Anti-corrosion and electrically conductive inorganic conversion coatings based on aligned graphene derivatives by electrodeposition

Ultrathin conversion coatings, made from aligned graphene derivatives and ammonium zirconium carbonate(AZC), were fabricated on stainless steel by electrodeposition. Sulfonated graphene oxide (SGO) provided electronpathways and physical barriers to corrosive molecules. Electrodeposition ensured the alignment of SGO and thefacile fabrication of the coatings. AZC is an environmental-friendly crosslinking agent, water-repellent andcorrosion inhibitor. Upon dehydration reactions, AZC improved the cohesion between SGO layers and anchoredthe conversion coatings on metal substrates. When the mass ratio of SGO to AZC was 2:1, the corrosion currentdensity of the composite coatings reached 0.098 μA cm^(-2), while that of the bared stainless steel was1.04 μA cm ^(-2), given a coating thickness of only 500 nm. The electrical conductivity of SGO/AZC compositecoatings can be tailored from 3.84 × 10^(-5) to 2.28×10^(-3)S‧cm^(-1) by heat treatment and HI reduction, whichsatisfied the electrical conductivity requirement of wide applications in electronic industry, office appliances andpetroleum storage.

Assessing current stocks and future sequestration potential of forest biomass carbon in Daqing Mountain Nature Reserve of Inner Mongolia, China

Assessment of regional forest carbon stocks and underlying controls is critical for guiding forest management in the context of carbon sequestration. We investigated the variations in tree biomass carbon stocks relating to forest types, and estimated the total tree biomass carbon stocks and projected gains through natural stand development by 2020 and 2050 in the Daqing Mountain Nature Reserve based on Category II data of the Forest Inventory of Inner Mongolia for the period ending 2008. Over a total area of 388,577 ha,this nature reserve currently stores an estimated 2221 Gg C in tree aboveground biomass alone, with potential to grow by more than 30 % to reach 2938 Gg C by 2020 and nearly double to 4092 Gg C by 2050 through natural development of the existing forest stands. The tree biomass carbon density and potential gain in tree biomass carbon stocks vary markedly among forest types and with stand development.The variations in the potential change of tree biomass carbon density for the periods 2008–2020 and 2008–2050 among forest types partly reflect the varying relationships of tree biomass carbon density with stand age for different tree species, and partly are attributable to variations in the stand age structure among different forest types. Of the major forest types, the ranking of projected changes in tree biomass carbon density are not consistent with variations in the relationship between tree biomass carbon density and stand age, neither are they explainable by variations in stand age structures, implying the interactive effect between forest type and stand dynamics on temporal changes in tree biomass carbon density. Birch rank highest for future biomass carbon sequestration because of its dominance in cover area and better age structure for potential gain in tree biomass carbon stocks. Poplar and larch were out-performers compared to other forest types given their greater contribution to total tree biomass carbon stocks relative to their distributional areas. Findings in this study illustrate that protection and proper management of under-aged forests can deliver marked gains in biomass carbon sequestration. This is of great importance to policy-makers as well as to scientific communities in seeking effective solutions for adaptive forest management and mitigation of anthropogenic greenhouse gases emissions using forest ecosystems.

Light polarization and color from guided‐mode resonance filter

The characteristics of reflected light of a 1-D guided-mode resonance filter(GMRF)are studied in this paper.A triple-layer GMRF is designed by using the finite difference time domain method under non-polarized light illumination.Numerical results show that the reflectance spectra of TE and TM polarizations can be changed by altering the fill factor f of the GMRF.Moreover,by calculating the color of the reflected light with the chromaticity theory,we find that the color of reflected light becomes pure when f is 0.9.The results show that the color and polarization degree of the reflected light of a GMRF are tunable by altering the fill factor.