Bulletin of Materials Science

Volume 32, No. 1, February 2009

CONTENTS

Cover: Microstructure of sintered titania sample (microwave). For details, see p. 5.

Review – Microwave Processing
Prospects of microwave processing: An overview
S Das, A K Mukhopadhyay, S Datta and D Basu	1

Thin Films and Nanomatter
2-Methoxycycloocta-1,5-dienyl platinum complexes as precursors for platinum nanoparticles
Ninad Ghavale, Sandip Dey, Vimal K Jain and R Tewari	15
Modeling nano-scale grain growth of intermetallics
Mohsen Kazeminezhad	19
Preparation and characterization of nanostructured ZnO thin films for photoelectrochemical splitting of water
Monika Gupta, Vidhika Sharma, Jaya Shrivastava, Anjana Solanki, A P Singh, V R Satsangi, S Dass and Rohit Shrivasta	23
Wavelength dependent laser-induced etching of Cr–O doped GaAs: Morphology studies by SEM and AFM
B Joshi, S S Islam, H S Mavi, Vinita Kumari, T Islam, A K Shukla and Harsh	31
Structural, optical and electrical properties of chemically deposited copper selenide films
R H Bari, V Ganesan, S Potadar and L A Patil	37
Structural characterization of lead sulfide thin films by means of X-ray line profile analysis
N Choudhury and B K Sarma	43

Composites
Fabrication and characterization of S. cilliare fibre reinforced polymer composites
A S Singha and Vijay Kumar Thakur	49
Effect of ellipse orientation on the thermoelastic behaviour of skew laminated composite plate with elliptical cutout
M S R Niranjan Kumar, M M M Sarcar, V Bala Krishna Murthy and K M Rao	59

Influence of fibre-surface treatment on structural, thermal and mechanical properties of jute fibre and its composite
E Sinha and S K Rout	65
Effects of fibre content on mechanical properties and fracture behaviour of short carbon fibre reinforced geopolymer matrix composites
Tiesong Lin, Dechang Jia, Meirong Wang, Peigang He and Defu Liang	77

Ceramics and Glasses
Enhancement in electrical conductivity of Li₂O:B₂O₃:V₂O₅ glasses
R S Gedam and V K Deshpande	83
Study of variation of thermal diffusivity of advanced composite materials of E-glass fibre reinforced plastic (GFRP) in temperature range 5–300 K
Kalobaran Das, S M Kamaruzzaman, Tapas Ranjan Middya and Siddhartha Datta	89
Influence of seeding on crystallization behaviour of BaNaB₉O₁₅ glasses
Rahul Vaish and K B R Varma	93
Effect of substitution of titanium by magnesium and niobium on structure and piezoelectric properties in (Bi_1/2Na_1/2)TiO₃ ceramics
Zhou Chang-Rong, Liu Xin-Yu, Li Wei-Zhou and Yuan Chang-Lai	99

Single Crystals
X-ray absorption spectroscopy of PbMoO₄single crystals
D Bhattacharyya, A K Poswal, S N Jha, Sangeeta and S C Sabharwal	103
Growth, characterization and transport properties of Pb_xZn_1–xS mixed crystals
M Nagabhushanam, E Nagabushan, D Jaya Prakash, B Rajam and K Yadaiah	109