An interpretation of solid surfaces is generated based on physical considerations and the laws of thermodynamics. Like the widely used Owens–Wendt (OW) method, the proposed method uses liquids for characterization. Each liquid provides an absolute lower bound on the surface energy with some uncertainty from measurement variations. If multiple liquids are employed, the largest lower bound is taken as the most accurate, with uncertainty due to measurement errors. The more liquids used, the more accurate is the greatest lower bound. This method links generalizations of the Good–Girifalco equation with a general thermodynamic inequality relating the three‐interfacial tensions in a three‐phase equilibrium system. The method always satisfies this inequality with better than a 65% certainty. However, the OW seldom, if ever, conforms to this inequality and even then, the degree of satisfaction is insignificant. A reconciliation of the two methods is proposed based on rescaling the OW surface energies to conform to the inequality. This enables interpretations of dispersion and polar components of the surface energy, which are thermodynamically self‐consistent. The proposed method is also capable of dealing with material exchange between liquid and solid phases, when the surface tension and contact angle of the saturated liquids can be measured.

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The reduction and efficiency of fertilizer use has been a recent focus of governments and scholars. As a new agricultural technology, controlled-release fertilizer can not only increase yield and save labor, but also improve efficiency and reduce the use of fertilizer, thus promoting sustainable agricultural development. Drawing on a sample of 231 farmers of Jiangsu Province, China, this paper applies a probit model to assess the adoption behavior of controlled-release fertilizer by large-scale households in terms of three dimensions of social network, i.e., communication intensity, trust level, and network size, specifically exploring how science popularization influences their adoption intention, and comparing the heterogeneity of impact that social network has on the adoption intention of farmers when the information is obtained adequately or not. The empirical results demonstrate that: (1) At the early stage of technology diffusion, the size of social network has a positive effect on farmers’ cognition of controlled-release fertilizer, and the communication intensity with neighboring farmers has a positive effect on the adoption behavior of controlled-release fertilizer; (2) Farmers’ adoption intention of controlled-release fertilizer is significantly influenced by their original knowledge of new technology and science popularization; (3) When the information is sufficient, the social network of large-scale households has no significant effect on their willingness to adopt. Therefore, in promoting controlled-release fertilizer, the government should highlight the synergistic effect of farmers’ cognition and science popularization activities, fully consider the characteristics of farmers’ social network, facilitate the infrastructure of rural informatization, and regulate the agricultural promotion networks so that farmers can obtain sufficient and effective information.

Photoreceptor degeneration diseases, such as retinitis pigmentosa and age-related macular degeneration, are major causes of blindness. Photovoltaic devices or materials activates retinal cells in response to light, hence are promising retinal prosthesis in treating blind patients. The restoration of image-forming vision with high sensitivity is the key. Here we demonstrated that Au nanoparticle-coated titania (TiO2-x) nanowire (NW) arrays can restore vision in blind mice and non-human primates with photoreceptor degeneration. We first showed that blind mice with subretinal implant of NW arrays were capable of detecting static, moving and flashing objects with low light intensity threshold for 22 months, having a visual acuity of 0.3 cpd (0.4 cpd in normal mice). Results in chronic in vivo calcium imaging in primary visual cortex (V1) collectively suggested the plastic change in V1 neurons as well as the improvement in visual information encoding for natural images after NW implant. What’s more, macaque monkeys with subretinal implant of NW arrays were capable of detecting an LED of 0.5º in diameter at 10 μW·mm-2 in visually-guided saccade experiments. Our findings opened up the possibility to utilize nanomaterials as artificial photoreceptors to ameliorate visual deficits of patients with photoreceptor degeneration.