Sharif Digital Repository

Tetragonal Gd1-xPrxBaSrCu3O 7-δ polycrystalline samples (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.9) have been prepared by the standard solid-state reaction and characterized by XRD. A hump on the ρ(T) curve have been observed at about 80 K for large values of x. The normal state resistivity have been investigated with two and three dimensional variable range hopping (2&3D-VRH) and Coulomb gap (CG). For low concentration of Pr, 2D-VRH is the dominant mechanism, but with the increase of x, 3D-VRH is dominant. The magnetoresistance measurements of the samples have been analysed by the Ambegakor and Halperin (AH) phase slip model. The field dependences of the pinning energy and critical current density have been studied for... 

Based on transport and magnetic measurements on Gd(Ba2-xPr x)Cu3O7+δ, and some other properties of high temperature superconductors (HTSC), we have extracted similarities between superconductors, two-dimensional electron gas (2D-EG) i.e., MOSFETs. These are based on properties such as superconductor-insulator transition in superconductors and metal-insulator transition (MIT) in 2D-EG with doping and magnetic field, localization in transport conduction, quantum unit of resistance at MIT, larger change in resistivity from critical doping to the insulating side in comparison with change from critical doping to the metallic side, and strongly electron-electron coupling. These similarities could... 

We have investigated the Hall measurement of Gd(Ba2-xNdx)Cu3O7+δ with x=0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.15, and 0.2 in a magnetic field of 0-1 T. The nominal samples has been prepared by the conventional solid-state reaction technique. The iodometric titration experiment was carried out for samples. The Rietveld analysis of the X-ray diffraction patterns indicates that samples are mainly single phase. The normal state Hall coefficient behaves as 1/T in all samples. All samples with nominal compositions show single sign reversal with variation of magnetic field and temperature. The Hall resistivity of the samples with x=0 and 0.1 close to the superconducting transition temperature changes its sign with... 

Tetragonal Gd 1-x Pr x BaSrCu 3O 7-δ (GdPr1113) polycrystalline high-temperature superconducting ceramic samples have been synthesized by the standard solid-state reaction process with different calcination and sintering temperatures and characterized by XRD and SEM. The optimum synthesis temperatures for obtaining single phase varied with Pr doping. Higher temperatures were necessary to obtain single phase for x ≥ 0.3. It was found that higher synthesis temperatures improved the electrical characteristics of these materials. The effects of different calcination and sintering temperatures on the anomalous hump in the ρ(T) curves observed at about 80 K is investigated. The percentage of the... 

Ab initio frozen-phonon calculations have been performed for k = 0 A g Raman modes of superconducting GdBa2Cu3O 7 and insulating PrBa2Cu3O7. We have used the generalized gradient approximation full-potential linear augmented plane-wave method in our calculations by Wien2k code. Results have been compared with other computational and experimental data for similar systems. © 2006 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA  

Tetragonal Gd1-xPrxBaCaCu3O 7-δ (0≤x≤1) polycrystalline samples have been prepared by the standard solid-state reaction, and characterized by XRD and SEM. Rietveld analysis on X-ray diffraction pattern shows site mixing between rare earth (R) and Ca. Contrary to Gd1-xPrxBa2Cu 3O7-δ, a hump on the ρ(T) curve is observed at about 80 K. The normal state resistivity has been analyzed by the two and three dimensional variable range hopping (2&3D-VRH) and Coulomb gap. For low concentration of Pr (x<0.5-0.6, corresponding to the metal-insulator transition), 2D-VRH is the dominant mechanism, but with the increase of x, the 3D-VRH is dominant. Substitution of Ba by Ca highly increases the... 

Operation of solid oxide fuel/electrolysis cells (SOFC/SOEC) at high temperatures (T > 850 °C) is accompanied by degradation phenomena, which severely affect the operational lifetime of the cell. Degradation processes are expected to occur slower at low temperatures. However, significant reduction in electrocatalytic activity of the oxygen electrode, is one of the major challenges in decreasing the operating temperature down to 500 °C-650 °C. Recently, Pr6O11 infiltrated Ce0.9Gd0.1O2 (CGO) based electrodes have been proposed to realize high electrochemical performance at intermediate temperature. In this study, Pr-oxide has been infiltrated into a well performing sub-micro... 

Ab initio total energy calculations have been performed for superconducting GdBa2Cu3O7 and insulating PrBa 2Cu3O7 using the full-potential linear augmented plane-wave method in the local density approximation (LDA) and generalized gradient approximation (GGA). The comparison of the calculated unit cell volume and lattice parameters with the experimental data indicates the improvement of these parameters in the GGA relative to LDA. LDA and GGA give the equilibrium unit cell volume about 6% smaller and 1.25% larger than the experimental data, respectively for both systems. Thus frozen phonon calculations have been performed to determine the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the k=0 Ag modes of... 

Granular composite samples of GdBa2Cu3O 7-δ (Gd123), PrBa2Cu3O 7-δ (Pr123), and Pr0.5Ba0.5Ba 2Cu3O7-δ (PrBa123) have been prepared by the solid state reaction technique. The characterization of samples has been done by SEM and XRD measurements. We have investigated the effect of Pr123 and PrBa123 insulating grains on the superconductor-insulator transition and the normal state resistivity of the (1 - n)Gd123-nPr123 and (1 - m)Gd123-mPrBa123 systems. The dominant diffusion of Pr ions onto the neighboring Gd123 grains in (1 - n)Gd123-nPr123 causes high rate of suppression of superconductivity similar to the chemical-doped GdPr123 system. For (1 - m)Gd123-mPrBal23 system, the suppression rate... 

Tetragonal Gd1-xPrxBaSrCu3O 7-δ (0 ≤ x ≤ 1) polycrystalline samples have been prepared by the standard solid-state reaction, and characterized by XRD and SEM. Resistance measurements and XRD patterns show site mixing between rare earth R and Sr is less than R and Ca. Contrary to Gd1-xPrxBa 2Cu3O7-δ, a hump on the ρ(T) curve is observed at about 80 K. Based on the resistivity measurements, the effect of Pr substitution in the 1113 structure, in comparison with the 123 structure, on the increase of pseudogap temperature is investigated. The normal state resistivity has been analyzed by the two and three dimensional variable range hopping (2D-VRH and 3D-VRH) and Coulomb gap. For the low... 

Based on transport and magnetic measurements on Gd(Ba2-xPrx)Cu3O7+δ, and some other properties of high temperature superconductors (HTSC), we have extracted similarities between superconductors, two-dimensional electron gas (2D-EG) i.e. MOSFETs and ultrathin films of conventional superconductors. These are based on properties such as superconductor-insulator transition in superconductors and metal-insulator transition (MIT) in 2D-EG with doping and magnetic field, localization in transport conduction, quantum unit of resistance at MIT, larger change in resistance from critical doping to the insulating side in comparison with change from critical doping to the metallic side and strong... 

Hydrothermal and in-situ polymerization methods were used to successfully fabricate a pompon flower-like CoGd0.5Fe1.5O4 (CG) as a magnetic component and a cauliflower-like poly(indole-co-Py) (PP) co-polymer as a dielectric component for microwave absorption. The physico-chemical properties of CG/PP samples were determined via XPS, XRD, FTIR, BET, UV–vis, EDS, and FESEM analysis. VNA and VSM were used to evaluate the dielectric and electromagnetic properties of the CG and PP samples. The results of the absorption capability tests revealed that bi-layer samples outperformed single layer samples in terms of microwave dissipation capability. The thickness and arrangement of each layer in bilayer... 

For improving competitiveness of SOEC/SOFC-technology it is desirable to reduce the temperature of operation down towards 500 oC - 600 oC. This requires improvement of the oxygen electrode such that this does not limit performance. Here, we report results on modifying various back-bone type oxygen electrodes via infiltration of materials targeting a surface decoration with Pr-oxide or Pr,Ni,Cu-oxides. Different composite back-bone electrodes (based on micron-sized particles) were investigated; La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O3/Ce0.9Gd0.1O2, (LSCF/CGO), La0.6Sr0.4FeO3 (LSF), and LaNi0.6Fe0.4O3/Ce0.9Gd0.1O2 (LNF/CGO). Marked performance improvements could be achieved with the infiltration, including a... 

Rare earth oxides with a trivalent nature play a pivotal role in reinforcing the magneto-optical attributes of spinel ferrite nanoparticles by replacing Fe3+ ions. In this study, rare earth Gd oxide doped with CoFe2O4 NPs with a composition of Co1+xGdxFe2-2xO4 (x = 0, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.15) were synthesized using sol-gel auto-combustion. The outcome of Gd cations on the physical, magneto-optical and electrical characteristics of the cobalt ferrite NPs were reported. X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) investigations confirmed the single-phase cubic crystalline nature and metal ion stretching in the cobalt ferrite synthesized samples. Decreasing drift in the average... 

The search for cathode materials with fast oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) catalytic activities and high ionic conductivity is the key obstacle to SOFCs commercialization and its operation at low temperatures. In order to search for a cathode with enhanced catalytic functionality, herein we report a single-phase CoFe2O4 (CFO) and CoGd0.2Fe1.80O4 (CGFO), which can be employed as an active cathode to improve electrocatalytic ORR functionalities at low temperature. It is found that CGFO having enriched oxygen vacancies exhibits the least polarization resistance (RP) of 0.42 Ωcm2 compared to the pure CFO which shows polarization resistance of 0.56 Ω cm2 under H2/air conditions. Furthermore,... 

The controlled and stable crystal structure, reduction in Curie temperature and semiconducting nature of oxide materials are the key factors for magnetoelectrical applications. Therefore, Co0.6Mn0.4GdxFe2-xO4 where x = 0, 0.033, 0.066 and 0.10 were synthesized to analyse the structural, morphological, magnetic, and electrical properties using a sol-gel autocombustion approach. The X-ray diffraction pattern reveals that the cubic crystallite size decreases with increasing smaller content of Gd3+ oxides without any secondary phase. Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HR-TEM) study explain the complete morphology,... 

Rare earth oxides with a trivalent nature play a pivotal role in reinforcing the magneto-optical attributes of spinel ferrite nanoparticles by replacing Fe3+ ions. In this study, rare earth Gd oxide doped with CoFe2O4 NPs with a composition of Co1+xGdxFe2-2xO4 (x = 0, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.15) were synthesized using sol-gel auto-combustion. The outcome of Gd cations on the physical, magneto-optical and electrical characteristics of the cobalt ferrite NPs were reported. X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) investigations confirmed the single-phase cubic crystalline nature and metal ion stretching in the cobalt ferrite synthesized samples. Decreasing drift in the average...