Conveners
Applied Physics
- Alan Matthews (UKZN)
Applied Physics
- phil ferrer (wits)
Applied Physics
- Ernest van Dyk (Mandela University)
Applied Physics
- Trevor Derry (University of the Witwatersrand)
Applied Physics
- Tjaart Krüger (University of Pretoria)
Applied Physics
- Kessie Govender (Cape Peninsula University of Technology)
Applied Physics
- Alan Matthews (UKZN)
Applied Physics
- Trevor Derry (University of the Witwatersrand)
Applied Physics
- Adiel Holtzhausen ()
Applied Physics
- Alan Matthews (UKZN)
Applied Physics
- There are no conveners in this block
Applied Physics
- There are no conveners in this block
This paper introduces our newly constructed solar trough collector featuring a cavity-type receiver design. This prototype has a receiver area of approximately 10kW, and includes an innovative focal length arrangement tailored for cavity-type receivers. A high-temperature pump is used to circulate a mineral oil as the heat transfer fluid. The receiver design incorporates a highly reflective...
An ecological network is typically a system of nutrient transfer between groups of species in an ecosystem. In common with physics, energy and mass are conserved, and transfer across the ecosystem boundaries are tracked. Furthermore, ecologists are concerned with macroscopic variables that characterise the system, including an analogy of entropy to measure the degree of order. Mathematically,...
Cuprous Oxide (Cu2O) nanostructures are known for their wide range of applications in photovoltaic devices, photoelectrochemical (PEC) cells, gas sensing devices and catalysts. They possess unique properties which are beneficial for PEC applications such as tunable narrow bandgaps and suitable band-edge positions. Furthermore, they are abundant and non-toxic in nature. Cu2O nanostructures such...
Due to the accessibility of Na resources and comparable performance to lithium-ion batteries, rechargeable sodium-ion batteries are popular for large-scale electric energy storage and smart grids. attributed by its benefits, NaMnO2 is a promising cathode material for Na-ion rechargeable batteries. However, Na has a lower ionization potential than Li, resulting in lower operating voltages and...
This study presents the activated and background sample activity results of different mined rocks from the Letseng diamond mine and the radiological impact due diligence simulated activation stage of the Mineral-Positron Emission Tomography (Min-PET) technique performed at Aarhus University. The activated and background-specific activities were validated by irradiating the kimberlite rocks...
The utilisation of wind energy has the potential to both alleviate South Africa's energy crisis and increase access to electricity in remote areas that lack connections to the national grid. Wind energy is a clean, abundant, and inexhaustible renewable energy source that can effectively reduce carbon dioxide emissions and mitigate the adverse effects of climate change that South Africa and its...
Detector Control Systems (DCS) and Data AQuisition (DAQ) Systems are susceptible to technological development due to the intricate relationship between their design and currently available hardware. This when coupled to the manner in which particle detectors are required to evolve in order to accommodate ever-increasing instantaneous luminosities provides a unique opportunity for the...
Over the past decade, South Africa has experienced massive scheduled power outages due to the inadequate generation capacity of coal-fired power plants. This ongoing crisis is likely to continue if researchers do not look for alternative methods to solve South Africa's poor energy supply. One alternative solution that could prevent South Africa from this crisis is using clean energy such as...
Diode lasers are compact, low-cost devices that are widely used in many applications requiring coherent light. However, for high precision atomic spectroscopy applications these devices are not suitable due to their large spectral linewidth. The laser wavelength is also dependent on the operating temperature and laser current. One way around the large linewidth problem is to enclose the diode...
Since the late 1990s, laser beam shaping has experienced a surge in activity. With the use of modern digital tools, one has the power to tailor light in its many degrees of freedom (polarisation, amplitude and phase) to create so-called ‘structured light’. In recent years we have seen structured light used in various fields such as optical communication, information processing, detection,...
Vectorial structured light has found numerous applications due to its unique properties and has many advantages over scalar light fields. However, there has been a lot of debate regarding the robustness of these modes to certain aberrations and distortions which has significant implications for the uses of these forms of light, including for communications, imaging and sensing. In this work...
Concrete in nuclear facilities is primarily used to provide structural support, radiation shielding, containment and protection against internal and external hazards. Over its lifetime, the concrete will be exposed to unfavourable conditions such as corrosion, radiation, extremely varying temperatures and cyclic loadings. Exposure to these conditions leads to deterioration and loss of moisture...
Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have attracted considerable attention in recent years as they offer the possibility of low-cost conversion of photovoltaic energy. DSSCs use the dye molecules adsorbed on the TiO2 semiconductor in nanoarchitecture with the role of absorbing photons from the sun. In this study, Density functional theory (DFT) has been used to study the geometric, electronic,...
The development of a Nuclear Orientation (NO) thermometer system for use at the University of Cape Town is essential to address the significant challenge in the accurate measurements at ultra-low temperatures (down to 8mK). A $^{60}CoCo(hcp)$ gamma-ray thermometry source was irradiated using the NECSA SAFARI-1 research reactor for 6 minutes and a preliminary activity value of 1.3 MBq was...
Introduction
However, designing an effective and efficient PV battery charging system requires careful consideration of several factors, including the weather patterns of the region.
Specifically, we focus on modeling the weather patterns of the region and the performance of the PV system under those conditions in order to identify the most suitable system configuration for reliable...
Graphite is the most valuable material with many applications such as lithium-ion batteries as anode material. The increase in demand for storage devices prompted researchers to consider other possible, low cost and commercially viable alternatives to meet the demand. The synthesis and application of biomass as carbon have drawn attention due to the host of biomass available for conversion,...
Abstract
The world is currently battling climate change through various mitigation and adaptation measures. Some of these measures include reducing greenhouse gas emissions, transitioning to renewable energy sources, implementing sustainable agriculture and forestry practices, and enhancing climate resilience in vulnerable communities. The Vuwani area plays a significant role in carbon...
Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) are widely used in particle physics research as a solution to handling complex, sparse, and noisy data. Detectors capture millions of measurements per second, resulting in high-dimensional data that is difficult to analyze.
GNNs allow us to model data as a graph, where each detector component corresponds to a node and edges represent interactions between...
Abstract: South Africa relies heavily on traditional fossil fuel sources, especially coal. The country initiated the production and distribution of several renewable energy technologies to solve the energy problem in rural areas. Biogas has been proven viable and has begun as a promising technology among several technologies. It has been one of the most successful models for producing clean,...
The earth has experienced extreme weather changes due to irresponsible human activities done ignorantly by passengers. The passengers are contaminating the atmosphere with greenhouse gases, polluting the environment with non-degradable materials, not considered renewable and green. This paper presents the status quo of the world methods to produce clean and green energy, with better methods...
South Africa is experiencing acute energy shortages leading to prolonged load shedding. Renewable energy can be a solution to this energy problem. From the renewable energy resources, wind has a great potential of increasing the energy mix and help in abatement of climate change. It is one of the fastest growing energy technologies that can substitute fossil fuels in electricity production....
In the demonstration of safety of a nuclear power plant (NPP), simulations for all plant states (normal operations, anticipated operational occurrences, design-basis accident, and beyond-design-basis accident) play an important role. Therefore, computer codes have been extensively developed to analyse the different aspects of a nuclear reactor. Thermo-hydraulic system codes are used to study...
Airborne transmitted diseases are a public health concern. They are ubiquitous in human’s life and include large variety of diseases such as the common cold, chicken pox, mumps and more serious ones like COVID-19 and tuberculosis. The aforementioned diseases are transmitted through saliva droplets emitted in the environing air. While being airborne, droplets are affected by multiple...
Respiratory diseases propagated by droplet-based transmission are serious public health hazard, leading to pandemics, such as the Coronavirus outbreak. One engineering intervention used to mitigate the spread of droplet-based transmission pathogens is ultraviolet germicidal irradiance (UVGI). The UVGI device is able to disinfect air and surfaces through intense ultraviolet germicidal...
The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation (Necsa) is in the process of establishing a neutron beam line center (NBLC) that will benefit South African researcher community and industries. The NBLC will grow and expand its capabilities at a proposed new build of a multi-purpose reactor facility which will include a cold neutron source. Imaging instruments with neutron/X-ray/gamma source, will...
In order to understand the oxidation of the PtSb2 minerals by either weathering or exposure to air, we considered the adsorption of oxygen molecules on mineral surfaces. The adsorption properties will give more insight into the interaction of the oxygen with the atoms on the surface. Generally, minerals are exposed to atmospheric air during crushing or storage. It had been reported previously...
Understanding and controlling structured light has led to many exciting opportunities in physics, optics, biophysical and related research fields. However, the required technical knowledge to use this promising technology remains an obstacle for non-experts. At Button Optics, we provide turnkey solutions that use digital technology to generate and diagnose structured light. We briefly present...
A low-cost, BPW21 Si-photodiode-driven solar radiometer was designed and used for long-term measurement of global horizontal solar irradiance. This was necessitated by the fact that the Kipp & Zonen CMP11 pyranometer available in the department and used as the secondary standard pyranometer, is expensive for most of our running renewable energy projects. A data acquisition system (DAS) was...
