Rechargeable Mg-Ion Full Battery System with High Capacity and High Rate.

Thanks to the low cost, free dendritic hazards, and high volumetric capacity, magnesium (Mg)-ion batteries have attracted increasing attention as alternative energy storage devices to lithium-ion batteries. Despite the successful development of electrode materials, the real-life application potential of Mg-ion full battery systems (MIFBSs) is largely hindered by the lack of suitable electrode couples and hence low diffusion kinetics, which induce low specific capacity, poor rate performance, and low working voltage. Herein, we report an aqueous rechargeable MIFBS by employing copper hexacyanoferrate (CuHCF) as the cathode and 3,4,9,10-perylene-tetracarboxylic acid diimide (PTCDI) as the anode in 1 moL L-1 MgCl2 electrolyte. The combination of PTCDI//CuHCF allows efficient redox and convenient intercalation/deintercalation of Mg2+ at the electrodes while facilitating a fast transfer of Mg2+ between the two electrodes. As a result, the system delivers a high capacity of ∼120.3 mAh g-1 at a current density of 0.5 A g-1 after 200 operation cycles with a broadened voltage range (0-1.95 V) and maintains a capacity of ∼97.8 mAh g-1 at 2.0 A g-1 after 1000 cycles. Even at a high current density of 5.0 A g-1, the battery provides a steady capacity of ∼81.4 mAh g-1 over 5000 cycles. Moreover, after being applied at 11.0 A g-1, the system can deliver a capacity of ∼126.5 mAh g-1 at 0.5 A g-1. This work emphasizes the great promise of developing suitable electrode couples for aqueous MIFBSs to achieve high capacity and high rate.

Porous Ultrathin NiSe Nanosheet Networks on Nickel Foam for High-Performance Hybrid Supercapacitors.

Transition metal selenides (TMSs) with excellent electrochemical activity and high intrinsic electrical conductivity have attracted considerable attention owing to their potential use in energy storage devices. However, the low energy densities of the reported TMSs, which originate from the small active surface area and poor electrolyte ion mobility, substantially restrict their application potential. In this work, porous ultrathin nickel selenide nanosheet networks (NiSe NNs) on nickel foam are fabricated by using a novel, facile method, that is, selenylation/pickling of the pre-formed manganese-doped α-Ni(OH)2 . Removal of Mn resulted in NNs with a highly porous structure. The 3D framework of the NNs and the inherent nature of the NiSe affords high ion mobility, abundant accessible activated sites, vigorous electrochemical activity, and low resistance. One of the highest specific capacities of TMSs ever reported, that is, 443 mA h g-1 (807 µAh cm-2 ) at 3.0 A g-1 , is achieved with the NNs as electrodes. The assembled NiSe NNs//porous carbon hybrid supercapacitor delivers a high energy density of 66.6 Wh kg-1 at a power density of 425 W kg-1 , with excellent cycling stability. This work provides a new strategy for the production of novel electrode materials that can be applied in high-performance hybrid supercapacitors, and a fresh pathway towards commercial applications of hybrid supercapacitors based on TMS electrodes.

850†nm GaAs/AlGaAs DFB lasers with shallow surface gratings and oxide aperture.

We present and experimentally demonstrate a novel oxide-confined ridge-waveguide distributed feedback (DFB) laser with the first-order surface grating using only a single growth step. The metal contacts are laterally offset from the ridge waveguide to inject current thus avoiding unwanted light absorption from the electrodes. The oxide aperture is defined by selective wet oxidation of aluminium-rich material, which confines the injection current from the electrodes to the active layer under the ridge waveguide. This allows that a thin ridge layer can be used with relatively higher refractive index compared to the active layer and thus the grating can be shallowly etched but provides a strong coupling effect. The fabricated 150 µm-long DFB laser exhibited a relatively low threshold current of 8 mA and a side mode suppression ratio (SMSR) up to 50 dB at the injected current of 32 mA around 4 times threshold at 20 °C. Stable single mode operation has been observed for the fabricated DFB laser over the temperature range from 10 to 50 °C. The variation of wavelength with temperature Δλ/ΔT was 0.06 nm/°C. The proposed laser may have advantages combined both DFB lasers and vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs), such as single mode, stabilized polarization, potentially narrow linewidth and low power consumption. In addition, the laser is regrowth free, thus has advantages of low cost and high reliability.

High-performance InP-based Mach-Zehnder polarization beam splitter with a 19 dB extinction ratio across C-band.

A high-performance InP-based polarization beam splitter (PBS) using a symmetrical Mach-Zehnder interferometer is experimentally demonstrated. The waveguides are aligned along the [011] direction, which results in a small reverse bias required and easy adjustment to realize the PBS. The experimental results indicate that the polarization extinction ratio (PER) is over 19 dB in the wavelength range from 1525 to 1570 nm with one arm injected with a 4.32 mA current and the other arm reversed biased at 5.14 V simultaneously. The PER is measured to remain above 18 dB in the same wavelength range even when the width varies by ±200 nm.

An Analog-Front ROIC with On-Chip Non-Uniformity Compensation for Diode-Based Infrared Image Sensors.

This paper proposes a CMOS front-end readout-integrated circuit (ROIC) with on-chip non-uniformity compensation technique for a diode-based uncooled infrared image sensor. Two techniques are adopted to achieve on-chip non-uniformity compensation: a reference dummy metal line is introduced to alleviate the dominant non-uniformity with IR-drop presented in large pixel array, and a current splitting architecture-based variable current source for diode bias is proposed to compensate other residual non-uniformity. A differential integrator is chosen as the main amplifier of readout circuit for its superior noise performance. For low power design, a pulse-powered row buffer is designed in this work. The proposed ROIC for 384 × 288 diode-based detector array is fabricated with a 0.35- µ m CMOS process. It occupies an area of 4.4 mm × 15 mm, and the power consumption is 180 mW. The measured result shows that with the proposed on-chip non-uniformity compensation, the output voltage variation is greatly reduced from 2.5 V to 60 mV.

Experimental demonstration of DFB lasers with active distributed reflector.

We experimentally demonstrated DFB lasers containing an active distributed reflector that has the same waveguide core as the active section. Although without current injection, the distributed reflector will be optically pumped to near transparency by the laser itself, and therefore can provide relatively high reflection to the laser. The laser, fabricated with processing steps similar to standard DFB lasers, has achieved 10-mA threshold current, 0.38-mW/mA slope efficiency, above 55-dB side mode suppression ratio, and 24-GHz modulation bandwidth at 60-mA current injection. 28-Gb/s transmission over 10-km single-mode fibers with a power penalty of less-than 0.5 dB has been demonstrated as well.

Biowaste-Derived Hierarchical Porous Carbon Nanosheets for Ultrahigh Power Density Supercapacitors.

Low-cost activated carbons with high capacitive properties remain desirable for supercapacitor applications. Herein, a three-dimensional scaffolding framework of porous carbon nanosheets (PCNSs) has been produced from a typical biowaste, namely, ground cherry calyces, the specific composition and natural structures of which have contributed to the PCNSs having a very large specific surface area of 1612 m2 g-1 , a hierarchical pore size distribution, a turbostratic carbon structure with a high degree graphitization, and about 10 % oxygen and nitrogen heteroatoms. A high specific capacitance of 350 F g-1 at 0.1 A g-1 has been achieved in a two-electrode system with 6 m KOH; this value is among the highest specific capacitance of biomass-derived carbon materials. More inspiringly, a high energy density of 22.8 Wh kg-1 at a power density of 198.8 W kg-1 can be obtained with 1 m aqueous solution of Li2 SO4 , and an ultrahigh energy density of 81.4 Wh kg-1 at a power density of 446.3 W kg-1 is realized with 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate electrolyte.

Design and simulation of two-section DFB lasers with short active-section lengths.

Distributed feedback lasers comprised of a reflection section and an active section have been proposed for high direct-modulation bandwidth. The reflection section has the same core layer as the active section so butt-joint re-growth is avoided. Without current injection the reflection section will be pumped to near transparency by the emission from the laser itself so high reflection (> 0.75) can still be achieved as confirmed by the simulation. Therefore a short (150 µm) active section can be used, which enables a low threshold current (~5 mA) and a high direct modulation bandwidth (>30 GHz) as demonstrated by the simulation.

Palladium(II)-catalyzed sequential C-H arylation/aerobic oxidative C-H amination: one-pot synthesis of benzimidazole-fused phenanthridines from 2-arylbenzimidazoles and aryl halides.

Starting from 2-arylbenzimidazoles and aryl halides, an efficient palladium-based catalytic method for the synthesis of benzimidazole-fused phenanthridines has been developed. This reaction sequence comprises intermolecular C-H arylation and intramolecular aerobic oxidative C-H amination, involving the rupture of two C-H bonds, one C-X bond, and one N-H bond in one pot. The Pd(II)-Pd(IV)-Pd(II) and Pd(II)-Pd(0)-Pd(II) catalytic cycles work together under the reported conditions to generate phenanthridines with diverse substituents.