Non-contact Mode Research Articles

Direct Imaging of Space Charges Around the Interface between Solid Electrolyte and Electrode of Solid-State Batteries

Solid-state batteries (SSBs) are a major focus for next-generation energy storage that is safe and has high energy density. In recent years, ion conductivity of solid-state electrolytes (SSEs) has developed to a level comparable to liquid electrolytes. However, great challenges are encountered at SSE/electrode interfaces when integrating the SSE into SSB cells. In addition to stability of the interface, which has been discussed extensively in the literature, a space-charge region around the electrode/SSE interface should exist and it can significantly affect Li-ion transport cross the interface [1]. Fermi-level alignment requires an ion charge transfer across the interface between the ion conductors that build an electric field around the interface. This space-charge region has been proposed theoretically,1 but direct measurement of the electric field or electrical potential has not been reported. On the other hand, the electric field in the semiconductor space-charge region has been studied extensively and directly measured and imaged; furthermore, the charge depletion and extension of the electric field into the semiconductor bulk have all been well documented. In fact, operations of many semiconductor micro-devices rely on the non-Ohmic current-voltage (I-V) characteristic across the space-charge region. And this makes the fundamental study and engineering of the semiconductor space charge among the farthestIn this contribution, we report on direct quantitative imaging of electrical potential on the space-charge region around the interface between Li6PS5Cl (LPSC) SSE and a NiMnCoO (NMC) cathode (Fig. 1a). We achieved this nm-scale, two-dimensional measurement by Kelvin probe force microscopy[2] (KPFM) imaging on the cross-section of a LPSC/NMC half-cell. KPFM is based on the non-contact mode of an atomic force microscope (AFM) setup in an Ar glove box. It maps the electrical potential of a sample surface in ~30-nm spatial resolution and ~10-mV voltage sensitivity. In our in-house KPFM setup, we used the second resonant oscillation of the cantilever to enhance the voltage sensitivity. To image the space charges, a well-defined SSE/electrode interface is needed. However, the sideview of the as-made LPSC/NMC half-cell by cold-pressing does not show a well-defined interface, and the surface of the sideview is rough for KPFM imaging. We polished the cross-section by ion-milling and via air-free sample transfer and polishing, and we obtained a well-defined interface exposed on the flat cross-sectional surface.The KPFM results show that the potential increased from the SSE side to the NMC side across the interface (Fig. 1b); this increase is due to the Li cation transferred from the SSE to NMC sides as well as the anion leveraged on the SSE side. This charge transfer is driven by the electrochemical potential difference of the Li ion in the two materials—in contrast to semiconductors, where the electronic charge transfer is driven by both the electronic band misalignment and charge-carrier concentrations at both sides of the interface. The potential is nonuniformly distributed, with 300‒500-mV variations in amplitude and 1‒2-μm variations in distance (Fig. 1c), indicating the nonuniformly distributed Li cations and anions. The nonuniform charge distribution can be caused by local chemical and structural defects and disorders such as grain boundaries, extended plane and line defects, and more. A simple estimate of the charge density is D=εε0V/d=2.3x10-9 C/cm2=1.5x108/cm2, with the assumptions that the potential is increased simply by an electrical double layer, the potential V = 400 mV, the dielectric constant ε=10, and the inter-distance of the double layer d=1.5 μm . This charge density corresponds to 3.3 charges per million (106) unit cells with a unit cell size of 1.5×1.5 nm2.This electrical potential of 300‒500 mV can significantly impede Li-ion transport from the SSE to the cathode during charging, and it should be mitigated. Dividing the potential difference between the two end-materials by engineering the interface (such as inserting a gradient layer) can be a promising approach, and it can also prevent interfacial chemical degradations. Interfacial engineering can effectively facilitate charge transport across the back contact of photovoltaic devices [3]. Further potential imaging on the engineered interfaces and degraded interfaces by cycling could lead to better understanding the interfacial electrical behavior. Our direct nm-scale potential imaging opens up a novel characterization technique for developing next-generation solid-state batteries. References Haruyama, K. Sodeyama, L. Han, K. Takeda, and Y. Tateyama, Chem. Mater. 26, 4248 (2014).C-S. Jiang et al., Nature Communications 6, 8397 (2015).Song, A. Moore, and J.R. Sites, IEEE J. Photovoltaics 8 , 293 (2018). Figure 1

Tunable current duration in triboelectric generators via capacitive air gaps

SummaryDespite the low cost, high power, and wide application areas, impact‐type triboelectric generators exhibit limited applicability due to the extremely short current duration, on the order of a millisecond. The high power, short lasting current peak not only results in reduced time‐averaged power output but also acts as triboelectric shock to the accompanying circuits, quickly degrading the usability of the generator. Here, we demonstrate tunable triboelectric current duration via controlling the air gap capacitance inserted between the two dielectric plates. In typical contact‐type triboelectric generator with nylon/air gap/Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) multilayers, decreasing the vertical speed of the dielectric plates from 0.5 cm/s to 0.05 cm/s result in increased current duration from 0.10 second to 0.81 second. The increased peak duration accompanies decreased peak current, resulting in the optimal charge density of 0.163 nC/cm2 at the vertical speed of 0.25 cm/s. Changing the air gap capacitance in noncontact mode or the relative permittivity in dielectric layers also results in similar change in peak duration. To explain the tunable current duration, an equivalent circuit model is constructed via serially connected capacitors and numerical solutions reproduce the trends in current duration associated with change in air gap capacitance. This study provides significant implications toward further optimizing triboelectric generators, in terms of optimal triboelectric charge density, accompanying circuit lifetime and broadened applicability.

Photogating-Induced Controlled Electrical Response in 2D Black Phosphorus

Photo-induced tunability in charge carriers can be proven as a promising alternative approach to traditional electrostatic gating because of its flexibility to operate in noncontact mode. We have established a reversibly tunable optical gating technique on a few-layer black phosphorus (BP) flake by shining a laser beam, with variation in incident power and energy. The laser power-dependent evolution of Raman spectra of the BP flake is compared with the effect of conventional electrostatic gating. The comparison shows identical linear redshift in characteristic vibrational modes; thereby, a correlation between the laser power and induced charge carrier density is established. The transfer characteristics of BP field effect transistor (FET) under varying laser power validate the optical tunability of the gating effect and demonstrate identical variation in charge carrier density, found in conventional back-gated BP FET.

Investigations on laser actuation and life cycle characteristics of NiTi shape memory alloy bimorph for non-contact functional applications

A laser source was used as non-contact mode of heating to actuate NiTi/kapton polyimide shape memory alloy (SMA) bimorph. The bimorph was fabricated by depositing NiTi thin film over Kapton polyimide sheet of dimension 5 × 2 cm2 using thermal evaporation. The laser parameters such as laser power, scanning speed and number of passes were optimized to ensure actuation without damaging the bimorph. The actuation was carried out at laser powers and scanning speeds of 14 to 16 W and 13–16 mm/s respectively. The displacement of SMA bimorph was found to increase with increase in laser power whereas it decreases with increase in scanning speeds. At lower laser power, the scanning speeds have influenced the actuation behavior to larger extent. Notably at the laser power of 14 W, the influence of scanning speed was significant and registered 53 % reduction in displacement with increase in scanning speeds from 13 mm/s to 16 mm/s. A minimum and maximum displacement of 0.35 mm and 3.8 mm was obtained during laser actuation of bimorph. The temperature experienced during laser actuation has been simulated using COMSOL Multiphysics and corroborated with the actuation behavior of the SMA bimorph. The displacement range and the actuation speed of laser actuation were found to be higher than the conventional electrical actuation. Furthermore, the life cycle analysis has been performed up to 100 laser passes and the phenomenon for reduction in displacement has been discussed in detail. Laser actuation of SMA bimorph could be utilized in thermal switches, adaptive optics and remote actuation of SMA elements etc.

Flexible Fringe Effect Capacitive Sensors with Simultaneous High‐Performance Contact and Non‐Contact Sensing Capabilities

To mimic human touch sensing, robotics must be able to leverage multiple sensory inputs. Previously, to achieve both proximity and pressure sensing, most approaches have required using two separate sensors, each with their corresponding electronics, limiting the achievable density. More recently, sensors with multifunctional pressure and proximity capabilities have been realized at the cost of compromised pressure sensing. Presented here is a new design for a multifunctional interdigitated fringe field capacitive pressure sensor with a pyramid microstructured dielectric layer that has proximity‐sensing capabilities (noncontact mode) while also sensing pressure (contact mode) as strongly as an equivalent parallel plate capacitive sensor of the same size. In contact mode, both sensors have a response time of less than 20 ms and can respond to loads lighter than 0.5 Pa. Further, the interdigitated fringe field sensor can clearly distinguish between the two sensing modes, as well as between conductive and nonconductive materials in the noncontact mode. Finally, we use the interdigitated fringe field sensor to demonstrate both proximity and high‐sensitivity pressure sensing on a robotic gripper.

Combined acoustic-convective drying of plant products

The paper presents the design of drying plants that combine convective drying with ultrasonic exposure. To create ultrasonic vibrations, ultrasonic emitters in the form of bending-vibrating discs with a diameter of 205 mm and 104 mm were used. Peas and vegetables were the objects of drying. As a result of the experiments, it was found. Drying with the help of ultrasonic action together with the thermal one proceeds no less than in 45% faster in comparison with the drying without ultrasonic action. During the drying of peas using the acoustic field, the drying time was reduced by 210 minutes (45%). The use of powerful ultrasonic action in a non-contact mode on dried carrot samples made it possible to reduce the drying time by 300 minutes, which is 47%. The acoustic method of drying allowed to reduce the drying time of potatoes by 300 minutes (45%).

Modeling of non-contact atomic force microscope with two-term excitations

The goal of this article is to study the dynamical behavior of atomic force microscope cantilever in its non-contact mode of operation. The lumped parameter model is used to construct the mathematical model of the cantilever. The tip of the cantilever is excited by two harmonic terms and is in interaction with the sample surface. The Van der Waals force, tip-sample interaction force, makes the system nonlinear. Using multiple scales method, the frequency response equation is found. The effects on the amplitude of excitations, the damping coefficient, and initial sample – tip distance is studied and presented as the results.

Improving maximal safe brain tumor resection with photoacoustic remote sensing microscopy

Malignant brain tumors are among the deadliest neoplasms with the lowest survival rates of any cancer type. In considering surgical tumor resection, suboptimal extent of resection is linked to poor clinical outcomes and lower overall survival rates. Currently available tools for intraoperative histopathological assessment require an average of 20 min processing and are of limited diagnostic quality for guiding surgeries. Consequently, there is an unaddressed need for a rapid imaging technique to guide maximal resection of brain tumors. Working towards this goal, presented here is an all optical non-contact label-free reflection mode photoacoustic remote sensing (PARS) microscope. By using a tunable excitation laser, PARS takes advantage of the endogenous optical absorption peaks of DNA and cytoplasm to achieve virtual contrast analogous to standard hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining. In conjunction, a fast 266 nm excitation is used to generate large grossing scans and rapidly assess small fields in real-time with hematoxylin-like contrast. Images obtained using this technique show comparable quality and contrast to the current standard for histopathological assessment of brain tissues. Using the proposed method, rapid, high-throughput, histological-like imaging was achieved in unstained brain tissues, indicating PARS’ utility for intraoperative guidance to improve extent of surgical resection.

Development of Magnetic Torque Stimulation (MTS) Utilizing Rotating Uniform Magnetic Field for Mechanical Activation of Cardiac Cells

Regulation of cell signaling through physical stimulation is an emerging topic in biomedicine. Background: While recent advances in biophysical technologies show capabilities for spatiotemporal stimulation, interfacing those tools with biological systems for intact signal transfer and noncontact stimulation remains challenging. Here, we describe the use of a magnetic torque stimulation (MTS) system combined with engineered magnetic particles to apply forces on the surface of individual cells. MTS utilizes an externally rotating magnetic field to induce a spin on magnetic particles and generate torsional force to stimulate mechanotransduction pathways in two types of human heart cells—cardiomyocytes and cardiac fibroblasts. Methods: The MTS system operates in a noncontact mode with two magnets separated (60 mm) from each other and generates a torque of up to 15 pN µm across the entire area of a 35-mm cell culture dish. The MTS system can mechanically stimulate both types of human heart cells, inducing maturation and hypertrophy. Results: Our findings show that application of the MTS system under hypoxic conditions induces not only nuclear localization of mechanoresponsive YAP proteins in human heart cells but also overexpression of hypertrophy markers, including β-myosin heavy chain (βMHC), cardiotrophin-1 (CT-1), microRNA-21 (miR-21), and transforming growth factor beta-1 (TGFβ-1). Conclusions: These results have important implications for the applicability of the MTS system to diverse in vitro studies that require remote and noninvasive mechanical regulation.

Advanced triboelectric nanogenerator with multi-mode energy harvesting and anti-impact properties for smart glove and wearable e-textile

Environmental hazardous stimuli including strong electromagnetic field and impact force were always harmful to human beings. Developing functional triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) with universally harvesting various energy and anti-impact effect may be an effective strategy to collect energy as well as protect human beings from danger. Thus, a miniaturized all-in-one TENG with high structural durability, anti-impact and multi-mode harvesting energy from compression, swaying and magnetic field was developed by assembling shear thickening fluid (STF) and magneto-sensitive films. TENG yielded maximum power density of 27.05 mW/m 2 with the voltage of 10.40 V at 10 MΩ under compression. It also sensed and collected tiny STF flowing energy under non-contact mode. Besides, high magnetic-sensitive effect endowed TENG with magnetic dependent programmable shapes which enabled it to harvest non-contact rubbing/deformation energy. More importantly, the device with STF exhibited high anti-impact properties which could resist and dissipate harsh collision force from 1390 N to 409 N, demonstrating excellent safeguarding properties for TENG and human wearers. This versatile device also showed reliable sensing properties to various external magnetic field, human motions, contacted materials and impact forces. In addition, a wearable TENG-based smart glove as a self-powered functional sensor presented the ability of precisely mapping finger joints. Finally, newly-designed Kevlar/TENG-based e-textile arrays with 95% impact-force dissipating and multi-fields display performance was proposed. Thus, this work opened a new perspective for the development of functional TENGs as wearable electronic devices in universally energy-scavenging and safeguarding areas. Multifunctional and miniaturized triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) with multi-mode energy harvesting and anti-impact properties has been proposed. It effectively gathers energy from compression, swaying and magnetic field. A TENG based-human hand array enables to precisely mapping various finger gestures. Besides, the wearable Kevlar/TENG pads could sense and dissipate 95% impact force which provide protection for human beings. • An all-in-one TENG with energy collecting and safeguarding effects has been constructed. • TENG could harvest compression, magnetic-induced deformation and fluid rubbing energy. • TENG-based wearable glove monitored human motions and distinguish contacted materials. • Kevlar/TENG array dissipated impact force by 95%, providing safeguarding for humans.

Intra-pulpal temperature evaluation during diode laser (445 nm) irradiation for treatment of dentine hypersensitivity: in vitro a pilot study

The current study aimed to evaluate the temperature rise in the dental pulp during treatment of dentin with 445-nm diode laser. Ten single-rooted human premolar teeth were randomly enumerated into 1 to 10. Teeth were embedded in a resin block, and a thermocouple was inserted into the pulp chamber. Cervical third of the crown were irradiated with 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, and 3 W at time of irradiation of 10, 15, 30, and 60 s (CW, Non-contact mode), while immersed in a 37 °C thermal bath. The maximum mean temperature rise in the dental pulp was 10.6 °C achieved after irradiation with 3 W for 60 s and the lowest temperature increase achieved was 0.3 °C with 1 W for 10 s. Using the 445-nm diode laser, 0.2–1 W, CW up to 60 s; 1.5 W, CW up to 15 s; 2 W, CW, 10 s; and 2.5 W,CW, 10 s are considered biologically safe parameters for the dental pulp during dentine hypersensitivity treatment.

An Ultrasonic Tweezer With Multiple Manipulation Functions Based on the Double-Parabolic-Reflector Wave-Guided High-Power Ultrasonic Transducer.

The development of ultrasonic tweezers with multiple manipulation functions is challenging. In this work, multiple advanced manipulation functions are implemented for a single-probe-type ultrasonic tweezer with the double-parabolic-reflector wave-guided high-power ultrasonic transducer (DPLUS). Due to strong high-frequency (1.49 MHz) linear vibration at the manipulation probe's tip, which is excited by the DPLUS, the ultrasonic tweezer can capture microobjects in a noncontact mode and transport them freely above the substrate. The captured microobjects that adhere to the probe's tip in the low-frequency (154.4 kHz) working mode can be released by tuning the working frequency. The results of the finite-element method analyses indicate that the manipulations are caused by the acoustic radiation force.

Biodegradation mechanism of arsenopyrite mine tailing with Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans and influence of ferric supplements

Microbial mobilization of arsenopyrite minerals under oxic conditions are well known; however, little is known about how the metals can be mobilized through biodegradation of mine tailings. Therefore, the role of inoculated Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans on the mobility of arsenic and iron was examined for a sample of South Korean mine tailing. Two modes of interactions (i) direct contact, and (ii) non-contact were examined along with the monitoring of Eh-pH values and cell density. Direct contact of Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans could mobilize metal ions more efficiently than the non-contact mode of interaction albeit revealed that the overall interaction was governed by a co-operative mechanism. A direct-contact biotic study resulted in the higher mobilization of arsenic (~69%) than the non-contact biotic system (~44%), but the maximum mobilization (~80%) could be achieved with 6 g/L ferric supplement to the direct-contact system. The ferric-improved mobilization was higher up to seven days from the starting time, thereafter, the surface passivation [KFe3(SO4)2(OH)6 and S0] sieged the mobilization progress. Finally, the interaction mechanism proposed in this study suggests that the storage with intact coating on tailings can limit the microbial degradation to prevent arsenic mobilization to the environment.

3D touchless multiorder reflection structural color sensing display.

The development of a lightweight, low-power, user-interactive three-dimensional (3D) touchless display in which a human stimulus can be detected and simultaneously visualized in noncontact mode is of great interest. Here, we present a user-interactive 3D touchless sensing display based on multiorder reflection structural colors (SCs) of a thin, solid-state block copolymer (BCP) photonic crystal (PC). Full-visible-range SCs are developed in a BCP PC consisting of alternating lamellae, one of which contains a chemically cross-linked, interpenetrated hydrogel network. The absorption of a nonvolatile ionic liquid into the domains of the interpenetrated network allows for further manipulation of SC by using multiple-order photonic reflections, giving rise to unprecedented visible SCs arising from reflective color mixing. Furthermore, by using a hygroscopic ionic liquid ink, a printable 3D touchless interactive display is created where 3D position of a human finger is efficiently visualized in different SCs as a function of finger-to-display distance.

The effect of liquid medium on vibration and control of the AFM piezoelectric microcantilever.

This article investigates the vibration motion and control of the piezoelectric microcantilever (MC) of the atomic force microscope in the amplitude mode in a liquid environment for both free and forced vibrations. The modeled MC includes two electrode layers, a piezoelectric layer, and the geometric discontinuities as a result of these layers and the change in the MC cross section at the probe-MC contact point is modeled. The equations of motion are derived using Hamilton's principle and then discretized with the aid of the finite element method. The system frequency and time response in the free vibration mode when placed in a liquid medium are compared with experimental results. Also, the sample surface topography in the noncontact mode, when passing through the surface roughness, has been modeled as rectangular and wedge-shaped. Furthermore, the control of piezoelectric MC in two cases of near and far from the sample surface is examined. In the case of far from the surface, the system is controlled using the piezoelectric layer installed on the beam, whereas in the case of near the surface, the piezo is turned off due to the existence of nonlinear forces such as Van der Waals and Derjaguin, Muller, and Toporov contact forces and the control is achieved through the base excitation. For system control modeling, the robust fuzzy sliding mode control (FSMC) approach is utilized and the results are compared with those of the simple sliding mode control (SMC) as well as proportional, integral, and derivative control. The presented FSMC approach can remarkably reduce the chattering phenomenon at the SMC input in the liquid medium and accordingly improve the results compared to the other two methods.

Pyroelectric Tweezers for Handling Liquid Unit Volumes

Liquids are the primary environments in which chemical, physical, and biological processes occur. Considering a liquid bridge as liquid unit volume (LUV) element, it is highly desirable to develop reliable tools for handling such volumes. Herein, a sort of intelligent microfluidic platform based on the pyroelectric‐electrohydrodynamics (EHD) is shown for manipulating liquid bridges and thus performing multiple functions in a flexible and simple way. Several basic operations with liquid bridges using an EHD‐pin matrix based on the pyroelectric effect engineered in ferroelectric crystals are demonstrated. By activating pyro‐EHD effect in predetermined positions (pins of the array), the locomotion and handling of single or multiple LUVs simultaneously are controlled. In particular, multiple operations such as lift, displacement, mixing, stretching, and carrying vector for microparticles, are shown. These tweezers based on a pyro‐EHD matrix can open the route for a multipurpose platform driven by physical intelligence and can be used for driving locomotion and operate manifolds functionalities in many areas of science and technology at microscale as well as nanoscale with advantages to be activated by the sole thermal stimulus, controlled remotely, and in noncontact mode.

Data-Driven Decision-Support System for Speaker Identification Using E-Vector System

Recently, biometric authorizations using fingerprint, voiceprint, and facial features have garnered considerable attention from the public with the development of recognition techniques and popularization of the smartphone. Among such biometrics, voiceprint has a personal identity as high as that of fingerprint and also uses a noncontact mode to recognize similar faces. Speech signal-processing is one of the keys to accuracy in voice recognition. Most voice-identification systems still employ the mel-scale frequency cepstrum coefficient (MFCC) as the key vocal feature. The quality and accuracy of the MFCC are dependent on the prepared phrase, which belongs to text-dependent speaker identification. In contrast, several new features, such as d-vector, provide a black-box process in vocal feature learning. To address these aspects, a novel data-driven approach for vocal feature extraction based on a decision-support system (DSS) is proposed in this study. Each speech signal can be transformed into a vector representing the vocal features using this DSS. The establishment of this DSS involves three steps: (i) voice data preprocessing, (ii) hierarchical cluster analysis for the inverse discrete cosine transform cepstrum coefficient, and (iii) learning the E-vector through minimization of the Euclidean metric. We compare experiments to verify the E-vectors extracted by this DSS with other vocal features measures and apply them to both text-dependent and text-independent datasets. In the experiments containing one utterance of each speaker, the average accuracy of the E-vector is improved by approximately 1.5% over the MFCC. In the experiments containing multiple utterances of each speaker, the average micro-F1 score of the E-vector is also improved by approximately 2.1% over the MFCC. The results of the E-vector show remarkable advantages when applied to both the Texas Instruments/Massachusetts Institute of Technology corpus and LibriSpeech corpus. These improvements of the E-vector contribute to the capabilities of speaker identification and also enhance its usability for more real-world identification tasks.

Endoscopic Multimodal Approach to the Treatment of Airway Venous Malformations.

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Active fault tolerant control for high-precision positioning of a non-contact mode uncertain atomic force microscopy

A non-contact mode atomic force microscope with chaotic dynamics may exposed to unknown faults, disturbances or uncertain parameters that are not always be compensated using classical control methods. Therefore, a fault tolerant controller must be designed for accurate tracking of the tip-position of the end-effector. In this paper, first, an unscented Kalman filter is designed for joint estimation of the states and parameters for an atomic force microscopy under process noise. The velocity of the end-effector, sample height and unknown fault are simultaneously estimated by measuring the tip position of randomly excited microscopy. Second, unscented Kalman filtering based model predictive controller is proposed for the accurate tracking of the tip-position. To prevent the disadvantage of the model-based controller design, an uncertainty or unknown fault function of the system is estimated by unscented Kalman filter such that the unmodeled dynamics of the system are compensated while the control signal is produced. Note that the controller voltage being applied to the microscopy is produced based on the estimated states and parameters of the atomic force microscopy. The numerical applications present that satisfactory tracking performance for tip position is obtained by the proposed fault tolerant controller such that extended Kalman filtering-based tracking results are also compared and discussed.

Activation of CuAlNi SMAs using a solar energy

"Shape memory alloys are special materials that can perform mechanical work during martensitic transformation. CuAlNi shape memory alloys have gained attention based on them high transformation temperatures domain and can be considered as HTSMAs (high temperature shape memory alloys). The thermal component in order to achieve martensitic transformation can be obtained from sun using a solar concentrator. The heating/cooling process was registered and analyzed during the experiments. Material surface was analyzed before and after thermal shocks by microstructure point of view using scanning electron microscopy (SEM VegaTescan LMH II, SE detector) and atomic force microscopy (AFM EasyScan II, non-contact mode). The experiments follow the material behavior during fast heating and propose the possibility of activating smart materials using the sun heat for aerospace applications. "