This work summarizes the design and construction of the first Iranian 115 kJ Mather type plasma focus (PF) machine (IR-MPF-100). This machine consists of a 6.25 cm radius and 22 cm height brass made anode with a 50 mm height insulator which separates the anode and cathode electrodes. Twelve copper made 22 cm height rods play the role of cathode with 10.2 cm radius. Twenty four 6 lF capacitors were used with the maximum charging voltage of 40 kV (maximum energy of 115 kJ) as the capacitor bank and maximum theoretical current around 1.224 MA. The total inductance of the system is 120 nH. By using NE-102 plastic Scintillator, Rogowski coil, current and voltage probes, hard X-ray, current derivative, current and voltage signals of IR-MPF-100 were measured. The primary result of neutron detection by neutron activation counter represents approximately 10 9 neutrons per shot at 65 kJ discharge energy while using deuterium filling gas. Also IR-MPF-100 PF has been tested successfully at 90 kJ by using the argon gas.
Ongoing technological advancements continually increase the demand for energy. Among various types of energy harvesting systems, biologically based systems have been an area of increasing interest for the past couple of decades. Such systems provide clean, safe power solutions, mainly for low-and ultralow-power applications. The microphotosynthetic power cell (μPSC) is one such system that make use of photosynthetic living cells or organisms to generate power. For strong performance, μPSC technology, because of its interdisciplinary nature, requires optimal engineering of both electrochemical cell design and the culture conditions of the photosynthetic microorganisms. We present here a simple, economical culture method for the photosynthetic microorganism Chlamydomonas reinhardtii suitable for the application of this biologically based power system in any geographical location. This article provides a series of protocols for preparing materials and culture medium designed to facilitate the culture of a suitable C. reinhardtii strain even in a non-biological laboratory. Possible challenges and methods to overcome them are also discussed. Cultured C. reinhardtii perform sufficiently well that they have already been successfully utilized to generate power from a μPSC, generating a peak power of 200 μW from just 2 ml of exponential-phase algal culture in a μPSC with an active electrode surface area of 4.84 cm 2 . The μPSC thus has potentially broad applications in low-and ultra-low-power devices and sensors.
Introduction: The ever-growing need for energy is becoming an inevitable concern in today’s life. Amongst various source of new energy sources and more specifically energy harvesting systems, the biological-base energy harvesters have been attracting attentions within the past few years. Utilization of photosynthetic microorganisms as the heart of energy harvesting system is a new technology which is still under development and study. Micro photosynthetic power cell (mPSC) is one such system that works based on harvesting electricity from the photosynthesis of living microalgae culture which has been under study for several years[1].There are several advantages in implementing mPSC over other conventional energy harvesting systems including photovoltaic power cell and this is due their nature of operation. mPSC technology is cleaner than many other energy harvesting systems as it uses biological organisms as the main source of energy. Moreover, mPSC can operate in both light and dark conditions which makes it a reliable source for low-power applications and sensors that requires continuous power supply. Due to the newness of this technology, the development and optimization of these systems are still in research. Principle of Operation: Micro photosynthetic power cell (uPSC) is an electrochemical cell that produces electricity at micro scale. During the light condition, a living microorganism culture use light to consume carbon dioxide and water to produce electricity and during dark condition, the produced glucose, disintegrates with the help of oxygen and as a result, the electrical power will be generated[2].Figure 1 provides a general schematic of the operation of uPSC. Same as the regular fuel cells, mPSC consists of two chambers known as anode and cathode chambers which are separated with a proton exchange membrane (PEM). PEM is responsible for letting positive hydrogen ions, more specifically protons to pass through itself from anode side to cathode side. On both sides of the membrane, porous electrodes have been placed to collect electrons from anode and release them in cathode chamberIn anode chamber, microorganisms which in this research is living microalgae culture perform photosynthesis in which during a complicated process, electrons and positive ions released. The released electrons near membrane surface then will be transferred to an external circuit for power generation. During the daytime, the cells do photosynthesis and in dark condition, they reverse the process also known as respiration and electrons will be released during both the processes.In the cathode side, the electrons will reduce the catholyte Potassium Ferricyanide to Potassium Ferrocyanide. In the same time, the transferred protons will oxidize back the reduced catholyte and with their combination with oxygen, water will be released. Methodology: This paper, discusses the simulation of the uPSC using COMSOL Multiphysics in a similar way as with the general fuel cell operating concepts. The geometry is provided in Figure 2. This simu...
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