Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “GOLD”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 253 records · Page 14
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2022

Formation and Evolution of Metallocene Single-Molecule Circuits with Direct Gold-π Links

Single molecule circuits with group 8 metallocenes are formed without additional linker groups in Scanning Tunnelling Microscope-based break junction (STMBJ) measurements at cryogenic and room temperature conditions with gold (Au) electrodes. We investigate the nature of this direct gold-π binding motif and its affect on molecular conductance and persistence characteristics during junction evolution. The measurement technique under cryogenic conditions tracks molecular plateaus through the full cycle of extension and compression. Analysis reveals that junction persistence when the metal electrodes are pushed together correlates with whether electrodes are locally sharp or blunt, suggesting distinct scenarios for metallocene junction formation and evolution. The top and bottom surfaces of the "barrel" shaped metallocenes present the electron-rich π system of cyclopentadienyl rings which interacts with the gold electrodes in two distinct ways. An undercoordinated gold atom on a sharp tip forms a donor-acceptor bond to a specific carbon atom in the ring. However, a small, flat patch on a dull tip can bind more strongly to the ring as a whole through Van der Waals interactions. Density functional theory (DFT) based calculations of model electrode structures provide an atomic-scale picture of these scenarios, demonstrating the role of these bonding motifs during junction evolution and showing that the conductance is relatively independent of tip atomic-scale structure. Furthermore, the non-specific interaction of the cyclopentadienyl rings with the electrodes enables extended conductance plateaus, a mechanism distinct from that identified for the more commonly studied, rod-shaped organic molecular wires.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2014

X-ray laser driven gold targets

The femtosecond population dynamics of gold irradiated by a coherent high-intensity (>10{sup 17} W/cm{sup 2}) x-ray laser pulse is investigated theoretically. There are two aspects to the assembled model. One is the construction of a detailed model of platinum-like gold inclusive of all inner-shell states that are created by photoionization of atomic gold and decay either by radiative or Auger processes. Second is the computation of the population dynamics that ensues when an x-ray pulse is absorbed in gold. The hole state generation depends on the intensity and wavelength of the driving x-ray pulse. The excited state populations reached during a few femtosecond timescales are high enough to generate population inversions, whose gain coefficients are calculated. These amplified lines in the emitted x-ray spectrum provide important diagnostics of the radiation dynamics and also suggest a nonlinear way to increase the frequency of the coherent output x-ray pulses relative to the frequency of the driver input x-ray pulse.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2014

Alignment of gold nanorods by angular photothermal depletion

In this paper, we demonstrate that a high degree of alignment can be imposed upon randomly oriented gold nanorod films by angular photothermal depletion with linearly polarized laser irradiation. The photothermal reshaping of gold nanorods is observed to follow quadratic melting model rather than the threshold melting model, which distorts the angular and spectral hole created on 2D distribution map of nanorods to be an open crater shape. We have accounted these observations to the alignment procedures and demonstrated good agreement between experiment and simulations. The use of multiple laser depletion wavelengths allowed alignment criteria over a large range of aspect ratios, achieving 80% of the rods in the target angular range. We extend the technique to demonstrate post-alignment in a multilayer of randomly oriented gold nanorod films, with arbitrary control of alignment shown across the layers. Photothermal angular depletion alignment of gold nanorods is a simple, promising post-alignment method for creating future 3D or multilayer plasmonic nanorod based devices and structures.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2014

Excitons in a mirror: Formation of “optical bilayers” using MoS{sub 2} monolayers on gold substrates

We report coupling of excitons in monolayers of molybdenum disulphide to their mirror image in an underlying gold substrate. Excitons at the direct band gap are little affected by the substrate whereas strongly bound C-excitons associated with a van-Hove singularity change drastically. On quartz substrates only one C-exciton is visible (in the blue) but on gold substrates a strong red-shifted extra resonance in the green is seen. Exciton coupling to its image leads to formation of a “mirror biexciton” with enhanced binding energy. Estimates of this energy shift in an emitter-gold system match experiments well. The absorption spectrum of MoS{sub 2} on gold thus resembles a bilayer of MoS{sub 2} which has been created by optical coupling. Additional top-mirrors produce an “optical bulk.”.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2014

A gold hybrid structure as optical coupler for quantum well infrared photodetector

A hybrid structure consisting of a square lattice of gold disk arrays and an overlaying gold film is proposed as an optical coupler for a backside-illuminated quantum well infrared photodetector (QWIP). Finite difference time-domain method is used to numerically simulate the reflection spectra and the field distributions of the hybrid structure combined with the QWIP device. The results show that the electric field component perpendicular to the quantum well is strongly enhanced when the plasmonic resonant wavelength of the hybrid structure coincides with the response one of the quantum well infrared photodetector regardless of the polarization of the incident light. The effect of the diameter and thickness of an individual gold disk on the resonant wavelength is also investigated, which indicates that the localized surface plasmon also plays a role in the light coupling with the hybrid structure. The coupling efficiency can exceed 50 if the structural parameters of the gold disk arrays are well optimized.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2015

Polarization sensitivity of light diffraction for periodic array of anisotropic gold nanoparticles

This article aims to analyze the first order diffraction intensity of the incident polarized light which is diffracted by the gold nanoparticles array in terms of the surface plasmon effect. The inspected gold nanoparticles array films are built in grating pattern with stripe thickness of 4 μm and diameters of gold nanoparticles ca. 10–56 nm, which are formed by annealing at temperatures of 400, 450, 500, and 550 °C, respectively. The probing light is linearly polarized with wavelengths of 450–800 nm and counterclockwise turns its polarization direction from 0° to 90° during measurements. The results show that the diffraction intensity depends on the anisotropic configuration samples which gold nanoparticles are orientated by analyzing the scanning electron microscope images. It results that the localized surface plasmon effect induced by incident field depends on orientation and causes the sample polarization-sensitive.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2015

Gold–superheavy-element interaction in diatomics and cluster adducts: A combined four-component Dirac-Kohn-Sham/charge-displacement study

The chemistry of superheavy elements (Z ≥ 104) is actively investigated in atom-at-a-time experiments of volatility through adsorption on gold surfaces. In this context, common guidelines for interpretation based on group trends in the periodic table should be used cautiously, because relativistic effects play a central role and may cause predictions to fall short. In this paper, we present an all-electron four-component Dirac-Kohn-Sham comparative study of the interaction of gold with Cn (Z = 112), Fl (Z = 114), and Uuo (Z = 118) versus their lighter homologues of the 6th period, Hg, Pb, and Rn plus the noble gas Xe. Calculations were carried out for Au–E (E = Hg, Cn, Pb, Fl, Xe, Rn, Uuo), Au{sub 7}– and Au{sub 20}–E (E = Hg, Cn, Pb, Fl, Rn) complexes, where Au{sub 7} (planar) and Au{sub 20} (pyramidal) are experimentally determined clusters having structures of increasing complexity. Results are analysed both in terms of the energetics of the complexes and of the electron charge rearrangement accompanying their formation. In line with the available experimental data, Cn and more markedly Fl are found to be less reactive than their lighter homologues. On the contrary, Uuo is found to be more reactive than Rn and Xe. Cn forms the weakest bond with the gold atom, compared to Fl and Uuo. The reactivity of Fl decreases with increasing gold-fragment size more rapidly than that of Cn and, as a consequence, the order of the reactivity of these two elements is inverted upon reaching the Au{sub 20}-cluster adduct. Density difference maps between adducts and fragments reveal similarities in the behaviour of Cn and Xe, and in that of Uuo and the more reactive species Hg and Pb. These findings are given a quantitative ground via charge-displacement analysis.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2016

A theoretical investigation of the influence of gold nanosphere size on the decay and energy transfer rates and efficiencies of quantum emitters

We present in this contribution a comprehensive investigation of the effect of the size of gold nanospheres on the decay and energy transfer rates of quantum systems placed close to these nanospheres. These phenomena have been investigated before, theoretically and experimentally, but no comprehensive study of the influence of the nanoparticle size on important dependences of the decay and energy transfer rates, such as the dependence on the donor-acceptor spectral overlap and the relative positions of the donor, acceptor, and nanoparticle, exists. As such, different accounts of the energy transfer mechanism have been presented in the literature. We perform an investigation of the energy transfer mechanisms between emitters and gold nanospheres and between donor-acceptor pairs in the presence of the gold nanospheres using a Green’s tensor formalism, experimentally verified in our lab. We find that the energy transfer rate to small nanospheres is greatly enhanced, leading to a strong quenching of the emission of the emitter. When the nanosphere size is increased, it acts as an antenna, increasing the emission of the emitter. We also investigate the emission wavelength and intrinsic quantum yield dependence of the energy transfer to the nanosphere. As evidenced from the literature, the energy transfer process between the quantum system and the nanosphere can have a complicated distance dependence, with a r{sup −6} regime, characteristic of the Förster energy transfer mechanism, but also exhibiting other distance dependences. In the case of a donor-acceptor pair of quantum systems in the presence of a gold nanosphere, when the donor couples strongly to the nanosphere, acting as an enhanced dipole; the donor-acceptor energy transfer rate then follows a Förster trend, with an increased Förster radius. The coupling of the acceptor to the nanosphere has a different distance dependence. The angular dependence of the energy transfer efficiency between donor and acceptor exhibits a strong focusing effect and the same enhanced donor-dipole character in different angular arrangements. The spectral overlap of the donor emission and acceptor absorption spectra shows that the energy transfer follows the near-field scattering efficiency, with a red-shift from the localized surface plasmon peak for small sphere sizes.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2016

In-situ realtime monitoring of nanoscale gold electroplating using micro-electro-mechanical systems liquid cell operating in transmission electron microscopy

The dynamics of nanoscale electroplating between gold electrodes was investigated using a microfabricated liquid cell mounted on a scanning transmission electron microscope. The electroplating was recorded in-situ for 10 min with a spatial resolution higher than 6 nm. At the beginning of the electroplating, gold spike-like structures of about 50 nm in size grew from an electrode, connected gold nanoclusters around them, and form three dimensional nanoscale structures. We visualized the elementary process of the gold electroplating, and believe that the results lead to the deeper understanding of electroplating at the nanoscale.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2016

Gold-Copper alloy “nano-dumplings” with tunable compositions and plasmonic properties

The unique yet tunable optical properties of plasmonic metal nanoparticles have made them attractive targets for a wide range of applications including nanophotonics, molecular sensing, catalysis etc. Such diverse applications that require precisely stable / reproducible plasmonic properties depend sensitively on the particle morphology ie. the shape, size and constituents. Herein, we systematically study the size / shape controlled synthesis of gold-copper “dumpling” shaped alloy nanoparticles by simultaneous reduction of gold and copper salts in the PVP-methanol solute-solvent system, by effectively utilizing the efficient but mild reduction as well as capping abilities of Poly (N-vinylpyrrolidone). Introduction of copper salts not only yielded the alloy nanoparticles, but also slowed down the growth process to maintain high mono-dispersity of the new shapes evolved. Copper and gold has different lattice constants (0.361 and 0.408 nm respectively) and hence doping/addition/replacement of copper atoms to gold FCC unit cell introduces strain into the lattice which is key parameter to the shape evolution in anisotropic nanoparticles. Synthesized alloy nanoparticles were characterized by UV-visible absorption spectroscopy, XRD and TEM imaging.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2016

Femtosecond laser generated gold nanoparticles and their plasmonic properties

The pulsed laser ablation in liquid medium is now commonly used to generate stable colloidal nanoparticles (NPs) in absence of any chemical additives or stabilizer with diverse applications. In this paper, we report generation of gold NPs (Au NPs) by ultra-short laser pulses. Femtosecond (fs) laser radiation (λ = 800 nm) has been used to ablate a gold target in pure de-ionized water to produce gold colloids with smallsize distribution. The average size of the particles can be further controlled by subjecting to laser-induced post-irradiation providing a versatile physical method of size-selected gold nanoparticles. The optical extinction and morphological dimensions were investigated with UV-Vis spectroscopy and Transmission Electron Microscopy measurements, respectively. Finite difference time domain (FDTD) method is employed to calculate localized surface plasmon (LSPR) wavelength and the near-field generated by Au NPs and their hybrids.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2016

The Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in National Ignition Facility hohlraums as a source of gold-gas mixing

Highly resolved radiation-hydrodynamics FCI2 simulations have been performed to model laser experiments on the National Ignition Facility. In these experiments, cylindrical gas-filled hohlraums with gold walls are driven by a 20 ns laser pulse. For the first time, simulations show the appearance of Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) vortices at the interface between the expanding wall material and the gas fill. In this paper, we determine the mechanisms which generate this instability: the increase of the gas pressure around the expanding gold plasma leads to the aggregation of an over-dense gold layer simultaneously with shear flows. At the surface of this layer, all the conditions are met for a KH instability to grow. Later on, as the interface decelerates, the Rayleigh-Taylor instability also comes into play. A potential scenario for the generation of a mixing zone at the gold-gas interface due to the KH instability is presented. Our estimates of the Reynolds number and the plasma diffusion width at the interface support the possibility of such a mix. The key role of the first nanosecond of the laser pulse in the instability occurrence is also underlined.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2016

Twinning in fcc lattice creates low-coordinated catalytically active sites in porous gold

We describe a new mechanism for creation of catalytically active sites in porous gold. Samples of porous gold prepared by de-alloying Al{sub 2}Au exhibit a clear correlation between the catalytic reactivity towards CO oxidation and structural defects in the fcc lattice of Au. We have found that on the stepped (211) surfaces quite common twin boundary defects in the bulk structure of porous gold can form long close-packed rows of atoms with the coordination number CN = 6. DFT calculations confirm that on these low-coordinated Au sites dioxygen chemisorbs and CO oxidation can proceed via the Langmuir–Hinshelwood mechanism with the activation energy of 37 kJ/mol or via the CO–OO intermediate with the energy barrier of 19 kJ/mol. The existence of the twins in porous gold is stabilized by the surface energy.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2015

Comparison of 20 nm silver nanoparticles synthesized with and without a gold core. Structure, dissolution in cell culture media, and biological impact on macrophages

Widespread use of silver nanoparticles raises questions of environmental impact and toxicity. Both silver particles and silver ions formed by particle dissolution may impact biological systems. Therefore it is important to understand the characteristics of silver nanoparticles and their stability in relevant media. The synthesis route can impact physical and chemical characteristics of the particles and we report the characterization and solution stability of three types of silver nanoparticles (20 nm particles with and without gold cores and 110 nm particles with gold cores) in cell culture media with serum proteins: FBS10%/RPMI. These nanoparticles were synthesized in aqueous solution and characterized using both in situ and ex situ analysis methods. Dissolution studies were carried at particle concentrations from 1 µg/ml to 50 µg/ml. Particles with gold cores had smaller crystallite size and higher apparent solubility than pure silver particles. A dissolution model was found to describe the time variation of particle size and amount of dissolved silver for particle loadings above 9 µg/ml. An effective solubility product obtained from fitting the data was higher for the 20 nm gold core particles in comparison to the pure silver or 110 nm particles. Dissolution of the nanoparticles was enhanced by presence of serum proteins contained in fetal bovine serum. In addition, the protocol of the dispersion in the medium was found to influence particle agglomeration and dissolution. Results show that particle structure can impact the concentration of dissolved silver and the dose to which cells would be exposed during in vitro studies.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2014

SU-E-J-246: A Deformation-Field Map Based Liver 4D CBCT Reconstruction Method Using Gold Nanoparticles as Constraints

Purpose: To investigate the feasibility of using nanoparticle markers to validate liver tumor motion together with a deformation field map-based four dimensional (4D) cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) reconstruction method. Methods: A technique for lung 4D-CBCT reconstruction has been previously developed using a deformation field map (DFM)-based strategy. In this method, each phase of the 4D-CBCT is considered as a deformation of a prior CT volume. The DFM is solved by a motion modeling and free-form deformation (MM-FD) technique, using a data fidelity constraint and the deformation energy minimization. For liver imaging, there is low contrast of a liver tumor in on-board projections. A validation of liver tumor motion using implanted gold nanoparticles, along with the MM-FD deformation technique is implemented to reconstruct onboard 4D CBCT liver radiotherapy images. These nanoparticles were placed around the liver tumor to reflect the tumor positions in both CT simulation and on-board image acquisition. When reconstructing each phase of the 4D-CBCT, the migrations of the gold nanoparticles act as a constraint to regularize the deformation field, along with the data fidelity and the energy minimization constraints. In this study, multiple tumor diameters and positions were simulated within the liver for on-board 4D-CBCT imaging. The on-board 4D-CBCT reconstructed by the proposed method was compared with the “ground truth” image. Results: The preliminary data, which uses reconstruction for lung radiotherapy suggests that the advanced reconstruction algorithm including the gold nanoparticle constraint will Resultin volume percentage differences (VPD) between lesions in reconstructed images by MM-FD and “ground truth” on-board images of 11.5% (± 9.4%) and a center of mass shift of 1.3 mm (± 1.3 mm) for liver radiotherapy. Conclusion: The advanced MM-FD technique enforcing the additional constraints from gold nanoparticles, results in improved accuracy for reconstructing on-board 4D-CBCT of liver tumor. Varian medical systems research grant.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2014

Moving metal artifact reduction in cone-beam CT scans with implanted cylindrical gold markers

Purpose: Implanted gold markers for image-guided radiotherapy lead to streaking artifacts in cone-beam CT (CBCT) scans. Several methods for metal artifact reduction (MAR) have been published, but they all fail in scans with large motion. Here the authors propose and investigate a method for automatic moving metal artifact reduction (MMAR) in CBCT scans with cylindrical gold markers. Methods: The MMAR CBCT reconstruction method has six steps. (1) Automatic segmentation of the cylindrical markers in the CBCT projections. (2) Removal of each marker in the projections by replacing the pixels within a masked area with interpolated values. (3) Reconstruction of a marker-free CBCT volume from the manipulated CBCT projections. (4) Reconstruction of a standard CBCT volume with metal artifacts from the original CBCT projections. (5) Estimation of the three-dimensional (3D) trajectory during CBCT acquisition for each marker based on the segmentation in Step 1, and identification of the smallest ellipsoidal volume that encompasses 95% of the visited 3D positions. (6) Generation of the final MMAR CBCT reconstruction from the marker-free CBCT volume of Step 3 by replacing the voxels in the 95% ellipsoid with the corresponding voxels of the standard CBCT volume of Step 4. The MMAR reconstruction was performed retrospectively using a half-fan CBCT scan for 29 consecutive stereotactic body radiation therapy patients with 2–3 gold markers implanted in the liver. The metal artifacts of the MMAR reconstructions were scored and compared with a standard MAR reconstruction by counting the streaks and by calculating the standard deviation of the Hounsfield units in a region around each marker. Results: The markers were found with the same autosegmentation settings in 27 CBCT scans, while two scans needed slightly changed settings to find all markers automatically in Step 1 of the MMAR method. MMAR resulted in 15 scans with no streaking artifacts, 11 scans with 1–4 streaks, and 3 scans with severe streaking artifacts. The corresponding numbers for MAR were 8 (no streaks), 1 (1–4 streaks), and 20 (severe streaking artifacts). The MMAR method was superior to MAR in scans with more than 8 mm 3D marker motion and comparable to MAR for scans with less than 8 mm motion. In addition, the MMAR method was tested on a 4D CBCT reconstruction for which it worked equally well as for the 3D case. The markers in the 4D case had very low motion blur. Conclusions: An automatic method for MMAR in CBCT scans was proposed and shown to effectively remove almost all streaking artifacts in a large set of clinical CBCT scans with implanted gold markers in the liver. Residual streaking artifacts observed in three CBCT scans may be removed with better marker segmentation.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2016

Gold Nanoparticle Microwave Synthesis

At the nanometer scale, numerous compounds display different properties than those found in bulk material that can prove useful in areas such as medicinal chemistry. Gold nanoparticles, for example, display promise in newly developed hyperthermia therapies for cancer treatment. Currently, gold nanoparticle synthesis is performed via the hot injection technique which has large variability in final particle size and a longer reaction time. One underdeveloped area by which these particles could be produced is through microwave synthesis. To initiate heating, microwaves agitate polar molecules creating a vibration that gives off the heat energy needed. Previous studies have used microwaves for gold nanoparticle synthesis; however, polar solvents were used that partially absorbed incident microwaves, leading to partial thermal heating of the sample rather than taking full advantage of the microwave to solely heat the gold nanoparticle precursors in a non-polar solution. Through this project, microwaves were utilized as the sole heat source, and non-polar solvents were used to explore the effects of microwave heating only as pertains to the precursor material. Our findings show that the use of non-polar solvents allows for more rapid heating as compared to polar solvents, and a reduction in reaction time from 10 minutes to 1 minute; this maximizes the efficiency of the reaction, and allows for reproducibility in the size/shape of the fabricated nanoparticles.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2023

Visible to NIR‐II Photoluminescence of Atomically Precise Gold Nanoclusters

Abstract Atomically precise gold nanoclusters (NCs) have emerged as a new class of precision materials and attracted wide interest in recent years. One of the unique properties of such nanoclusters pertains to their photoluminescence (PL), for it can widely span visible to near‐infrared–I and –II wavelengths (NIR‐I/II), and even beyond 1700 nm by manipulating the size, structure, and composition. The current research efforts focus on the structure–PL correlation and the development of strategies for raising the PL quantum yields, which is nontrivial when moving from the visible to the near‐infrared wavelengths, especially in the NIR–II regions. This review summarizes the recent progress in the field, including i) the types of PL observed in gold NCs such as fluorescence, phosphorescence, and thermally activated delayed fluorescence, as well as dual emission; ii) some effective strategies that are devised to improve the PL quantum yield (QY) of gold NCs, such as heterometal doping, surface rigidification, and core phonon engineering, with double‐digit QYs for the NIR PL on the horizons; and iii) the applications of luminescent gold NCs in bioimaging, photosensitization, and optoelectronics. Finally, the remaining challenges and opportunities for future research are highlighted.

Liu, Zhongyu↗