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Positron lifetime spectroscopy was used to study native vacancy defects in semi-insulating silicon carbide. The material is shown to contain (i) vacancy clusters consisting of 4--5 missing atoms and (ii) Si vacancy related negatively…
Silicon presents itself as a high-capacity anode material for lithium-ion batteries with a promising future. The high ability for lithiation comes along with massive volume changes and a problematic voltage hysteresis, causing reduced…
Compact layers containing embedded semiconductor particles consolidated using pulsed electric current sintering exhibit intense, broadband near-infrared reflectance. The composites consolidated from nano- or micro-silica powder have a…
We have investigated the possibility of using aluminum functionalized silicene trilayers (ABC-Si$_4$Al$_2$) as an anode material for alkali metal ion batteries (AMIBs). First, we studied the thermodynamic stability of ABC-Si$_4$Al$_2$ using…
An in situ study of deformation, fracture, and fatigue behavior of silicon as a lithium-ion battery electrode material is presented. Thin films (100-200 nm) of silicon are cycled in a half-cell configuration with lithium metal foil as…
In pulsed laser deposition, along the traditionally exploited deposition on the front-side of the plasma-plume, a coating forms on the surface of the target as well. For reproducibility, this residue is usually cleaned and discarded. Here…
There is increasing interest in materials that combine energy-storing functions with augmented mechanical properties, ranging from flexibility in bending to stretchability to structural properties. In the case of lithium-ion batteries,…
As photovoltaics (PVs) scale from one to multiple terawatts over the next decade, ensuring sustainable deployment is urgently required. Crystalline silicon (c-Si) PVs, the current industry standard, will generate an estimated 160 million…
Increasing the density of superconducting circuits requires compact components, however, superconductor-based capacitors typically perform worse as dimensions are reduced due to loss at surfaces and interfaces. Here, parallel plate…
Natural silicon consists of three stable isotopes with atomic mass 28 (92.21%), 29 (4.70%) and 30 (3.09%). To present day, isotopic enrichment of Si was used in electronics for two goals: (i) fabrication of substrates with high level of…
The rapid growth of electronic waste must be curtailed to prevent accumulation of environmentally and biologically toxic materials, which are essential to traditional electronics. The recent proliferation of transient electronics has…
The use of Si anodes can greatly improve the energy density of Li-ion batteries. However, understanding and mitigation of calendar aging remains a barrier to commercialization. In this short report, we utilize operando Nuclear Magnetic…
Nano-scale eutectics, such as rapid solidified Al-Si, exhibit enhanced yield strength and strain hardening but plasticity is limited by cracking of the hard phase (Si). Mechanisms that may suppress cracking and enable plastic co-deformation…
Silicon carbide (SiC) has great potential for optomechanical applications due to its outstanding optical and mechanical properties. However, challenges associated with SiC nanofabrication have constrained its adoption in optomechanical…
Metal-ion batteries are in huge demand to cope with the increasing need for renewable energy, especially in automobiles. In this work, we apply first-principle calculations to examine two-dimensional beryllium carbide (2D-Be2C) as a…
The design and fabrication of a metal-dielectric-metal absorber that achieves strong absorption from the ultraviolet (UV) to the near-infrared (near-IR) spectrum are presented. The proposed nanostructure consists of a periodic titanium (Ti)…
Since the photoconversion efficiency $\eta$ of the silicon-based solar cells (SCs) under laboratory conditions is approaching the theoretical fundamental limit, further improvement of their performance requires theoretical modeling and/or…
We present new atomistic models of amorphous silicon (a-Si) and hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) surfaces. The a-Si model included 4096 atoms and was obtained using local orbital density functional theory. By analyzing a slab model…
A 3D mechanical stable scaffold is shown to accommodate the volume change of a high specific capacity nickel-tin nanocomposite Li-ion battery anode. When the nickel-tin anode is formed on an electrochemically inactive conductive scaffold…
We propose a back-reflecting scheme in order to enhance the maximum achievable current in one micron thick crystalline silicon solar cells. We perform 3-dimensional numerical investigations of the scattering properties of metallic…