Thermally insulating and fire-retardant bio-mimic structural composites with a negative Poisson's ratio for battery protection

Battery safety has attracted considerable attention worldwide due to the rapid development of wearable electronics and the steady increase in the production and use of electric vehicles.As battery failures are often associated with mechanical-thermal coupled behaviors,protective shielding materials with excellent mechanical robustness and flame-retardant properties are highly desired to mitigate thermal runaway.However,most of the thermal insulating materials are not strong enough to protect batteries from mechanical abuse,which is one of the most critical scenarios with catastrophic consequences.Here,inspired by wood,we have developed an effective approach to engineer a hierarchical nanocomposite via self-assembly of calcium silicate hydrate and polyvinyl alcohol polymer chains(referred as CSH wood).The versatile protective material CSH wood demonstrates an unprecedented combination of light weight(0.018 g cm-3),high stiffness(204 MPa in the axial direction),negative Poisson's ratio(-0.15),remarkable toughness(6.67×105 J m-3),superior thermal insulation(0.0204 W m-1 K-1 in the radial direction),and excellent fire retardancy(UL94-V0).When applied as a protective cover or a protective layer within battery packages,the tough CSH wood can resist high-impact load and block heat diffusion to block or delay the spread of fire,therefore significantly reducing the risk of property damage or bodily injuries caused by battery explosions.This work provides new pathways for fabricating advanced thermal insulating materials with large scalability and demonstrates great potential for the protection of electronic devices.

Ferromagnetic barrier-induced negative differential conductance on the surface of a topological insulator

The effect of the negative differential conductance of a ferromagnetic barrier on the surface of a topological insulat（ is theoretically investigated. Due to the changes of the shape and position of the Fermi surfaces in the ferromagnetic barrie the transport processes can be divided into three kinds： the total, partial, and blockade transmission mechanisms. The bias voltage can give rise to the transition of the transport processes from partial to blockade transmission mechanisms, which results in a considerable effect of negative differential conductance. With appropriate structural parameters, the currenl voltage characteristics show that the minimum value of the current can reach to zero in a wide range of the bias voltag and then a large peak-to-valley current ratio can be obtained.

Current loss of magnetically insulated coaxial diode with cathode negative ion

Current loss without an obvious impedance collapse in the magnetically insulated coaxial diode （MICD） is studied through experiment and particle-in-cell （PIC） simulation when the guiding magnetic field is strong enough. Cathode nega- tive ions are clarified to be the predominant reason for it. Theoretical analysis and simulation both indicate that the velocity of the negative ion reaches up to 1 cm/ns due to the space potential between the anode and cathode gap （A-C gap）. Accord- ingly, instead of the reverse current loss and the parasitic current loss, the negative ion loss appears during the whole pulse. The negative ion current loss is determined by its ionization production rate. It increases with diode voltage increasing. The smaller space charge effect caused by the beam thickening and the weaker radial restriction both promote the negative ion production under a lower magnetic field. Therefore, as the magnetic field increases, the current loss gradually decreases until the beam thickening nearly stops.

Negative Resistance Region 10 nm Gate Length on FINFET

In this paper the physical characteristics of FINFET (fin-field effect transistor) transistor behavior are investigated. For the analysis, semi-classical electron transfer method was used based on drift diffusion approximation by TCAD (Tiber CAD) software. Simulations show that the output resistance of FINFET along very small gate (gate length and fin height of 50 nm) is negative. The negative resistance is used in oscillators.

Electron Correlation in High Temperature Cuprates

Electron correlation plays a key role in high-temperature cuprate superconductors. Material-parameter dependence of cuprates is important to clarify the mechanism of high temperature superconductivity. In this study, we examine the ground state of the three-band Hubbard model (d-p model) that explicitly includes oxygen p orbitals. We consider the half-filled case with the large on-site Coulomb repulsion Ud by using the variational Monte Carlo method. The ground state is insulating when Ud is large at half-filling. The ground state undergoes a transition from a metal to a Mott insulator when the level difference εp-εd is increased.

A Band Theory Perspective on Molecular Orbitals in Complex Oxides

In view of the growing interest in molecular orbitals (MOs) encountered in certain complex oxides, we review some of their properties from the band theory perspective and provide detailed examples based on real materials. Our discussion includes some technical aspects of identifying MOs in electronic structure calculations and considers cases when MOs can be both orthogonal and non-orthogonal. We also describe orthonormalization of MOs, a procedure converting them into Wannier functions, and discuss the problem of Wannier functions possibly being rather spatially extended and how using MO, rather than atomic orbital, based effective Hamiltonians might be a better choice in describing certain strongly correlated systems as well as systems with strong electron-phonon coupling. Furthermore, we address the problem of strongly correlated MOs and how it can be treated in band theory calculations.

Magnetically Controlled Electronic Transport Properties of a Ferromagnetic Junction on the Surface of a Topological Insulator

We have investigated the transport properties of the Dirac fermions through a ferromagnetic barrier junction on the surface of a strong topologicM insulator. The current-voltage characteristic curve and the tunneling conductance are calculated theoretically. Two interesting transport features are predicted： observable negative differential conductances and linear conductances tunable from unit to nearly zero. These features can be magnetically manipulated simply by changing the spacial orientation of the magnetization. Our results may contribute to the development of high-speed switching and functional applications or electricalIy controlled magnetization switching.

Quantum transport in topological semimetals under magnetic fields (Ⅱ)

We review our recent works on the quantum transport, mainly in topological semimetals and also in topological insulators, organized according to the strength of the magnetic field. At weak magnetic fields, we explain the negative magnetoresistance in topological semimetals and topological insulators by using the semiclassical equations of motion with the nontrivial Berry curvature. We show that the negative magnetoresistance can exist without the chiral anomaly. At strong magnetic fields, we establish theories for the quantum oscillations in topological Weyl, Dirac, and nodal-line semimetals. We propose a new mechanism of 3D quantum Hall effect, via the "wormhole" tunneling through the Weyl orbit formed by the Fermi arcs and Weyl nodes in topological semimetals. In the quantum limit at extremely strong magnetic fields, we find that an unexpected Hall resistance reversal can be understood in terms of the Weyl fermion annihilation. Additionally, in parallel magnetic fields, longitudinal resistance dips in the quantum limit can serve as signatures for topological insulators.

Multi-dimensional wave steering with higher-order topological phononic crystal

The recent discovery and realizations of higher-order topological insulators enrich the fundamental studies on topological phases.Here,we report three-dimensional(3D)wave-steering capabilities enabled by topological boundary states at three different orders in a 3D phononic crystal with nontrivial bulk topology originated from the synergy of mirror symmetry of the unit cell and a non-symmorphic glide symmetry of the lattice.The multitude of topological states brings diverse possibilities of wave manipulations.Through judicious engineering of the boundary modes,we experimentally demonstrate two functionalities at different dimensions:2D negative refraction of sound wave enabled by a firstorder topological surface state with negative dispersion,and a 3D acoustic interferometer leveraging on second-order topological hinge states.Our work showcases that topological modes at different orders promise diverse wave steering applications across different dimensions.