This study pioneers a transformative approach of discarded orange peels (Citrus sinensis) into highly porous carbon, demonstrating its potential application in energy storage devices. The porous carbon structure offers a substantial surface area, making it conducive for effective ion adsorption and storage, thereby enhancing capacitance. The comprehensive characterization, including X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared, Raman spectroscopy, field emission scanning electron microscopy, and XPS verifies the material’s suitability for energy storage applications by confirming its nature, functional groups, graphitic structure, porous morphology and surface elemental compositions. Moreover, the introduced plasma treatment not only improves the material’s intensity, bending vibrations, and morphology but also increases capacitance, as evidenced by galvanostatic charge–discharge tests. The air plasma-treated carbon exhibits a noteworthy capacitance of 1916F/g at 0.05A/g in 2 M KOH electrolyte. long term cyclic stability has been conducted up to 10,000 cycles, the calculated capacitance retention and columbic efficiency is 92.7% and 97.6%. These advancements underscore the potential of utilizing activated carbon from agricultural waste in capacitors and supercapatteries, offering a sustainable solution for energy storage with enhanced performance characteristics.

The electrochemical properties of a CFX cathode were improved by defluorination of the surface with a N2 plasma and using a silica wafer. Compared to the N2 plasma treatment alone, when the CFX and silica were reacted together, the C-F bonds were modified and the surface was etched efficiently, so defluorination was enhanced. An electrochemical analysis confirmed that Half-cells prepared by treating CFx and silica with nitrogen plasma exhibited a capacity of about 400 mAh/g at 5C. In addition, it was confirmed that the loss of charge transfer was reduced by up to 71% compared to that for pristine CFX. As shown by a GITT analysis, when the CFx and silica were treated with N2 plasma together, the ion conductivity gradually increased due to a decrease in the ion diffusion barriers and the formation of a carbon layer. Therefore, this is a simple and effective way to improve the conductivities of CFX cathode materials with the energy of a N2 plasma and the silica-fluorine reaction.

The aggressive scaling of dynamic random-access memory capacitors has increased the need to maintain high capacitance despite the limited physical thickness of electrodes and dielectrics. This makes it essential to use high-k dielectric materials. TiO2 has a large dielectric constant, ranging from 30~75 in the anatase phase to 90~170 in rutile phase. However, it has significant leakage current due to low energy barriers for electron conduction, which is a critical drawback. Suppressing the leakage current while scaling to achieve an equivalent oxide thickness (EOT) below 0.5 nm is necessary to control the influence of interlayers on capacitor performance. For this, Pt and Ru, with their high work function, can be used instead of a conventional TiN substrate to increase the Schottky barrier height. Additionally, forming rutile-TiO2 on RuO2 with excellent lattice compatibility by epitaxial growth can minimize leakage current. Furthermore, plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (PEALD) can be used to deposit a uniform thin film with high density and low defects at low temperatures, to reduce the impact of interfacial reactions on electrical properties at high temperatures. In this study, TiO2 was deposited using PEALD, using substrates of Pt and Ru treated with rapid thermal annealing at 500 and 600 °C, to compare structural, chemical, and electrical characteristics with reference to a TiN substrate. As a result, leakage current was suppressed to around 10-6 A/cm2 at 1 V, and an EOT at the 0.5 nm level was achieved.

In this work, we have designed a novel gas inlet structure for efficient usage of growth and doping precursors. Our previous gas injection configuration is that the gas is mixed to one pipe first, then divided into two pipes, and finally entered the chamber symmetrically above the substrate without a jet nozzle. The distance between gas inlet and substrate is about 14.75 cm. Our new design is to add a new tube in the center of the susceptor, and the distance between the new tube and substrate is about 0.5 cm. In this new design, different gas injection configurations have been planned such that the gas flow in the reactor aids the transport of reaction species toward the sample surface, expecting the utilization efficiency of the precursors being improved in this method. Experiments have shown that a high doping efficiency and fast growth could be achieved concurrently in diamond growth when methane and diborane come from this new inlet, demonstrating a successful implementation of the design to a diamond microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition system. Compared to our previous gas injection configuration, the growth rate increases by 15-fold and the boron concentration increases by ~ 10 times. COMSOL simulation has shown that surface reaction and precursor supply both have a change in determining the growth rate and doping concentration. The current results could be further applied to other dopants for solving the low doping efficiency problems in ultra-wide-band-gap semiconductor materials.

For the regeneration of diesel particulate filters (DPF) using non-thermal plasma (NTP), both cost-effectiveness and regeneration efficiency should be raised. This study compared and contrasted the physicochemical characteristics of carbon black and engine particulate matter (PM). After carbon black was put into the DPF, an experimental setup for the oxidation of PM using NTP was created. The findings showed that carbon black and PM samples had comparable oxidation traits, micronanostructures, and C/O elemental ratios. O3, the main active species in NTP, was susceptible to heat breakdown, and the rate of decomposition of O3 increases with increasing temperature. The removal effectiveness of carbon black first improved and subsequently declined with an increase in the NTP injection flow rate during offline DPF regeneration using NTP at room temperature. A relatively high carbon black removal efficiency of 85.1% was achieved at an NTP injection flow rate of 30 L/min.

The effects of different plasma agent species ( CF4, N2) over the conductivity of CFX cathode material were identified. Both plasma treatments have surface etching effect, while the CF4 plasma treatment has C–F bond modification effect and the N2 plasma treatment has defluorination effect. The changes of surface chemical species and porosity along the plasma agent were elucidated. Moreover, the electrochemical properties of plasma-treated CFX confirmed the effects of plasma treatments. The charge-transfer resistance of plasma-treated CFX was maximum 60.3% reduced than the pristine CFX. The effects of surface chemical modification coupled with etching along the plasma gas agents were compared and identified with their reaction mechanisms.

The limitation of markers for chronic oral diseases such as oral lichen planus (OLP) and burning mouth syndrome (BMS) is a diagnostic challenge for clinicians. The pathogenesis of OLP and BMS is not yet fully understood. Therefore, diagnoses are mainly based on the observation of clinical features and history, rather than established markers. C-reactive protein (CRP) and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) are used to determine the state of inflammation; however, these markers have some limitations. Recently, a new inflammatory marker, pentraxin-3 (PTX3), has been identified in other systemic inflammatory diseases. PTX3 is a member of the pentraxin family and is classified as a long pentraxin. PTX3 is found in various human tissues, whereas the classical short pentraxin, CRP, is secreted only in the liver. PTX3 is a marker of autoimmune diseases and periodontitis. However, there are no studies on PTX3 in OLP and BMS; therefore, we sought to determine if PTX3 can be a diagnostic marker for OLP and BMS. PTX3 was found to be correlated with other inflammatory markers, suggesting its diagnostic value for inflammatory oral diseases. We also found that the PTX3 levels were lower in patients with OLP and BMS. ESR levels were elevated in the OLP and BMS groups, but CRP levels were not. Despite these associations, no correlation was found between PTX3 expression and other known clinical features of OLP and BMS. We suggest that PTX3 plays a role in the immunological and neurological pathways involved in the complex pathogenesis of OLP and BMS.

수인성 질산 노출에 대한 향어의 독성 영향을 확인하기 위해 96시간 동안 0, 4, 20, 100, 500 및 2,500 mg NO3 -/L의 수인성 질산에 노출을 실시하였다. 질산 96시간 급성 노출에 의한 향 어의 반수치사농도(LC50)는 1,433.54 mg NO3 -/L로 나타났다. 혈액학적 성상을 통해 수인성 질 산 노출이 향어에게 미치는 생리학적 변화를 평가하였으며, RBC count는 유의적인 감소를 나 타내었다(p < 0.05). 혈장 무기성분을 통해 수인성 질산 노출에 따른 향어의 이온 조절 능력 변화를 평가하였으며, 혈장 무기성분에서 calcium과 magnesium은 유의적으로 감소하였다(p < 0.05). 혈장 유기성분을 통해 수인성 질산 노출로 인한 향어의 건강도와 스트레스 상태를 평 가하였으며, 혈장 유기성분인 glucose는 유의적인 증가를 나타내었다(p < 0.05). 혈장 효소성분 을 통해 수인성 질산 노출로 인한 간 손상도 및 효소 활성의 변화를 평가하였으며, 혈장 효소 성분인 AST, ALT 및 ALP는 높은 수준의 수인성 질산 노출에서 유의적으로 감소하였다(p < 0.05). 본 연구의 결과는 C. carpio nudus에 대한 수인성 질산 노출이 생존율, 혈액학적 성상 및 혈장성분에 독성으로 영향을 미칠 수 있음을 의미한다.