Electrodeposited Vanadium Dioxide Films with Unique Optical Property.

This study represents a facile but effective electrodeposition method to fabricate vanadium dioxide (VO2) thin films on fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) glass at room temperature. The film microstructure (thickness, surface structure, particle size and composition) and relevant optical properties were investigated by several advanced techniques. The pertinent variables that can affect the thin film formation and structure, such as deposition potential, time and post-treatment annealing temperature were also studied. It was found that the film thickness could be tuned from 35 to 130 nm by adjusting the potential from -1.22 to -1.35 V, and consequently leading to optical transmittance decreasing from ∼60% to ∼38% in the wavelength of 500-1000 nm, further confirmed by computational simulations using three-dimension (3D) finite-difference time-domain method. The hysteresis loop of the generated VO2 film on FTO glass shows that the phase transition temperature from monoclinic to rutile is around 73 °C, a little higher than pure monoclinic VO2 (∼68 °C) in this study. This proposed electrodeposition method is possible to extend into obtaining metal oxide films with tuneable surface properties for thermochromic smart devices.

A Malleable Composite Dough with Well-Dispersed and High-Content Boron Nitride Nanosheets.

Aggregation of two-dimensional (2D) nanosheet fillers in a polymer matrix is a prevalent problem when the filler loading is high, leading to degradation of physical and mechanical properties of the composite. To avoid aggregation, a low-weight fraction of the 2D material (<5 wt %) is usually used to fabricate the composite, limiting performance improvement. Here, we develop a mechanical interlocking strategy where well-dispersed high filling content (up to 20 wt %) of boron nitride nanosheets (BNNSs) can be incorporated into a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) matrix, resulting in a malleable, easy-to-process and reusable BNNS/PTFE composite dough. Importantly, the well-dispersed BNNS fillers can be rearranged into a highly oriented direction due to the malleable nature of the dough. The resultant composite film has a high thermal conductivity (4408% increase), low dielectric constant/loss, and excellent mechanical properties (334%, 69%, 266%, and 302% increases for tensile modulus, strength, toughness, and elongation, respectively), making it suitable for thermal management applications in the high-frequency areas. The technique is useful for the large-scale production of other 2D material/polymer composites with a high filler content for different applications.

Data on spatiotemporal patterns of the foundation of Japanese companies in China from 1980-2016.

This data article provides spatiotemporal patterns of the foundation of Japanese companies in China. The data for companies in the food manufacturing, wholesaling, and service industries were collected from published lists of Chinese companies founded through the investment of Japanese companies. The data are provided in a matrix heatmap format, a two-dimensional visualization of data using color to represent the magnitude of two variables: year of foundation and area in China where the company is located.

Data on people's interests related to entry into the Chinese market based on Internet activity corresponding to real-world statistical data in the period 2004-2015 in Japan.

This data article describes Internet activities in Japan related to entry into the Chinese market from 2004 to 2015 using data obtained from mining Google Trends. The search volumes were processed and correlated with statistical annual data on the number of Chinese companies founded by investment from Japanese companies. Relative search volumes generated by Google Trends reflect the increase and decrease in the number of Chinese companies founded by Japanese companies in the "real world." The correlation between relative search volumes generated by Google Trends and foundation of companies in the "real world" in the study period (2004-2015) was statistically significant.