A Novel Composite with Structural Health Monitoring Functionality via 2D and 3D Impedance Mapping Topography

We report the transformation of a conventional composite material into a multifunctional structure able to provide information about its structural integrity. A purposely positioned grid of carbon fabric strips located within a glass fibre laminate in alternating 0/90 configuration combined with a ternary nanomodified epoxy matrix imparted structural health monitoring (SHM) topographic capabilities to the composite using the impedance spectroscopy (IS) technique. The matrix was reinforced with homogenously dispersed multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and carbon black (CB). A sinusoidal electric field was applied locally over a frequency range from 1 Hz to 100 kHz between the junction points of the grid of carbon fabric strips. The proposed design enabled topographic damage assessment after a high-velocity impact via the local monitoring of the impedance. The data obtained from the IS measurements were depicted by magnitude and phase delay Bode plots and Nyquist plots. The impedance values were used to create a 2D and a multi-layer (3D) contour topographical image of the damaged area, which revealed crucial information about the structural integrity of the composite.

Alternating electric field-induced ion current rectification and electroosmotic pump in ultranarrow charged carbon nanocones

Molecular dynamics simulations were performed to study a symmetrical sinusoidal electric field-induced electroosmotic pump in ultranarrow charged carbon nanocone (CNC) channels.

Dependence of sinusoidal electric field effect on neuronal morphological properties

In this paper, the neuronal firing patterns under extracellular sinusoidal electric field (EF) are investigated based on a reduced two-compartment model with focus on the effects of morphological and internal coupling parameters. We observe that the neuron can exhibit bursting, synchronous firing and subthreshold oscillation depending on EF amplitude A and frequency f. Furthermore, neuronal firing properties change obviously over a range of morphological parameter p. As p increases, the firing region expands first and then diminishes gradually until it disappears in the observed (A, f) parameter space and the transition from bursting to synchronous firing is also markedly distinct. Meanwhile, the morphological parameter also has significant effects on the EF threshold for triggering neuronal spikes. Unlike morphological parameter, though the internal coupling conductance gc can also induce some changes in firing behavior and EF threshold, it cannot qualitatively change neuronal dynamical properties. All these results demonstrate that neuronal morphology plays a crucial role in neuronal responses to sinusoidal EF.