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Topic Review
Hidden Jahn-Teller and Pseudo-Jahn-Teller effects
The source of spontaneous symmetry breaking (SSB) in polyatomic systems, attributed to the Jahn-Teller effect (in electronic degenerate states) or to the pseudo-Jahn-Teller effect (under the condition of pseudodegeneracy), is complemented with the notions of hidden Jahn-Teller effect (h-JTE) and hidden pseudo-Jahn-Teller effect (h-PJTE) to stand for the cases when neither electronic degeneracy, nor pseudodegeneracy is present, but the system is still spontaneously distorted. The h-JTE and h-PJTE occur due to, respectively, the JTE and PJTE in the excited states of the undistorted system, but being strong enough, they penetrate its ground state forming a stable configuration with lower symmetry and (possibly) different spin.
  • 1.5K
  • 11 Dec 2020
Topic Review
Emergency Position-Indicating Radiobeacon Station
An emergency position-indicating radiobeacon (EPIRB) is a type of emergency locator beacon, a portable battery powered radio transmitter used in emergencies to locate airplanes, vessels, and persons in distress and in need of immediate rescue. In the event of an emergency, such as the ship sinking or an airplane crash, the transmitter is activated and begins transmitting a continuous radio signal which is used by search and rescue teams to quickly locate the emergency and render aid. The signal is detected by satellites operated by an international consortium of rescue services, COSPAS-SARSAT. The basic purpose of this system is to help rescuers find survivors within the so-called "golden day" (the first 24 hours following a traumatic event) during which the majority of survivors can usually be saved. The feature distinguishing modern EPIRBs, often called GPIRBs, from other types of emergency beacon is that it contains a GPS receiver and broadcasts its position, usually accurate within 100 metres (330 ft), to facilitate location. The standard frequency of a modern EPIRB is 406 MHz. It is an internationally regulated mobile radiocommunication service that aids search and rescue operations to detect and locate distressed boats, aircraft, and people. It is distinct from a Satellite emergency position-indicating radiobeacon station. The first form of these beacons was the 121.500 MHz ELT, which was designed as an automatic locator beacon for crashed military aircraft. These beacons were first used in the 1950s by the U.S. military and were mandated for use on many types of commercial and general aviation aircraft beginning in the early 1970s. The frequency and signal format used by the ELT beacons was not designed for satellite detection, which resulted in a system with poor location detection abilities and with long delays in detection of activated beacons. The satellite detection network was built after the ELT beacons were already in general use, with the first satellite not being launched until 1982, and even then, the satellites only provided detection, with location accuracy being roughly 20 kilometres (12 mi). The technology was later expanded to cover use on vessels at sea (EPIRB), individual persons (PLB and, starting in 2016, MSLD). All have migrated from using 121.500 MHz as their primary frequency to using 406 MHz, which was designed for satellite detection and location. Since the inception of Cospas-Sarsat in 1982, distress radiobeacons have assisted in the rescue of over 28,000 people in more than 7,000 distress situations. In 2010 alone, the system provided information used to rescue 2,388 persons in 641 distress situations.
  • 1.5K
  • 27 Oct 2022
Topic Review
N-Type Organic Semiconductors
This work was intended to enlarge the gates toward green organic technologies at room temperature, searching for new types of semiconductors with low toxicity and simple molecular organization. In our previous studies, para-aminobenzoic acid was used to construct a p-type green semiconductor. A non-toxic organic compound, acting as an electron donor, is sulpho-salicylic acid. SSA can be efficiently attached to the external shell of a ferrite (Fe3O4) nanocore, providing Fe3O4–SSA nanoparticles. This is a N-Type Organic Semiconductor - made by green technologies and used to construct a simple thin film transistor. 
  • 1.5K
  • 22 Oct 2020
Topic Review
Spectrum
A spectrum (plural spectra or spectrums) is a condition that is not limited to a specific set of values but can vary, without gaps, across a continuum. The word was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of colors in visible light after passing through a prism. As scientific understanding of light advanced, it came to apply to the entire electromagnetic spectrum. It thereby became a mapping of a range of magnitudes (wavelengths) to a range of qualities, which are the perceived "colors of the rainbow" and other properties which correspond to wavelengths that lie outside of the visible light spectrum. Spectrum has since been applied by analogy to topics outside optics. Thus, one might talk about the "spectrum of political opinion", or the "spectrum of activity" of a drug, or the "autism spectrum". In these uses, values within a spectrum may not be associated with precisely quantifiable numbers or definitions. Such uses imply a broad range of conditions or behaviors grouped together and studied under a single title for ease of discussion. Nonscientific uses of the term spectrum are sometimes misleading. For instance, a single left–right spectrum of political opinion does not capture the full range of people's political beliefs. Political scientists use a variety of biaxial and multiaxial systems to more accurately characterize political opinion. In most modern usages of spectrum there is a unifying theme between the extremes at either end. This was not always true in older usage.
  • 1.5K
  • 11 Nov 2022
Topic Review
(225088) 2007 OR10
(225088) 2007 OR10, proposed to be named Gonggong, is a likely dwarf planet in the Solar System beyond Neptune, and is a member of the scattered disc. It has a highly eccentric and inclined orbit during which it ranges from 33–101 astronomical units (4.9–15.1 billion kilometers) from the Sun. (As of 2019), its distance from the Sun is 88 AU (1.32×1010 km; 8.2×109 mi), and it is the sixth-farthest known Solar System object. 2007 OR10 is in a 3:10 orbital resonance with Neptune, in which it completes three orbits around the Sun for every ten orbits completed by Neptune. 2007 OR10 was discovered in July 2007 by American astronomers Megan Schwamb, Michael Brown, and David Rabinowitz at the Palomar Observatory, and the discovery was announced in January 2009. At 1,230 km (760 mi) in diameter, 2007 OR10 is approximately the size of Pluto's moon Charon, and is the fifth-largest known trans-Neptunian object in the Solar System. It is sufficiently massive to be gravitationally rounded, thereby qualifying for dwarf planet status. Its large mass also makes retention of a tenuous atmosphere of methane just possible, though such an atmosphere would slowly escape into space. 2007 OR10 is currently the largest known body in the Solar System without an official name, but in 2019, the discoverers hosted an online poll for the general public to help choose a name for the object, and the name Gonggong won. The winning name is derived from Gonggong, a Chinese water god responsible for chaos, floods and the tilt of the Earth. 2007 OR10 is red in color, likely due to the presence of organic compounds called tholins on its surface. Water ice is also present on its surface, which hints at a brief period of cryovolcanic activity in the distant past. 2007 OR10 rotates slowly compared to other trans-Neptunian objects, which typically have rotation periods less than 12 hours, which may be due to its natural satellite, provisionally designated S/2010 (225088) 1.
  • 1.5K
  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Raksha Bandhan
Raksha Bandhan, also Rakshabandhan, or Rakhi, is a popular, traditionally Hindu, annual rite, or ceremony, which is central to a festival of the same name, celebrated in parts of South Asia, and among people influenced by South Asian culture around the world. On this day, sisters of all ages tie a talisman, or amulet, called the rakhi, around the wrists of their brothers, symbolically protecting them, receiving a gift in return, and traditionally investing the brothers with a share of the responsibility of their potential care. Raksha Bandhan is observed on the last day of the Hindu lunar calendar month of Shraavana, which typically falls in August. The expression "Raksha Bandhan," Sanskrit, literally, "the bond of protection, obligation, or care," is now principally applied to this ritual. Until the mid-20th-century, the expression was more commonly applied to a similar ritual, also held on the same day, with precedence in ancient Hindu texts, in which a domestic priest ties amulets, charms, or threads on the wrists of his patrons, or changes their sacred thread, and receives gifts of money; in some places, this is still the case. In contrast, the sister-brother festival, with origins in folk culture, had names which varied with location, with some rendered as Saluno, Silono, and Rakri. A ritual associated with Saluno included the sisters placing shoots of barley behind the ears of their brothers. Of special significance to married women, Raksha Bandhan is rooted in the practice of territorial or village exogamy, in which a bride marries out of her natal village or town, and her parents, by custom, do not visit her in her married home. In rural north India, where village exogamy is strongly prevalent, large numbers of married Hindu women travel back to their parents' homes every year for the ceremony. Their brothers, who typically live with the parents or nearby, sometimes travel to their sisters' married home to escort them back. Many younger married women arrive a few weeks earlier at their natal homes and stay until the ceremony. The brothers serve as lifelong intermediaries between their sisters' married and parental homes, as well as potential stewards of their security. In urban India, where families are increasingly nuclear, the festival has become more symbolic, but continues to be highly popular. The rituals associated with this festival have spread beyond their traditional regions and have been transformed through technology and migration, the movies, social interaction, and promotion by politicized Hinduism, as well as by the nation state. Among women and men who are not blood relatives, there is also a transformed tradition of voluntary kin relations, achieved through the tying of rakhi amulets, which have cut across caste and class lines, and Hindu and Muslim divisions. In some communities or contexts, other figures, such as a matriarch, or a person in authority, can be included in the ceremony in ritual acknowledgement of their benefaction.
  • 1.5K
  • 18 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Pi Interaction
In chemistry, π-effects or π-interactions are a type of non-covalent interaction that involves π systems. Just like in an electrostatic interaction where a region of negative charge interacts with a positive charge, the electron-rich π system can interact with a metal (cationic or neutral), an anion, another molecule and even another π system. Non-covalent interactions involving π systems are pivotal to biological events such as protein-ligand recognition.
  • 1.5K
  • 07 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Ti/Al/X/Au Au-Contained Ohmic Contact Technique
AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) are regarded as promising candidates for a 5G communication system, which demands higher frequency and power. Source/drain ohmic contact is one of the key fabrication processes crucial to the device performance. Firstly, Aucontained metal stacks combined with RTA high-temperature ohmic contact schemes were presented and analyzed, including process conditions and contact formation mechanisms. Considering the issues with the Au-contained technique, the overview of a sequence of Au-free schemes is given and comprehensively discussed. In addition, in order to solve various problems caused by hightemperature conditions, novel annealing techniques including microwave annealing (MWA) and laser annealing (LA) were proposed to form Au-free low-temperature ohmic contact to AlGaN/GaN HEMT. The most popular metallization schemes of ohmic contact in AlGaN/GaN HEMT is Ti/Al/X/Au, where X can be Ni, Mo, Pt, Ta, Ir, etc.
  • 1.5K
  • 28 Jun 2022
Topic Review
Medical Uses of Silver
The medical uses of silver include its use in wound dressings, creams, and as an antibiotic coating on medical devices. Wound dressings containing silver sulfadiazine or silver nanomaterials may be used to treat external infections. The limited evidence available shows that silver coatings on endotracheal breathing tubes may reduce the incidence of ventilator-associated pneumonia. There is tentative evidence that using silver-alloy indwelling catheters for short-term catheterizing will reduce the risk of catheter-acquired urinary tract infections. Silver generally has low toxicity, and minimal risk is expected when silver is used in approved medical applications. Alternative medicine products such as colloidal silver are not safe or effective.
  • 1.5K
  • 24 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Magnitude
In astronomy, magnitude is a unitless measure of the brightness of an object in a defined passband, often in the visible or infrared spectrum, but sometimes across all wavelengths. An imprecise but systematic determination of the magnitude of objects was introduced in ancient times by Hipparchus. The scale is logarithmic and defined such that a magnitude 1 star is exactly 100 times brighter than a magnitude 6 star. Thus each step of one magnitude is [math]\displaystyle{ \sqrt{100} \approx 2.512 }[/math] times brighter than the next faintest. The brighter an object appears, the lower the value of its magnitude, with the brightest objects reaching negative values. Astronomers use two different definitions of magnitude: apparent magnitude and absolute magnitude. The apparent magnitude (m) is the brightness of an object as it appears in the night sky from Earth. Apparent magnitude depends on an object's intrinsic luminosity, its distance, and the extinction reducing its brightness. The absolute magnitude (M) describes the intrinsic luminosity emitted by an object and is defined to be equal to the apparent magnitude that the object would have if it were placed at a certain distance from Earth, 10 parsecs for stars. A more complex definition of absolute magnitude is used for planets and small Solar System bodies, based on its brightness at one astronomical unit from the observer and the Sun. The Sun has an apparent magnitude of −27 and Sirius, the brightest visible star in the night sky, −1.46. Venus at its brightest is -5. The International Space Station (ISS) sometimes reaches a magnitude of −6.
  • 1.5K
  • 28 Sep 2022
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