Modeling and simulation of segregation phenomena in granular flows are investigated. Computational models at different scales ranging from particle level (microscale) to continuum level (macroscale) are employed in order to determine the important microscale physics relevant to macroscale modeling. The capability of a multi-fluid model to capture segregation caused by density difference is demonstrated by simulating grain-chaff biomass flows in a laboratory-scale air column and in a combine harvester. The multi-fluid model treats gas and solid phases as interpenetrating continua in an Eulerian frame. This model is further improved by incorporating particle rotation using kinetic theory for rapid granular flow of slightly frictional spheres. A simplified model is implemented without changing the current kinetic theory framework by introducing an effective coefficient of restitution to account for additional energy dissipation due to frictional collisions. The accuracy of predicting segregation rate in a gas-fluidized bed is improved by the implementation. This result indicates that particle rotation is important microscopic physics to be incorporated into the hydrodynamic model. Segregation of a large particle in a dense granular bed of small particles under vertical. vibration is studied using molecular dynamics simulations. Wall friction is identified as a necessary condition for the segregation. Large-scale force …

Four different laser-based techniques were applied to study physical and chemical characteristics of biomolecules and dye molecules. These techniques are liole burning spectroscopy, single molecule spectroscopy, time-resolved coherent anti-Stokes Raman spectroscopy and laser-induced fluorescence microscopy. Results from hole burning and single molecule spectroscopy suggested that two antenna states (C708 & C714) of photosystem I from cyanobacterium Synechocystis PCC 6803 are connected by effective energy transfer and the corresponding energy transfer time is {approx}6 ps. In addition, results from hole burning spectroscopy indicated that the chlorophyll dimer of the C714 state has a large distribution of the dimer geometry. Direct observation of vibrational peaks and evolution of coumarin 153 in the electronic excited state was demonstrated by using the fs/ps CARS, a variation of time-resolved coherent anti-Stokes Raman spectroscopy. In three different solvents, methanol, acetonitrile, and butanol, a vibration peak related to the stretch of the carbonyl group exhibits different relaxation dynamics. Laser-induced fluorescence microscopy, along with the biomimetic containers-liposomes, allows the measurement of the enzymatic activity of individual alkaline phosphatase from bovine intestinal mucosa without potential interferences from glass surfaces. The result showed a wide distribution of the enzyme reactivity. Protein structural variation is one of the major reasons that …

We study the emission and absorption properties of photonic crystals and metamaterials using Comsol Multiphysics and Ansoft HFSS as simulation tools. We calculate the emission properties of metallic designs using drude model and the results illustrate that an appropriate termination of the surface of the metallic structure can significantly increase the absorption and therefore the thermal emissivity. We investigate the spontaneous emission rate modifications that occur for emitters inside two-dimensional photonic crystals and find the isotropic and directional emissions with respect to different frequencies as we have expected.