Mechanical Characterization of Pharmaceutical Powders by Nanoindentation and Correlation with Their Behavior during Grinding.

Controlling the size of powder particles is pivotal in the design of many pharmaceutical forms and the related manufacturing processes and plants. One of the most common techniques for particle size reduction in the process industry is powder milling, whose efficiency relates to the mechanical properties of the powder particles themselves. In this work, we first characterize the elastic and plastic responses of different pharmaceutical powders by measuring their Young modulus, the hardness, and the brittleness index via nano-indentation. Subsequently, we analyze the behavior of those powder samples during comminution via jet mill in different process conditions. Finally, the correlation between the single particle mechanical properties and the milling process results is illustrated; the possibility to build a predictive model for powder grindability, based on nano-indentation data, is critically discussed.

Friction and adhesion mediated by supramolecular host-guest complexes.

The adhesive and frictional response of an AFM tip connected to a substrate through supramolecular host-guest complexes is investigated by dynamic Monte Carlo simulations. Here, the variation of the pull-off force with the unloading rate recently observed in experiments is unraveled by evidencing simultaneous (progressive) breaking of the bonds at fast (slow) rates. The model reveals the origin of the observed plateaus in the retraction force as a function of the tip-surface distance, showing that they result from the tip geometrical features. In lateral sliding, the model exhibits a wide range of dynamic behaviors ranging from smooth sliding to stick-slip at different velocities, with the average friction force determined by the characteristic formation/rupture rates of the complexes. In particular, it is shown that for some molecular complexes friction can become almost constant over a wide range of velocities. Also, we show the possibility of exploiting the ageing effect through slide-hold-slide experiments, in order to infer the characteristic formation rate. Finally, our model predicts a novel "anti-ageing" effect which is characterized by a decrease of the static friction force with the hold time. Such an effect is explained in terms of enhancement of adhesion during sliding, especially observed at high driving velocities.

Superlubricity of graphene nanoribbons on gold surfaces.

The state of vanishing friction known as superlubricity has important applications for energy saving and increasing the lifetime of devices. Superlubricity, as detected with atomic force microscopy, appears when sliding large graphite flakes or gold nanoclusters across surfaces, for example. However, the origin of the behavior is poorly understood because of the lack of a controllable nanocontact. We demonstrated the superlubricity of graphene nanoribbons when sliding on gold with a joint experimental and computational approach. The atomically well-defined contact allows us to trace the origin of superlubricity, unraveling the role played by ribbon size and elasticity, as well as by surface reconstruction. Our results pave the way to the scale-up of superlubricity and thus to the realization of frictionless coatings.

Scalar model for frictional precursors dynamics.

Recent experiments indicate that frictional sliding occurs by nucleation of detachment fronts at the contact interface that may appear well before the onset of global sliding. This intriguing precursory activity is not accounted for by traditional friction theories but is extremely important for friction dominated geophysical phenomena as earthquakes, landslides or avalanches. Here we simulate the onset of slip of a three dimensional elastic body resting on a surface and show that experimentally observed frictional precursors depend in a complex non-universal way on the sample geometry and loading conditions. Our model satisfies Archard's law and Amontons' first and second laws, reproducing with remarkable precision the real contact area dynamics, the precursors' envelope dynamics prior to sliding, and the normal and shear internal stress distributions close to the interfacial surface. Moreover, it allows to assess which features can be attributed to the elastic equilibrium, and which are attributed to the out-of-equilibrium dynamics, suggesting that precursory activity is an intrinsically quasi-static physical process. A direct calculation of the evolution of the Coulomb stress before and during precursors nucleation shows large variations across the sample, explaining why earthquake forecasting methods based only on accumulated slip and Coulomb stress monitoring are often ineffective.

Critical length limiting superlow friction.

Since the demonstration of superlow friction (superlubricity) in graphite at nanoscale, one of the main challenges in the field of nano- and micromechanics was to scale this phenomenon up. A key question to be addressed is to what extent superlubricity could persist, and what mechanisms could lead to its failure. Here, using an edge-driven Frenkel-Kontorova model, we establish a connection between the critical length above which superlubricity disappears and both intrinsic material properties and experimental parameters. A striking boost in dissipated energy with chain length emerges abruptly due to a high-friction stick-slip mechanism caused by deformation of the slider leading to a local commensuration with the substrate lattice. We derived a parameter-free analytical model for the critical length that is in excellent agreement with our numerical simulations. Our results provide a new perspective on friction and nanomanipulation and can serve as a theoretical basis for designing nanodevices with superlow friction, such as carbon nanotubes.

Does rotational melting make molecular crystal surfaces more slippery?

The surface of a crystal made of roughly spherical molecules exposes, above its bulk rotational phase transition at T = Tr, a carpet of freely rotating molecules, possibly functioning as "nanobearings" in sliding friction. We explored by extensive molecular dynamics simulations the frictional and adhesion changes experienced by a sliding C60 flake on the surface of the prototype system C60 fullerite. At fixed flake orientation both quantities exhibit only a modest frictional drop of order 20% across the transition. However, adhesion and friction drop by a factor of ∼2 as the flake breaks its perfect angular alignment with the C60 surface lattice suggesting an entropy-driven aligned-misaligned switch during pull-off at Tr. The results can be of relevance for sliding Kr islands, where very little frictional differences were observed at Tr, but also to the sliding of C60-coated tip, where a remarkable factor ∼2 drop has been reported.

Role of interface coupling inhomogeneity in domain evolution in exchange bias.

Models of exchange-bias in thin films have been able to describe various aspects of this technologically relevant effect. Through appropriate choices of free parameters the modelled hysteresis loops adequately match experiment, and typical domain structures can be simulated. However, the use of these parameters, notably the coupling strength between the systems' ferromagnetic (F) and antiferromagnetic (AF) layers, obscures conclusions about their influence on the magnetization reversal processes. Here we develop a 2D phase-field model of the magnetization process in exchange-biased CoO/(Co/Pt)×n that incorporates the 10 nm-resolved measured local biasing characteristics of the antiferromagnet. Just three interrelated parameters set to measured physical quantities of the ferromagnet and the measured density of uncompensated spins thus suffice to match the experiment in microscopic and macroscopic detail. We use the model to study changes in bias and coercivity caused by different distributions of pinned uncompensated spins of the antiferromagnet, in application-relevant situations where domain wall motion dominates the ferromagnetic reversal. We show the excess coercivity can arise solely from inhomogeneity in the density of biasing- and anti-biasing pinned uncompensated spins in the antiferromagnet. Counter to conventional wisdom, irreversible processes in the latter are not essential.

Optical properties of emeraldine salt polymers from ab initio calculations: comparison with recent experimental data.

We present the absorption coefficient alpha(omega), the transverse dielectric function epsilon(omega), the optical conductivity sigma(omega), and the reflectance R(omega) calculated for an emeraldine salt conducting polymer in its crystalline 3D polaronic structure. We utilize Kohn-Sham density functional theory (DFT) electronic wavefunctions and energies implemented in the expression of the macroscopic transverse dielectric function in the framework of the band theory without the electron-hole interaction. Contributions of intra-band transitions are taken into account by adding a Drude-like term to the dielectric function calculated ab initio. Comparison with optical properties, recently measured on high-quality emeraldine salts (Lee, K.; Cho, S.; Park, S. H.; Heeger, A. J.; Lee, C.-W.; Lee, S. H. Nature 2006, 441, 65), and with optical absorption spectra, recorded on other emeraldine salts, is very satisfactory. The calculated spectra are discussed in terms of energy-band structure, density of states, inter- and intra-band transitions, and transverse dielectric function.