the radar transmit signal. The stored energy is then used for information transmission from the nodes to UAV in phase 2, i.e., uplink phase. Performance of the radar system depends on the transmit signal as well as the receive filter; the energy of the transmit... 

One of the important obstacles in MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) radars is the issue of designing proper transmit signals. Indeed, the capability of signal design is a significant advantage in MIMO radars, through which, the system can achieve much better performance. Many different aspects of this performance improvement have been considered yet, and the transmit signals have been designed to attain such goal, e.g., getting higher SNR or better detector's performance at the receiver. However, an important tool for evaluating the radar's performance is its ambiguity function. In this paper, we consider the problem of transmit signal design, in order to optimize the ambiguity function... 

Two gains play key roles in recently developed MIMO wireless communication systems: "spatial diversity" gain and "spatial multiplexing" gain. The diversity gain refers to the capability to decrease the error rate of the MIMO channel, while the multiplexing gain implicitly refers to the amount of increase in the capacity of the MIMO channel. It has been shown that there is a fundamental tradeoff between these two types of gains, meaning interplay between increasing reliability (via an increase in the diversity gain) and increasing data rate (via an increase in the multiplexing gain). On the other hand, recently, MIMO radars have attracted much attention for their superior ability to enhance... 

It is a well known fact that using multiple antennas at transmit and receive sides improves the detection performance. However, in such multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) configuration, proper positioning of transmitters and receivers is a big challenge that can have significant influence on the performance of the overall system. In addition, determining the power of each transmitter under a total power constraint is a problem that should be solved in order to enhance the performance and coverage of such a system. In this paper, we design the Neyman-Pearson detector under the Rayleigh scatter model and use it to introduce a criterion for the antenna placement at both transmit and receive... 

There has been much interest, recently, towards exploiting the Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) technique in radar. It is shown that using multiple antennas at transmit and receive sides can improve the performance of the system. However, in order to analyze the system's performance, its ambiguity function, i.e. the ambiguity function of a MIMO radar, is needed to be defined. In this paper, beginning from the information theoretic definitions, we derive such function, specifically for a MIMO radar with widely separated antennas  

By combining the two ideas of MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) and PCL (Passive Coherent Location) in radar, one can achieve the advantages of both recently developed techniques simultaneously. While using multiple antennas at the receive side provides a spatial diversity of the object to be detected, using multiple illuminators of opportunity, most importantly, makes the radar covert to the interceptors. One obstacle in such MIMO configuration is choosing the positions of the receive antennas. In this paper, after analyzing the Neyman-Pearson detector for the DVB-T based PCL, we introduce the probability of missed detection as a criterion to place the receive antenna. Here, we only... 

One of the most important obstacles in passive radar applications is removing the direct signal from the target channel. Otherwise, week echoes from the targets in the target channel would be ignored due to the limited dynamic range of the system. One of the most effective techniques in this field is using adaptive filters. In this paper various adaptive filters are introduced and their performances are shown and compared  

It has been shown that using multiple antennas in a radar system improves the performance considerably, since multiple target echoes are received from different aspect angles of the target. In this way, the target detection is improved. However, when using multiple antennas, some problems, such as designing the transmit signals, synchronization, etc. emerge that should be solved. One of such problems is the receiver placement. Receiver placement deals with choosing a proper position for the receive antenna in order to optimize the whole system's performance. In this paper, a receiver placement procedure based on improving the radar ambiguity function is proposed for the case of a multisite... 

By employing the MIMO (multiple-input-multiple-output) technology in radar, some new problems emerged, that, in order to benefit the MIMO gains in radar, it was necessary to solve them suitably. One of such obstacles is determining the positions of receive antennas in a MIMO radar system with widely separated antennas (WS MIMO radar), since it is shown that the antennas' positions affect the whole system's performance considerably. In this study, a proper receivers' positioning procedure is proposed. To do this end, four criteria are developed based on the proposed MIMO detector and the MIMO ambiguity function. The simulations verify that the proposed positioning procedure improves the... 

Phenols and alcohols are silylated with hexamethyldisilazane (HMDS) under microwave irradiation in solvent-free condition in good to excellent yields  

Carbon capture is crucial for mitigating climate change and achieving global emissions reduction targets. Among various technologies, absorption-based methods using aqueous solvents are among the most common and efficient, offering high capture rates and retrofit capabilities for existing industrial facilities. However, selecting the optimal solvent is challenging due to its direct impact on the performance, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness of the carbon capture process. This research introduces a novel multi-class classification methodology for solvent selection in carbon capture. Leveraging a dataset of 656 data points, including features such as temperature, pressure, molar ratio, and... 

Purpose: Intensive actions implemented to alleviate poverty created many challenges. Millions of people face acute food insecurity; hence, food production needs to be increased to feed the existing and increasing population through sustainable agricultural practices. Sustainable agricultural development is the only way forward to assist humanity. Research Method: TExisting literature on sustainable agriculture was reviewed, explored, understood, described, evaluated, and synthesized and their relationships to sustain smallholder farmers were analyzed. Findings: Technological innovations in increasing resource use efficiency, modern breeding techniques, and renewable energy sources aid in...