TY - JOUR A1 - Alexopoulos, Spiros T1 - Biogas systems: basics, biogas multifunction, principle of fermentation and hybrid application with a solar tower for the treatment of waste animal manure JF - Journal of Engineering Science and Technology Review N2 - Two of the main environmental problems of today’s society are the continuously increasing production of organic wastes as well as the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the related green house effect. A way to solve these problems is the production of biogas. Biogas is a combustible gas consisting of methane, carbon dioxide and small amounts of other gases and trace elements. Production of biogas through anaerobic digestion of animal manure and slurries as well as of a wide range of digestible organic wastes and agricultural residues, converts these substrates into electricity and heat and offers a natural fertiliser for agriculture. The microbiological process of decomposition of organic matter, in the absence of oxygen takes place in reactors, called digesters. Biogas can be used as a fuel in a gas turbine or burner and can be used in a hybrid solar tower system offering a solution for waste treatment of agricultural and animal residues. A solar tower system consists of a heliostat field, which concentrates direct solar irradiation on an open volumetric central receiver. The receiver heats up ambient air to temperatures of around 700°C. The hot air’s heat energy is transferred to a steam Rankine cycle in a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG). The steam drives a steam turbine, which in turn drives a generator for producing electricity. In order to increase the operational hours of a solar tower power plant, a heat storage system and/ or hybridization may be considered. The advantage of solar-fossil hybrid power plants, compared to solar-only systems, lies in low additional investment costs due to an adaptable solar share and reduced technical and economical risks. On sunny days the hybrid system operates in a solar-only mode with the central receiver and on cloudy days and at night with the gas turbine only. As an alternative to methane gas, environmentally neutral biogas can be used for operating the gas turbine. Hence, the hybrid system is operated to 100% from renewable energy sources Y1 - 2012 SN - 1791-2377 N1 - Special Issue on Renewable Energy Systems VL - 5 IS - 4 SP - 48 EP - 55 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Aggarwal, P. A1 - Dhiman, S. A1 - Kumar, G. A1 - Scherer, Ulrich W. A1 - Singla, M. L. A1 - Srivastava, A. T1 - Optical study of poly(ethyleneterephthalate) modified by different ionizing radiation dose JF - Indian Journal of Pure and Applied Physics N2 - Thin films of poly(ethyleneterephthalate) [PET]were exposed to radiation dose ranging from 10 to 30 kGy by using gamma rays in the range 12.8-177.8 MGy using swift light ions of hydrogen. There was no effect of the radiation dose on the optical behaviour of PET as a result of exposure to radiation dose up to 30 kGy brought about by gamma rays but a significant decrease in the optical band gap values was observed when PET was exposed to swift light ions of hydrogen. The data obtained are discussed in terms of optical studies carried out on PET using swift heavy ions. Y1 - 2012 SN - 0019-5596 VL - 50 IS - 2 SP - 129 EP - 132 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Achenbach, Timm A1 - Geimer, Konstantin A1 - Lynen, Arthur A1 - Göttsche, Joachim A1 - Hoffschmidt, Bernhard T1 - Simulation of thermo-mechanical processes in open volumetric absorber modules T2 - SolarPaces 2012 : concentrating solar power and chemical energy systems : Sept. 11 - 14 2012, Marrakech, Marokko Y1 - 2012 SP - 1 EP - 8 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Abouzar, Maryam H. A1 - Poghossian, Arshak A1 - Cherstvy, Andrey G. A1 - Pedraza, Angela M. A1 - Ingebrandt, Sven A1 - Schöning, Michael Josef T1 - Label-free electrical detection of DNA by means of field-effect nanoplate capacitors: Experiments and modeling JF - Physica Status Solidi (a) N2 - Label-free electrical detection of consecutive deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) hybridization/denaturation by means of an array of individually addressable field-effect-based nanoplate silicon-on-insulator (SOI) capacitors modified with gold nanoparticles (Au-NP) is investigated. The proposed device detects charge changes on Au-NP/DNA hybrids induced by the hybridization or denaturation event. DNA hybridization was performed in a high ionic-strength solution to provide a high hybridization efficiency. On the other hand, to reduce the screening of the DNA charge by counter ions and to achieve a high sensitivity, the sensor signal induced by the hybridization and denaturation events was measured in a low ionic-strength solution. High sensor signals of about 120, 90, and 80 mV were registered after the DNA hybridization, denaturation, and re-hybridization events, respectively. Fluorescence microscopy has been applied as reference method to verify the DNA immobilization, hybridization, and denaturation processes. An electrostatic charge-plane model for potential changes at the gate surface of a nanoplate field-effect sensor induced by the DNA hybridization has been developed taking into account both the Debye length and the distance of the DNA charge from the gate surface. Y1 - 2012 U6 - http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pssa.201100710 SN - 1862-6319 VL - 209 SP - 925 EP - 934 PB - Wiley-VCH CY - Weinheim ER -