Sharif Digital Repository

The spatial scaling law and intermittency of the V2O5 surface roughness has been investigated by atomic force microscopy. The intermittency of the height fluctuations has been checked by two different methods, first, by measuring the scaling exponent of the qth moment of height-difference fluctuations i.e. Cq = <|h(x1) - h(x2)|q>, and second, by defining the generating function Z(q, N) and generalized multi-fractal dimension Dq. These methods predict that there is no intermittency in the height fluctuations. The observed roughness and dynamical exponents can be explained by numerical simulation on the basis of the forced Kuramoto-Sivashinsky equation  

As membrane distillation (MD) is an under-developed separation process, specific membranes for MD applications are not yet commercially available. Therefore, microporous polymeric membranes made of hydrophobic materials fabricated for microfiltration purposes are usually used for MD applications. Characterization of such kind of membranes is important in order to achieve a better in-depth understanding of their performance and to fabricate specific membranes for MD process. One of the emerging characterization methods is atomic force microscopy (AFM) analysis. AFM is a newly developed high-resolution method that is useful for studying the surface topography of various types of membranes, and... 

In this paper, we have successfully deposited Ag-Cu thin films. Nanoscale morphology and nanotexture were studied using atomic force microscopy (AFM) through fractal and stereometric parameters. Additional algorithms have been developed to study new fractal parameters such as surface entropy, fractal succolarity, and fractal lacunarity. The results revealed that as the deposition time increased, films exposed isotropies between ~65 and 82%, which were correlated to the fractal patterns, where from #3 to #5 there were greater spatial complexities. Moreover, surface roughness increased from #1 to #3, which was observed for both Sq and Sa. Similar behavior was exhibited by the other height... 

To investigate the Ta/Co/Cu/Co/NiO/Si(100) spin valve structure, fabrication and characterization of the Cu/Co/NiO/Si(100) system was studied for further understanding the structure. The system was grown by employing combinative DC sputtering-evaporation technique. Nickel oxide with a thickness of about 30 nm was deposited on Si(100) substrate using thermal evaporation technique.The cobalt film, then, with a thickness of about 3 nm was grown by DC sputtering under various applied negative bias voltages ranging from 0 to - 80 V. The optimum bias voltage (Vb = -60 V) for the growth of Co layer was determined by atomic force microscopy (AFM), four-point probe sheet measurement (Rs) and scanning... 

We investigate the Markov property of rough surfaces. Using stochastic analysis, we characterize the complexity of the surface roughness by means of a Fokker-Planck or Langevin equation. The obtained Langevin equation enables us to regenerate surfaces with similar statistical properties compared with the observed morphology by atomic force microscopy. © 2003 The American Physical Society  

In this paper, the atomic-scale interactions between metallic tips and samples in noncontact atomic force microscopy (NC-AFM) are studied using molecular dynamics simulations. The effects of the tip and sample materials, the surface plane direction and the lateral position of the tip with respect to the sample, on the interaction force and the dissipated energy, are investigated. The simulations conducted demonstrate that, generally, we can classify the possible outcomes for the dynamics due to the tip-surface interactions into four major categories. The first category includes all cases in which there are no considerable instabilities in tip-surface interactions, leading to negligible... 

Purpose: The morphological stability of silicon single crystal wafers was investigated, after performing cleaning surface treatments based on moderate temperature annealing and plasma sputtering. Methods: The wafer surfaces were measured by Tapping mode atomic force microscopy in air, before and after the different treatments. The 3D images were segmented by watershed algorithm identifying the local peaks, and the stereometric parameters were extracted thereof. The analysis of variance allowed to better assess the statistically significant differences. Results: All the resulting quantities were critically discussed. It appeared that the different cleaning treatments affected differently the... 

Atomic force microscopy (AFM), as an indispensable tool for nanoscale characterization, presents major drawbacks for operation in a liquid environment arising from the large hydrodynamic drag on the vibrating cantilever. The newly introduced 'Trolling mode' (TR-mode) AFM resolves this complication by using a specialized nanoneedle cantilever that keeps the cantilever outside of the liquid. Herein, a mechanical model with a lumped mass was developed to capture the dynamics of such a cantilever with a nanoneedle tip. This new developed model was applied to investigate the effects of the needle-liquid interface on the performance of the AFM, including the imaging capability in liquid  

The taping mode Atomic Force Microscopic (T-AFM) can be assumed as a cantilever beam which its base is excited by a sinusoidal force and nonlinear potential interaction with sample. Thus the cantilever may cause chaotic behavior which decreases the performance of the sample topography. In order to modeling, using the galerkin method, the PDE equation is reduced to a single ODE equation which properly describing the continuous beam. In this paper a nonlinear delayed feedback control is proposed to control chaos in T-AFM system. Assuming model parameters uncertainties, the first order Unstable Periodic Orbits (UPOs) of the system is stabilized using the sliding nonlinear delayed feedback... 

The fractal study of thin layer films has been concerned by numerous studies, but it is a novel idea to use this method for interpretation of layer formation during electrocrystallization, simultaneously. In present study, Scharifker's equations were derived for instantaneous and progressive nucleation and 3D growth of hemispherical centers under diffusion-controlled condition to calculate in situ change of fractal dimension of surface. It was assumed that the layer could be formed completely when fractal dimension of surface inclined to 2. Moreover, the fractal analysis of AFM images has confirmed the presumed model. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved  

The effect of etching time scale of glass surface on its statistical properties has been studied using atomic force microscopy technique. We have characterized the complexity of the height fluctuation of an etched surface by the stochastic parameters such as intermittency exponents, roughness, roughness exponents, drift and diffusion coefficients and found their widths in terms of the etching time. © 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved  

Anodic aluminium oxide films were fabricated by well known two-step anodizing process in oxalic acid electrolyte. The ordering characteristics (ordered pore domains, average pore diameter size and through-pore arrangement) of anodic aluminium oxide films, obtained in different growth sequences, were identified by microscopic analysis such as ex situ contact-mode atomic force microcopy and scanning electron microscopy. Flattened areas in which some pits are seen mostly cover the electropolished surface of aluminium. Single anodizing of aluminium produces a broad distribution of nanopore size, whereas induces a highly ordered hemispherical pattern, which plays the ordered nucleation sites for... 

This paper is concerned with the effect of axial load, shear deformation and rotary inertia on wave propagation in double-walled carbon nanotubes (DWCNTs) within terahertz range. Our analysis is based on Timoshenko-beam model and Eulerbeam model. The present models predict some terahertz critical frequencies at which the number of wave speeds changes. In these models the amounts of wave speed is unique only when the frequency is below the lowest critical frequency. When the frequency is equal to the lowest critical frequency, there can be one or two (for CNTs of smaller radii) wave speeds. Furthermore, when the frequency is higher than the lowest critical frequency, more than one wave speed...