Energy Loss Measurements Research Articles

On the principle of reciprocity in inelastic electron scattering.

In electron microscopy the principle of reciprocity is often used to imply time reversal symmetry. While this is true for elastic scattering, its applicability to inelastic scattering is less well established. From the second law of thermodynamics, the entropy for a thermally isolated system must be constant for any reversible process. Using entropy and statistical fluctuation arguments, it is shown that, while reversibility is possible at the microscopic level, it becomes statistically less likely for higher energy transfers. The implications for reciprocal imaging modes, including energy loss and energy gain measurements, as well as Kainuma's reciprocal wave model are also discussed.

Microstructural and mechanical properties of TiN/CrN and TiSiN/CrN multilayer coatings deposited in an industrial-scale HiPIMS system: Effect of the Si incorporation

Surface engineering through the deposition of advanced coatings, particularly multilayer coatings has gained significant interest for enhancing the performance of coated parts. The incorporation of Si into TiN coatings has shown promise for improving hardness, oxidation resistance, and thermal stability, while high-power impulse magnetron sputtering (HiPIMS) has emerged as a technique to deposit coatings with exceptional properties. However, TiN/CrN and TiSiN/CrN coatings deposited by HiPIMS remain relatively unexplored. In this study, different TiN/CrN and TiSiN/CrN multilayer coatings with different bilayer periods from 5 to 85 nm were deposited using an industrial-scale HiPIMS reactor, and their microstructure and mechanical properties were investigated using advanced characterization techniques. Results revealed successful deposition of smooth and compact coatings with controlled bilayer periods. X-ray diffraction analysis showed separate crystalline phases for coatings with high bilayer periods, while those with smaller bilayer periods exhibited peak-overlapping and superlattice overtones, especially for the TiN/CrN coatings. Epitaxial grain growth was confirmed by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM). HRTEM and electron energy-loss spectroscopy measurements confirmed Si incorporation into the TiN crystal lattice of TiSiN/CrN coatings reducing the crystallinity, especially for coatings with smaller bilayer periods. Nanoindentation tests revealed that coatings with a bilayer period of 15–20 nm displayed the highest hardness values regardless of the composition. The mechanical properties of the TiSiN/CrN coatings showed no improvement over those of the TiN/CrN coatings, attributed to the Si induced amorphization of the Ti(Si)N phase and the absence of SiNx phase segregation within the TiN nanocrystals in these coatings. These findings provide valuable insights into the microstructure and mechanical properties of TiN/CrN and TiSiN/CrN multilayer coatings deposited by HiPIMS in an industrial scale reactor, paving the way for their application in various industrial sectors.

Experimental and calculated electronic stopping force determination of 24Cr, 28Ni and 22Ti ions crossing PVC and Mylar foils in the ion energy domain of LSS theory

Energy loss measurements for heavy ions (28Ni,24Cr and 22Ti) crossing thin polymeric foil such as PVC and Mylar in the energy range 0.1–0.3 MeV/n have been carried out utilizing the 6MV Tandem accelerator facility at iThemba-labs in Johannesburg (South Africa). These measurements deduced experimental stopping force data have been compared with those calculated using Lindhard, Scharff and Schiott formulation (LSS) and SRIM-2013 predictions. A large significant deviation has been observed between experimental values and those calculated by LSS formula. Based on physical postulate, we have developed a reasonably simple semi-empirical formula that takes in to account a mean residual projectile charge Z1¯ and suitable ξe factor which depend on Z1 and Z2. This new modified LSS formula has been tested and the calculated stopping force values generated by this formula are in close agreement with the measured ones.

Crystallographic Dependence of Field Evaporation Energy Barrier in Metals Using Field Evaporation Energy Loss Spectroscopy Mapping.

Atom probe tomography data are composed of a list of coordinates of the reconstructed atoms in the probed volume. The elemental identity of each atom is derived from time-of-flight mass spectrometry, with no local chemical information readily available. In this study, we use a data processing technique referred to as field evaporation energy loss spectroscopy (FEELS), which analyzes the tails of mass peaks. FEELS was used to extract critical energetic parameters that are related to the activation energy for atoms to escape from the surface under intense electrostatic field and dependent of the path followed by the departing atoms. We focused our study on pure face-centered cubic metals. We demonstrate that the energetic parameters can be mapped in two-dimensional with nanometric resolution. A dependence on the considered crystallographic planes is observed, with sets of planes of low Miller indices showing a lower sensitivity to the field. The temperature is also an important parameter in particular for aluminum, which we attribute to an energetic transition between two paths of field evaporation between 25 and 60 K close to (002) pole. This paper shows that the information that can be retrieved from the measured energy loss of surface atoms is important both experimentally and theoretically.

Optical, thermal, and electrical characteristics of cashew gum/Polypyrrole/zinc oxide nanocomposites for next‐gen optoelectronics

AbstractIn this electronic era, there is a demand to switch from conventional polymers to conducting biopolymers. We developed conducting biopolymer nanocomposites of cashew gum (CG) and polypyrrole (PPy) with zinc oxide (ZnO) nanofillers [CG/PPy/ZnO] via in‐situ oxidative polymerization using a sustainable solvent. These nanocomposites were characterized using Fourier‐transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), UV–visible spectroscopy, field emission scanning electron microscope (FE‐SEM), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). The FTIR signal at 855 cm−1 confirms the successful inclusion of ZnO nanofillers into the biopolymer. UV–vis absorption of the blend nanocomposite increases with the nanoparticle doses. Among the various blend nanocomposites, the least bandgap energy was observed for 7 wt% ZnO loading. FE‐SEM revealed homogeneous dispersion of ZnO nanofillers in the CG/PPy blend at 7 wt% ZnO. TGA and DSC demonstrated that the CG/PPy/ZnO nanocomposites have better thermal stability and glass transition temperature than the pure polymer blend, indicating enhanced thermal properties. The CG/PPy/7 wt% ZnO showed the highest conductivity, 4.62 times greater than the pristine blend at 100 Hz. Dielectric constant, activation energy, AC conductivity and dielectric loss measurements demonstrated that the nanocomposites outperformed the pure polymer blend. Complex impedance analysis revealed increased impedance with rising temperature. Overall, CG/PPy/ZnO nanocomposites exhibit superior optical, morphological, thermal, electrical, and dielectric properties, making them promising for energy storage and optoelectronic applications.Highlights Ecofriendly synthesis of CG/PPy/ZnO nanocomposites Enhancement in optical, structural, and thermal properties of CG/PPy/ZnO Dielectric properties and temperature‐dependent AC conductivity are summarized. Blend nanocomposite shows higher AC conductivity and dielectric constant CG/PPy/ZnO nanocomposites are suitable for energy storage applications

Towards ion stopping power experiments with the laser-driven LIGHT beamline

The main emphasis of the Laser Ion Generation, Handling and Transport (LIGHT) beamline at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH are phase-space manipulations of laser-generated ion beams. In recent years, the LIGHT collaboration has successfully generated and focused intense proton bunches with an energy of 8 MeV and a temporal duration shorter than 1 ns (FWHM). An interesting area of application that exploits the short ion bunch properties of LIGHT is the study of ion-stopping power in plasmas, a key process in inertial confinement fusion for understanding energy deposition in dense plasmas. The most challenging regime is found when the projectile velocity closely approaches the thermal plasma electron velocity ( $v_{i}\approx v_{e,\text {th}}$ ), for which existing theories show high discrepancies. Since conclusive experimental data are scarce in this regime, we plan to conduct experiments on laser-generated plasma probed with ions generated with LIGHT at a higher temporal resolution than previously achievable. The high temporal resolution is important because the parameters of laser-generated plasmas are changing on the nanosecond time scale. To meet this goal, our recent studies have dealt with ions of lower kinetic energies. In 2021, laser accelerated carbon ions were transported with two solenoids and focused temporally with LIGHT's radio frequency cavity. A bunch length of 1.2 ns (FWHM) at an energy of 0.6 MeV u $^{-1}$ was achieved. In 2022, protons with an energy of 0.6 MeV were transported and temporally compressed to a bunch length of 0.8 ns. The proton beam was used to measure the energy loss in a cold foil. Both the ion and proton beams will also be employed for energy loss measurements in a plasma target.

Generation of entangled waveguided photon pairs by free electrons.

Entangled photons are a key resource in quantum technologies. While intense laser light propagating in nonlinear crystals is conventionally used to generate entangled photons, such schemes have low efficiency due to the weak nonlinear response of known materials and losses associated with in/out photon coupling. Here, we show how to generate entangled polariton pairs directly within optical waveguides using free electrons. The measured energy loss of undeflected electrons heralds the production of counter-propagating polariton pairs entangled in energy and emission direction. For illustration, we study the excitation of plasmon polaritons in metal strip waveguides that strongly enhance light-matter interactions, rendering two-plasmon generation dominant over single-plasmon excitation. We demonstrate that electron energy losses detected within optimal frequency ranges can reliably signal the generation of plasmon pairs entangled in energy and momentum. Our proposed scheme is directly applicable to other types of optical waveguides for in situ generation of entangled photon pairs.

Signal shapes in multiwire proportional chamber-based TPCs

A large-volume Time Projection Chamber (TPC) is the main tracking and particle identification (PID) detector of the ALICE experiment at the CERN LHC. PID in the TPC is performed via specific energy-loss measurements (dE/dx), which are derived from the average pulse-height distribution of ionization generated by charged-particle tracks traversing the TPC volume. During Runs 1 and 2, until 2018, the gas amplification stage was based on multiwire proportional chambers (MWPC). Signals from the MWPC show characteristic long negative tails after an initial positive peak due to the long ion drift times in the MWPC amplification region. This so-called ion tail can lead to a significant amplitude loss in subsequently measured signals, especially in the high-multiplicity environment of high-energy Pb-Pb collisions, which results in a degradation of the dE/dx resolution. A detailed study of the signal shapes measured with the ALICE TPC with the Ne-CO2 (90-10) and Ar-CO2 (90-10) gas mixtures is presented, and the results are compared with three-dimensional Garfield simulations. The impact of the ion tail on the PID performance is studied employing the ALICE simulation framework and the feasibility of an offline correction procedure to account for the ion tail is demonstrated.

Does arginine aggregate formation in aqueous solutions follow a two-step mechanism?

The formation of aggregates was studied in arginine aqueous solutions using light scattering. The main driving force for aggregate formation is hydrogen bonding between the arginine (Arg) amino acids, which is partially verified using density functional theory calculations. The measurement of energy loss during this process, coupled with Cryo-EM morphology data, indicates that these aggregates are in the solid state. The aggregation occurs in two steps, with a liquid intermediate stage. The investigation of the effect of pH and solute concentration on aggregate formation for other amino acid aqueous solutions verifies that aggregate formation is amino-acid specific, while small-sized clusters formed by weak interactions lead to large-sized aggregation. The water structure around amino acid molecules sheds light on the prediction of their aggregate formation. Homochirality is observed in the aggregates; its existence sheds light on the origin of protein homochirality.

Regional biomechanical characterization of the spinal cord tissue: dynamic mechanical response.

Characterizing the dynamic mechanical properties of spinal cord tissue is deemed important for developing a comprehensive knowledge of the mechanisms underlying spinal cord injury. However, complex viscoelastic properties are vastly underexplored due to the spinal cord shows heterogeneous properties. To investigate regional differences in the biomechanical properties of spinal cord, we provide a mechanical characterization method (i.e., dynamic mechanical analysis) that facilitates robust measurement of spinal cord ex vivo, at small deformations, in the dynamic regimes. Load-unload cycles were applied to the tissue surface at sinusoidal frequencies of 0.05, 0.10, 0.50 and 1.00Hz ex vivo within 2h post mortem. We report the main response features (e.g., nonlinearities, rate dependencies, hysteresis and conditioning) of spinal cord tissue dependent on anatomical origin, and quantify the viscoelastic properties through the measurement of peak force, moduli, and hysteresis and energy loss. For all three anatomical areas (cervical, thoracic, and lumbar spinal cord tissues), the compound, storage, and loss moduli responded similarly to increasing strain rates. Notably, the complex modulus values of ex vivo spinal cord tissue rose nonlinearly with rising test frequency. Additionally, at every strain rate, it was shown that the tissue in the thoracic spinal cord was significantly more rigid than the tissue in the cervical or lumbar spinal cord, with compound modulus values roughly 1.5-times that of the lumbar region. At strain rates between 0.05 and 0.50Hz, tan δ values for thoracic (that is, 0.26, 0.25, 0.06, respectively) and lumbar (that is, 0.27, 0.25, 0.07, respectively) spinal cord regions were similar, respectively, which were higher than cervical (that is, 0.21, 0.21, 0.04, respectively) region. The conditioning effects tend to be greater at relative higher deformation rates. Interestingly, no marked difference of conditioning ratios is observed among all three anatomical regions, regardless of loading rate. These findings lay a foundation for further comparison between healthy and diseased spinal cord to the future development of spinal cord scaffold and helps to advance our knowledge of neuroscience.

Diagnosis of bound electron density by measuring energy loss of proton beam in partially ionized plasma target

Partially ionized plasma contains the bound electrons, which have an effect on the instability of the plasma. The evolution process of bound electron density cannot be obtained by using the existing optical method used for diagnosing the free electron density. In this work, we carry out a high-precision experiment: the energy loss of a 100 keV proton beam penetrating through the partially ionized hydrogen plasma target is measured on the platform of ion beam-plasma interaction at the Institute of Modern Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. The bound electron density is obtained according to the energy loss model of Bethe theory. The free electron density is measured by laser interferometry and the electron tempercture is obtained from the measured spectrum (<i>T</i><sub>e</sub> = 0.68 eV; <i>n</i><sub>fe</sub> = 2.41×10<sup>17</sup> cm<sup>–2</sup>). It is found that the bound electron density decreases during plasma lifetime. The diagnosis of bound electron density by measuring energy loss of ion beam has the advantages of on-line, in-situ and high resolution, thus providing a new way to solve the problem about measuring the bound electron density in partially ionized plasma. A COMSOL simulation reveals that the high-temperature free electrons will be ejected quickly out of the plasma area through a mechanical diaphragm, thus reducing the total number of free electrons. In order to maintain a relatively high degree of ionization in this plasma, in principle, more and more bound electrons are ionized into free electrons, the density of bound electrons decreases correspondingly. The simulation result accords well with our experimental data. Based on this finding, more detailed plasma target parameter is obtained, which is helpful in deepening the understanding of the interaction process between ion beam and plasma. In future, more researches of low low-energy highly-charged ions-plasma interaction will be conducted.

Abstract 19104: Hemodynamic Analysis of Pulmonary Artery for Congenital Right-Side Heart Disease in Adulthood by 4d-Flow MRI

Introduction: Using 4D-flow MRI, we evaluated hemodynamics in the pulmonary artery of congenital right-side heart disease in adulthood. Hypothesis: We hypothesize that 4D flow MRI may be used to assess pulmonary artery flow hemodynamics in adults with congenital right heart disease. Methods: In 20 adults, we measured energy loss (EL) and helicity of the main pulmonary artery (MPA) by cardiovascular MRI. The maximum value (peak EL) in one heartbeat and the total value were obtained for EL. Helicity was defined as a vector quantity, with clockwise rotation being positive and counterclockwise rotation being negative, and the total value was calculated. Results: The mean age was 27.9 years. The cases included 15 cases of postoperative tetralogy of Fallot without pulmonary arterial hypertension (TOF) and 5 cases of congenital heart diseases with pulmonary arterial hypertension (CHD-PAH). Peak EL, time to peak EL, and total helicity were higher in the CHD-PAH group than TOF group. Peak EL values were significantly higher during systole but were observed during diastole in 8 patients (40%). The combined mean value of helicity was positive, with clockwise predominance in 12 cases (60%). A strong correlation was found between peak EL and clockwise helicity (r=0.68) and counterclockwise helicity (r=-0.73). In addition, a correlation was observed between diastolic EL/BSA and diastolic clockwise helicity (r=0.51) and diastolic counterclockwise helicity (r=-0.52). A correlation was also observed with the pulmonary regurgitant fraction (r=0.49). Conclusions: In this study, helicity in the MPA was dominant clockwise in congenital right-side heart disease in adulthood. It was suggested that EL was involved in helicity throughout the entire cardiac cycle and that peak EL had a particularly large effect.

Ionoacoustic monitoring of relativistic heavy ion beams

The performance of ionoacoustic detectors is investigated with respect to application of high-precision range and energy loss measurements for relativistic heavy ions. The technique is based on the generation of a pressure wave when a microsecond-pulsed relativistic ion beam is stopped in a water container. The acoustic signal from individual ion pulses is registered by a piezoelectric detector and analyzed in the time/frequency domain to identify the location of pressure wave generation. The experiments were performed at the SIS18 synchrotron at GSI Helmholtzzentrum (Darmstadt, Germany) with Xe, Pb and U ions of energies between 200 MeV/u and 1 GeV/u. We show that the signal amplitude of the acoustic pressure pulse has a linear correlation with the beam intensity within a range of at least 104 to 109 particles/spill.By determining the delay time of the primary and reflected acoustic signal in the water reservoir, the ionoacoustic technique provides information on ion ranges of 1 % accuracy. By an energy-range calibration in combination with a simulation code such as FLUKA, the range data can be used to determine the beam energy. As demonstrated, inserting targets of known thickness in front of the detector is a simple approach for measuring the energy loss of relativistic ions. The advantage of the ionoacoustic technique is the rather simple experimental setup, the huge dynamic range, the information available online by means of only a single pulse and its radiation hardness. Ionoacoustic detectors have great potential as intensity and energy monitor for short-pulsed light and heavy ion beams at existing or future high-energy ion facilities.

Thoracic Aortic Aneurysm Risk Assessment: A Machine Learning Approach

BackgroundTraditional methods of risk assessment for thoracic aortic aneurysm (TAA) based on aneurysm size alone have been called into question as being unreliable in predicting complications. Biomechanical function of aortic tissue may be a better predictor of risk, but it is difficult to determine in vivo. ObjectivesThis study investigates using a machine learning (ML) model as a correlative measure of energy loss, a measure of TAA biomechanical function. MethodsBiaxial tensile testing was performed on resected TAA tissue collected from patients undergoing surgery. The energy loss of the tissue was calculated and used as the representative output. Input parameters were collected from clinical assessments including observations from medical scans and genetic paneling. Four ML algorithms including Gaussian process regression were trained in Matlab. ResultsA total of 158 patients were considered (mean age 62 years, range 22-89 years, 78% male), including 11 healthy controls. The mean ascending aortic diameter was 47 ± 10 mm, with 46% having a bicuspid aortic valve. The best-performing model was found to give a greater correlative measure to energy loss (R2 = 0.63) than the surprisingly poor performance of aortic diameter (R2 = 0.26) and indexed aortic size (R2 = 0.32). An echocardiogram-derived stiffness metric was investigated on a smaller subcohort of 67 patients as an additional input, improving the correlative performance from R2 = 0.46 to R2 = 0.62. ConclusionsA preliminary set of models demonstrated the ability of a ML algorithm to improve prediction of the mechanical function of TAA tissue. This model can use clinical data to provide additional information for risk stratification.

Results on light (anti)hypernuclei production with ALICE at the LHC

The high collision energies reached at the LHC lead to significant production yields of light (anti)hypernuclei in proton–proton (pp), proton–lead (p–Pb) and, in particular, Pb–Pb collisions. The lightest known hypernucleus is the hypertriton, which is a bound state of a proton, a neutron, and a Λ hyperon. It decays weakly with a decay length of a few centimeters. The excellent tracking and particle identification capabilities of the ALICE detector, exploiting the energy loss measurement of the Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and using the Inner Tracking System (ITS) to distinguish between primary and secondary (decay) vertices, allow for the determination of the hypertriton yield across different collision systems, its lifetime, and its binding energy. The latest hypertriton lifetime measurement in Pb–Pb collisions performed in the 2-body decay channel will be presented. This measurement contributes to the solution of the hypertriton lifetime puzzle. In addition, the hypertriton production in different collision systems and at different energies will be compared to model predictions. Due to its low binding energy, and hence to its large size, the hypertriton is the ideal candidate to distinguish between statistical hadronization and coalescence models. With the precision of the presented yield measurements some variants of the aforementioned models can be excluded.

Energy Loss Measurements on the Limiter of the Gas Dynamic Trap

A discrepancy between the energy input into the plasma and the energy lost through the measured loss channels is observed in the Gas Dynamic Trap (GDT): while 2-3 megawatts of power are captured by the plasma from the neutral beams, the observed energy losses do not exceed hundreds of kilowatts. In this study, a proposal was investigated that a part of the input energy is lost on the limiters of the GDT. The proposal was based on numerical modelling results that predict an existence near the limiter of a peak of power transferred to the plasma via fast ion drag. The experimental results showed that the energy losses on the limiter are too small to explain the energy balance discrepancy and further investigations of large loss channels are required.

Bubble dynamics in a pressure gradient with reentrant jet break through and energy loss

The dynamics of a bubble in a pressure gradient is investigated experimentally and numerically with particular emphasis on the behavior at reentrant jet impact and break through the opposite side of the bubble with corresponding energy loss and vorticity generation. High speed photography observations of a bubble generated by electric spark energy deposit in a low ambient pressure tank are coupled with wavelet based Optical Flow Velocimetry (wOFV) and Boundary Element Method (BEM) numerical analysis to examine the flow field resulting from the reentrant jet formation and break through. We study, as an illustration, the effects of the constant pressure gradient due to gravity on the bubble dynamics. Energy losses between the first and second cycle are measured for the bubbles generated under various conditions characterized by a non-dimensional pressure gradient parameter, and the corresponding measured energy loss is used in the numerical simulations. Good correspondence is seen between the image analysis, the wOFV computations, and the BEM results and insight is gained on the involved physics.

Measuring energy loss of alpha particles in hydrogen gas

The goal of this work is to measure the rate of energy loss (stopping power) of alpha particles emitted from 241Am source as it passes through hydrogen gas which have been investigated using surface barrier detector in vacuum chamber. It was found that the loss energy of alpha particles in hydrogen gas decreases linearly with the increase in the pressure between 0 and 1 bar. The measured value of the range and stopping power were compared with SRIM code and ICRU. The predicted values based on the experimental, SRIM code and ICRU show good agreement with for stopping power and rang of alpha particle.

Geophysical Characterization and Attenuation Correction Applied for Hydrate Bearing Sediments in Japan Sea

Estimation of rock properties from seismic data is important for exploration and production activities in the petroleum industry. Considering the compressional velocity—the speed of propagating body waves in formations—and the quality factor (Q)—a measure of the frequency-selective energy losses of waves propagating through formations—both properties are usually estimated from multichannel seismic data. Velocity is estimated during multichannel processing of seismic reflection data in either the time or depth domain. In marine seismic acquisition, Q can be estimated from the following sources: Vertical Seismic Profile (VSP) surveys, where sources are located near the sea surface and geophones are distributed at depth along a borehole; and multichannel reflection data, where sources are also located near the sea surface and receivers are distributed either at the sea surface (conventional seismic survey with streamers) or on the sea floor (use of nodes or Ocean Bottom Cables (OBC)). The aforementioned acquisition devices, VSP, conventional streamers, nodes, and OBCs are much more expensive than single-channel acquisition with one receiver per shot due to the cost of operation. There are numerous old and new datasets from academia and the oil industry that have been acquired with single-channel acquisition devices. However, there is a paucity of work addressing the estimation of velocity and Q from this type of equipment. We investigate the estimation of Q and velocity from single-channel seismic data. Using the windowed discrete Fourier transform for a single seismic trace, we calculate the peak and dominant frequency that changes with time. In the geologic environment, higher frequencies are attenuated at shallow depths (time), while lower frequencies remain at deeper positions. From the rate at which higher frequencies are attenuated with time, we estimate the effective quality factor (Qeff). However, when using Kirchhoff migration to process single-channel seismic data, events far from the vertical projection of the receiver contribute to the trace at a given time. Then, an underestimation of the effective quality factor occurs. To compensate for the effects of more distant events with lower-frequency content contaminating the shorter events, we propose a linear equation to correct the effective quality factor estimated from migrated seismic data. Effective Q and its correction are estimated in five single-channel seismic lines surveyed along the Joetsu Knoll, a SW-NE anticline structure on the eastern margin of the Sea of Japan. These results are linked to geomorphological and geological features and the velocity field. Joetsu Knoll is a known site of massive gas hydrates (GH), which occur in the first hundred metres of Neogene sediments and, together with gas chimneys, play an important role in seismic wave absorption. Qeff estimated from migrated seismic data maintains the spatial relationship between high and low Q regions. The region of low Q, which is below 124 and has an average value of 57, occurs near the anticlinal hinge and tends to coincide with the region in which the Bottom Simulating Reflector (BSR) resides. The coexistence of GH and free gas coincides with the very low P velocity gradient of 0.225 s−1. BSR occurrence, Qeff and the geometry of the Joetsu anticline testify to progressive gas hydrate depletion northward along the dome.

Two-Dimensional Violet Phosphorus P11: A Large Band Gap Phosphorus Allotrope.

The discovery of novel large band gap two-dimensional (2D) materials with good stability and high carrier mobility will innovate the next generation of electronics and optoelectronics. A new allotrope of 2D violet phosphorus P11 was synthesized via a salt flux method in the presence of bismuth. Millimeter-sized crystals of violet-P11 were collected after removing the salt flux with DI water. From single-crystal X-ray diffraction, the crystal structure of violet-P11 was determined to be in the monoclinic space group C2/c (no. 15) with unit cell parameters of a = 9.166(6) Å, b = 9.121(6) Å, c = 21.803(14)Å, β = 97.638(17)°, and a unit cell volume of 1807(2) Å3. The structure differences between violet-P11, violet-P21, and fibrous-P21 are discussed. The violet-P11 crystals can be mechanically exfoliated down to a few layers (∼6 nm). Photoluminescence and Raman measurements reveal the thickness-dependent nature of violet-P11, and exfoliated violet-P11 flakes were stable in ambient air for at least 1 h, exhibiting moderate ambient stability. The bulk violet-P11 crystals exhibit excellent stability, being stable in ambient air for many days. The optical band gap of violet-P11 bulk crystals is 2.0(1) eV measured by UV-Vis and electron energy-loss spectroscopy measurements, in agreement with density functional theory calculations which predict that violet-P11 is a direct band gap semiconductor with band gaps of 1.8 and 1.9 eV for bulk and monolayer, respectively, and with a high carrier mobility. This band gap is the largest among the known single-element 2D layered bulk crystals and thus attractive for various optoelectronic devices.