• Carbon letters
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• v.21
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• pp.51-60
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• 2017

Isotropic pitch-based fibers produced from coal tar pitch with the melt-blowing method were carbonized at temperatures ranging from 800 to $1600^{\circ}C$ to investigate their crystalline structure and physical properties as a function of the carbonization temperature. The in-plane crystallite size ($L_a$) of the carbonized pitch fiber from X-ray diffraction increased monotonously by increasing the carbonization temperature resulting in a gradual increase in the electrical conductivity from 169 to 3800 S/cm. However, the variation in the $d_{002}$ spacing and stacking height of the crystallite ($L_c$) showed that the structural order perpendicular to the graphene planes got worse in carbonization temperatures from 800 to $1200^{\circ}C$ probably due to randomization through the process of gas evolution; however, structural ordering eventually occurred at around $1400^{\circ}C$. For the carbonized pitch powder without stabilization, structural ordering perpendicular to the graphene planes occurred at around $800-900^{\circ}C$ indicating that oxygen was inserted during the stabilization process. Additionally, the shear stress that occurred during the melt-blowing process might interfere with the crystallization of the CPF.

• Carbon letters
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.230-235
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• 2012

In this study, reduced graphene oxide/polyimide (r-GO/PI) composite films, which showed significant enhancement in their electrical conductivity, were successfully fabricated. GO was prepared from graphite using a modified Hummers method. The GO was used as a nanofiller material for the preparation of r-GO/PI composites by in-situ polymerization. An addition of 20 wt% of GO led to a significant decrease in the volume resistivity of composite films by less than nine orders of magnitude compared to that of pure PI films due to the electrical percolation networks of reduced GO created during imidization within the films. A tensile test indicated that the Young's modulus of the r-GO/PI composite film containing 20 wt% GO increased drastically from 2.3 GPa to 4.4 GPa, which was an improvement of approximately 84% compared to that of pure PI film. In addition, the corresponding tensile strength was found to have decreased only by 12%, from 113 MPa to 99 MPa.

• Current Optics and Photonics
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• v.1 no.5
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• pp.514-524
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• 2017

We proposed an integrated wavelength-selective photodetector based on a grating-assisted contradirectional coupler and a graphene absorption layer for a coarse wavelength division multiplexing (CWDM) communication system. The center wavelength of the absorption spectrum of the proposed device can be tuned simply by changing the period of the grating, and the proposed device structure is suitable to forming a cascaded structure. Therefore, an array of the proposed device of different grating periods can be used for simultaneous wavelength demultiplexing and signal detection in a CWDM communication system. Our theoretical study showed that the designed device with a grating length of $500{\mu}m$ could have an absorption of 95.1%, an insertion loss of 0.2 dB, and a 3 dB bandwidth of 7.5 nm, resulting in a -14 dB crosstalk to adjacent CWDM channels. We believe that the proposed device array can provide a compact and economic solution to receiver implementation in the CWDM system by combining functions of wavelength demultiplexing and signal detection.

• Journal of the Optical Society of Korea
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.5-9
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• 2013

We report on high-power continuous-wave operations of an Er:YAG ceramic laser in-band pumped by a cladding-pumped Er,Yb fiber laser at 1532 nm. With an output coupler of 10% transmission, the ceramic laser yielded 16.7 W of continuous-wave output at 1645 nm for 28.8 W of incident pump power, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 61.0% with respect to the incident pump power. The lasing wavelength switched to 1617 nm when output couplers of > 20% transmission were used. Up to 16.2 W of 1617 nm output was generated for 33.0 W of incident pump power, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 51.8%. Graphene Q-switched operation of Er:YAG cermic laser at 1645 nm was also demonstrated with stable pulses of 30-74 kHz repetition rates and 1.5-6.4 ${\mu}s$ pulse widths.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.02a
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• pp.559-559
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• 2012

We developed a new scheme for the highly sensitive near-field scanning optical microscope (NSOM) by using a dithering sample stage rather than a dithering probe. In the proposed scheme, the sample is directly loaded on one prong surface of a dithering bare tuning fork. Gap control between probe and sample is performed by detecting the shear force between an immobile fiber probe and the dithering sample. In a conventional NSOM, the Q factor drastically decreases from 7783 to 1000 or even to 100 by attaching a probe to the tuning fork. In our proposed NSOM, on the contrary, the Q factor does not change significantly, 7783 to 7480, when the sample is loaded directly to the tuning fork instead of attaching a probe. Consequently, the graphene sheets that cannot be observed by a conventional NSOM were clearly observed by the proposed method with sub-nanometer vertical resolution due to the extremely high Q factor.

• Carbon letters
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.223-228
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• 2011

In this present work, the effect of additional heat-treatment (AHT) in the range from $1800^{\circ}C$ to $2400^{\circ}C$ on the chemical composition, morphology, microstructure, tensile properties, electrical resistivity, and thermal stability of commercial polyacrylonitrile (PAN)-based carbon fibers was explored by means of elemental analysis, electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction analysis, single fiber tensile testing, two-probe electrical resistivity testing, and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). The characterization results were in agreement with each other. The results clearly demonstrated that AHTs up to $2400^{\circ}C$ played a significant role in further contributing not only to the enhancement of carbon content, fiber morphology, and tensile modulus, but also to the reduction of fiber diameter, inter-graphene layer distance, and electrical resistivity of "as-received" carbon fibers without AHT. The present study suggests that key properties of commercial PAN-based carbon fibers of an intermediate grade can be further improved by proprietarily adding heat-treatment without applying tension in a batch process.

• Composites Research
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.109-114
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• 2014

Manufacture of nancomposites has simple process for developing nanocomposites due to the increasing applications using nanofillers. This work studied nanofiller coated glass fiber for reinforcing material with good wetting and conductivity and the morphology of nanofiller coated glass fiber was analyzed by FE-SEM. The durability of reinforced glass fiber was investigated with different shapes of nanofillers using sonication rinsing method. Fatigue test was performed to evaluate the adhesion of reinforcing interface and stability of nanofiller coating layer for single fiber reinforced composites. Apparent modulus and conductivity of nanofiller coating layer were evaluated to realize multifunctional of nanocomposites. Fiber type of nanofiller was better than plate type due to better cohesion between fiber and nanofillers. At last, the stability of fiber type nanofiller of coating layer has better durability and conductivity than plate type case.

• Composites Research
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.91-100
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• 2020

Polyphenylene sulfide (PPS) is a semi-crystalline engineering thermoplastic resin that has outstanding thermal stability, mechanical strength, inherent flame retardancy, chemical resistance, and electrical properties. Due to these outstanding properties, it is preferred as a matrix for composite materials. Many studies have been conducted to produce composites with carbon fibers and glass fibers to improve mechanical properties and provide functionality of PPS. In this review paper, we report a brief introduction to the fabrication and applications of PPS composites with carbon nanotubes, graphene, carbon fibers, and glass fibers.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.151-157
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• 2014

In this study, the nanofiber composite membrane was prepared by electrospinning method with poly (ancrylonitrile) (PAN) and a dispersed solution of graphene oxide (GO) and $Fe_3O_4$ functionalized graphene oxide (M-GO) in dimethyl formamide (DMF). The pore-diameter of prepared membranes was controlled by change of those layers. It was confirmed with SEM that the nanofiber composite membranes having fiber size of 500 nm were prepared. It was found with Raman spectroscopy and EDS that GO and M-GO were well dispersed on those membranes. Final nanofiber composite membrane showed the similar pore properties ($0.21{\sim}0.24{\mu}m$/pore-size, 40% porosity) with the commercial membrane ($0.27{\mu}m$/pore-size, 55% porosity) and their water-flux results also showed the 200% higher flux than its PAN membrane. From these results, it was expected that the nanofiber composite membrane prepared by electrospinning method could be utilized as a water-treatment membrane.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.293-306
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• 2020

Increasing harmful effects of climate change, such as its effect on water scarcity, has led to a focus on developing effective water purification methods to obtain pure water. Additionally, rising levels of water pollution is increasing levels of environmental degradation, calling for sources of water treatment to remove contaminants. To purify water, osmotic processes across a semipermeable membrane can take place, and recent studies are showing that incorporating nanoparticles, including carbon quantum dots (CQDs), graphene carbon dots (GQDs), and graphene oxide quantum dots (GOQDs) are making thin film composite (TFC) membranes more effective by increasing water flux while maintaining similar levels of salt rejection, increasing the hydrophilicity of the membrane surface, showing bactericidal properties, exhibiting antifouling properties to prevent accumulation of bacteria or other microorganisms from reducing the effectiveness of the membrane, and more. In the review, the synthesis process, applications, functionality, properties, and the role of several types of quantum dots are discussed in the composite membrane for water purification.