The devices analyzed in this work present an S-shape J-V characteristic when illuminated. By changing the light flux a non linear dependence of the photocurrent with illumination is observed. Thus a low intensity light beam can be used to probe the local illumination conditions, since a relationship exists between the probe beam photocurrent and the steady state illumination. Numerical simulation studies showed that the origin of this S-shape lies in a reduced electric field across the intrinsic region, which causes an increase in the recombination losses. Based on this, we present a model for the device consisting of a modulated barrier recombination junction in addition to the p-i-n junction. The simulated results are in good agreement with the experimental data. Using the presented model a good estimative of the LSP signal under different illumination conditions can be obtained, thus simplifying the development of applications using the LSP as an image sensor, with advantages over the existing imaging systems in the large area sensor fields with the low cost associated to the amorphous silicon technology. © 2007 Materials Research Society.

Although occurrences of marine reptiles have been previously reported from Angola, with the exception of two Turonian taxa, these reports were based largely on isolated teeth. Fieldwork in 2005 and 2006 yielded well-preserved remains of marine reptiles including plesiosaurs, turtles, and mosasaurs. The mosasaurs discussed here were recovered from two field areas: Turonian sediments at Iembe along the north coast and Maastrichtian sediments at Bentiaba on the south coast. The Turonian section near Iembe produced at least two new specimens of Angolasaurus bocagei and one fragmentary specimen of Tylosaurus iembeensis. One of the Angolasaurus specimens is represented by a well preserved, complete and articulated skull and partial postcrania, including portions of the forelimbs and pectoral girdle. The preservation of material from the Bentiaba locality is remarkable due to the grain support of the entombing sandstone, which preserves fine anatomical details with little apparent crushing, and in the number of articulated, semi-articulated, and associated skeletons. Identifications from the field and preliminary preparation show the Bentiaba mosasaur fauna is represented by at least five genera including Mosasaurus, Prognathodon, Globidens, Plioplatecarpus and Halisaurus. Collectively, these new specimens greatly expand our knowledge of the anatomy and systematics of Angolan mosasaurs.

We report the 98% assignment of the apo-form of an orange protein, containing a novel Mo-Cu cluster isolated from Desulfovibrio gigas. This protein presents a region where backbone amide protons exchange fast with bulk solvent becoming undetectable. These residues were assigned using C-13-detection experiments.

The isoconversional methods (Friedman (FR), Flynn-Wall-Ozawa (FWO) and Kissinger-Akahira-Sunose (KAS)) were applied for evaluating the dependencies of the activation energy (E) on the mass loss (Δm) corresponding to the non-isothermal decomposition of two Zn acetate-based gel precursors for ZnO thin films whose preparation differs by the drying temperature of the liquid sol-precursor (125°C for sample A, and 150°C for sample B). Although both investigated samples exhibit similar decomposition steps, strong differences between E vs. Δm curves as well as among the characteristic parameters of the decomposition steps, directly evaluated from TG, DTG and DTA curves, were put in evidence. © 2007 Springer Science+Business Media LLC.

This paper presents a finite element model based on mathematical non-linear programming in order to determine upper bounds of colapse loads of a mechanical structure.The proposed formulation is derived within a kinematical approach framework, employing two simultaneous and independent field approximations for the velocity and strain rate fields. The augmented Lagrangian is used to establish the compatibility between these two fields. In this model, only continuous velocity fields are used.Uzawa's minimization algorithm is applied to determine the optimal kinematical field that minimizes the difference between external and dissipated work rate. The use of this technique allows to bypass the complexity of the non-linear aspects of the problem, since non-linearity is addressed as a set of small local subproblems of optimization for each finite element.The obtained model is quite versatile and suitable for solving a wide range of collapse problems. This paper studies 3D strut-and-tie structures, 2D plane strain/stress and 3D solid problems.

Here we describe an innovative optoelectronic platform which enables the specific detection of unamplified nucleic acid sequences with the integration of oligonucleotide-derivatized gold nanoparticles, a colour sensor and a light emission source for a colorimetric detection method. This new low cost, fast and simple optoelectronic platform permits detection of less than 1 picomole quantities of nucleic acid without target or signal amplification. ©2007 IEEE.

In the production of porous silicon (PS) to optoelectronic application one of the most significant constrains is the surface defects passivation. In the present work we investigate, gallium-doped zinc oxide (GZO) thin films deposited by rf magnetron sputtering at room temperature on PS obtained with different etching times. The X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) analysis have been carried out to understand the effect of GZO films coating on PS. Further, the XRD analysis suggests the formation of a good crystalline quality of the GZO films on PS. From AFM investigation we observe that the surface roughness increases after GZO film coating. The photoluminescence (PL) measurements on PS and GZO films deposited PS shows three emission peaks at around 1.9 eV (red-band), 2.78 eV (blue-band) and 3.2 eV (UV-band). PL enhancement in the blue and ultraviolet (UV) region has been achieved after GZO films deposition, which might be originated from a contribution of the near-band-edge recombination from GZO. © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.