Publications related to Determining the Optimal Phase-Change Material via High-Throughput Calculations

Organic matters, but inorganic matters too: column examination of elevated mercury sorption on low organic matter aquifer material using concentrations and stable isotope ratios

Sorption of mercury (Hg) in soils is suggested to be predominantly associated with organic matter (OM). However, there is a growing collection of research that suggests that clay minerals and oxides are also important solid phases for the sorption of solu ...

2024

Microbial hydrogen sinks in the sand-bentonite backfill material for the deep geological disposal of radioactive waste

Rizlan Bernier-Latmani, Manon Frutschi, Niels Burzan, Aislinn Ann Boylan, Nicolas Louis Maurice Jacquemin, Simiao Wang, Camille Aude Rolland

The activity of subsurface microorganisms can be harnessed for engineering projects. For instance, the Swiss radioactive waste repository design can take advantage of indigenous microorganisms to tackle the issue of a hydrogen gas (H2) phase pressure build ...

Frontiers Media SA2024

Localized Ionic Reinforcement of Double Network Granular Hydrogels

Esther Amstad, Alexandra Thoma

Nature produces soft materials with fascinating combinations of mechanical properties. For example, the mussel byssus embodies a combination of stiffness and toughness, a feature that is unmatched by synthetic hydrogels. Key to enabling these excellent mec ...

Wiley-V C H Verlag Gmbh2024

Methods for high-throughput synthesis and screening of peptide libraries

Zsolt Bognár

Macrocycles provide an attractive modality for drug development but the identification of ligands to targets of interest is hindered by the lack of large macrocyclic compound libraries for high-throughput screening. A strategy to efficiently synthesize lar ...

EPFL2024

Mixed ionic-electronic conduction in Ruddlesden-Popper and Dion-Jacobson layered hybrid perovskites with aromatic organic spacers

Michael Graetzel, Davide Moia, Joachim Maier, Jovana Milic, Algirdas Ducinskas, Mina Jung

The understanding of mixed ionic-electronic conductivity in hybrid perovskites has enabled major advances in the development of optoelectronic devices based on this class of materials. While recent investigations revealed the potential of using dimensional ...

Royal Society of Chemistry2024

Filiform Variable Stiffness Technologies for Medical Robotics

Yegor Piskarev

In recent years, soft robotics has surged in applications like wearables, drones, smart fabrics, and medical instruments. Due to their compliance, these devices excel in tasks demanding dexterity and adaptability, such as manipulation, locomotion, crash re ...

EPFL2024

Ion Spectroscopy Reveals Structural Difference for Proteins Microhydrated by Retention and Condensation of Water

Oleg Boyarkine, Andrei Zviagin

Protein ubiquitin in its +7 charge state microhydrated by 5 and 10 water molecules has been interrogated in the gas phase by cold ion UV/IR spectroscopy. The complexes were formed either by condensing water onto the unfolded bare proteins in a temperature- ...

Amer Chemical Soc2024

Primary and secondary order parameters in the fully frustrated transverse-field Ising model on the square lattice

Frédéric Mila

Using quantum Monte Carlo simulations and field-theory arguments, we study the fully frustrated transversefield Ising model on the square lattice for the purpose of quantitatively relating two different order parameters to each other. We consider a "primar ...

Amer Physical Soc2024

Percolation and phase behavior in cellulose nanocrystal suspensions from nonlinear rheological analysis

Tiffany Abitbol

We examine the influence of surface charge on the percolation, gel-point and phase behavior of cellulose nanocrystal (CNC) suspensions in relation to their nonlinear rheological material response. Desulfation decreases CNC surface charge density which lead ...

ELSEVIER SCI LTD2023

Modeling the mechanics and rheology of porous and granular media: an elastoplastic continuum approach

Lars Kristoffer Uhlen Blatny

The complex mechanics of porous and granular media play a significant role in various industrial processes and natural phenomena. As an example, understanding the mechanics of how failure occurs, localizes and propagates in porous brittle solids under vari ...

EPFL2023

Twisting instabilities in elastic ribbons with inhomogeneous pre-stress: A macroscopic analog of thermodynamic phase transition

Pedro Miguel Nunes Pereira de Almeida Reis, Michael Christopher Gomez

We study elastic ribbons subject to large, tensile pre-stress confined to a central region within the cross-section. These ribbons can buckle spontaneously to form helical shapes, featuring regions of alternating chirality (phases) that are separated by so ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2023

Growth and investigation of Argon thin films adsorbed on graphite by means of Ultrafast Electron Diffraction

Paolo Usai

Starting from our big universe to the microscopic world, phase transitions play an important role in nature. Just after the Big Bang our universe experienced multiple phase transitions, from high-temperature plasma to the matter we know today. Phase transi ...

EPFL2023

Direct Observation of the Phase Transition in C60 Fullerene

Chengcheng Yan

In the third study, the order-disorder phase transition of single-crystal C60 is studied using time-resolved electron microscopy. Solid C60 undergoes a first-order phase transition upon heating to 260 K. This is a structural transition from the low-tempera ...

EPFL Infoscience2023

Mechanism of Reduction of Aqueous U(V)-dpaea and Solid-Phase U(VI)-dpaea Complexes: The Role of Multiheme c-Type Cytochromes

Marinella Mazzanti, Rizlan Bernier-Latmani, Karin Lederballe Meibom, Radmila Faizova, Margaux Camille Andréa Molinas

The biological reduction of soluble U(VI) complexes to form immobile U(IV) species has been proposed to remediate contaminated sites. It is well established that multiheme c-type cytochromes (MHCs) are key mediators of electron transfer to aqueous phase U( ...

2023

Critical properties of the quantum Ashkin-Teller chain with chiral perturbations

Frédéric Mila, Natalia Chepiga

We investigate the nature of the phase transitions in the quantum Ashkin-Teller chain in the presence of chiral perturbations. We locate the Lifshitz line separating a region of direct chiral transitions from the region where the transition is through an i ...

Amer Physical Soc2023

Sinter-Resistant Nickel Catalyst for Lignin Hydrogenolysis Achieved by Liquid Phase Atomic Layer Deposition of Alumina

Jeremy Luterbacher, Farzaneh Talebkeikhah, Songlan Sun

Lignin hydrogenolysis is a key step in the sustainable production of renewable bio-based chemicals and fuels. Heterogeneous metal catalysts have led to high yields but they rapidly deactivate, notably due to nanoparticle sintering and carbonaceous deposit ...

2023

Fractal Analysis of Four Xerogels Based on TEGylated Phenothiazine and Chitosan

Maria-Alexandra Paun

The present article describes novel massive materials (in the solid phase) based on TEGylated phenothiazine and chitosan that possess great capability to recover mercury ions from constituent aqueous solutions. These were produced by chitosan hydrogelation ...

MDPI2023

Thermal Conditions in Indoor Environments: Exploring the Reasoning behind Standard-Based Recommendations

Dolaana Khovalyg

Professionals in the building design and operation fields typically look at standards and guidelines as a reliable source of information and guidance with regard to procedural, contractual, and legal scope and requirements that are relevant to accountabili ...

2023

Eight-vertex criticality in the interacting Kitaev chain

Frédéric Mila, Natalia Chepiga

We show that including pairing and repulsion into the description of one-dimensional spinless fermions, as in the domain wall theory of commensurate melting or the interacting Kitaev chain, leads, for strong enough repulsion, to a line of critical points i ...

AMER PHYSICAL SOC2023

Snowfall microphysics: a dual-frequency and Doppler spectral radar perspective

Anne-Claire Marie Billault--Roux

Snowfall is an essential component of the hydrological cycle, as it is involved in most precipitation on Earth, either directly as snow falling to the ground or indirectly as rain melted from snow. At the same time, the ice phase of clouds and precipitatio ...

EPFL2023