With the growth of the manufacturing industry, the demand for alloy materials with high hardness, toughness, and impact strength has increased. Since products from such alloy materials are extremely difficult to manufacture with high accuracy and reduced surface roughness using traditional machining techniques, wire electric discharge machining can be used to machine such complex parts with more precision. In this case-study-based research, machining factors such as current, pulse-on time, and voltage are studied to determine their effects on the material removal rate for AISI 1045 medium carbon steel. The Taguchi L9 orthogonal array is used in the design of experiments for optimization. Statistical techniques such as analysis of variance and signal-to-noise ratio are used to identify the control parameters that matter most in bringing about optimal results. Based on the results, the current is the most crucial control variable in this investigation. Moreover, the maximum material removal rate obtained was 0.7112 mm3/min with the obtained optimized values of current (I) = 16 A, voltage (V) = 50 V, and pulse-on time (Ton) = 100 µs.

The field of supercapacitors consistently focuses on research and challenges to improve energy efficiency, capacitance, flexibility, and stability. Low-cost laser-induced graphene (LIG) offers a promising alternative to commercially available graphene for next-generation wearable and portable devices, thanks to its remarkable specific surface area, excellent mechanical flexibility, and exceptional electrical properties. We report on the development of LIG-based flexible supercapacitors with optimized geometries, which demonstrate high capacitance and energy density while maintaining flexibility and stability. Three-dimensional porous graphene films were synthesized, and devices with optimized parameters were fabricated and tested. One type of device utilized LIG, while two other types were fabricated on LIG by coating multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) at varying concentrations. Characterization techniques, including scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, and voltammetry, were employed to analyze the fabricated devices. AFM analysis revealed a surface roughness of 2.03 µm for LIG due to laser treatment. SEM images displayed compact, dense, and porous surface morphology. XRD analysis confirmed the presence of graphene and graphene oxide, which was further supported by energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) data. Raman spectroscopy indicated that the fabricated samples exhibited distinct D and G bands at 1362 cm–1 and 1579 cm–1, respectively. Cyclic voltammetry (CV) results showed that LIG's capacitance, power density, and energy density were 6.09 mF cm–2, 0.199 mW cm–2, and 3.38 µWh cm–2, respectively, at a current density of 0.2 mA cm–2. The LIG-MWCNT coated electrode exhibited a higher energy density of 6.05 µWh cm–2 and an areal-specific capacitance of 51.975 mF cm–2 compared to the LIG-based devices. The fabricated device has potential applications in smart electronics, nanorobotics, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), and wearable and portable electronics.

The understanding of the growth and morphological evolution of nanoclusters with process parameters such as ion source geometry, voltage, current, time, and gas pressure are highly important to achieve their desired sizes, morphology, and concentration. Carbon nanoclusters (0-dimensional) were synthesized using the DC glow discharge technique at different process parameters (such as Ne-gas pressures, current, voltage, etc.) using custom fabricated graphite ion sources of cylindrical and U-shaped geometries. The morphology and density of carbon nanoclusters were studied with an atomic force microscope (AFM) to understand their evolution at different process parameters. The study suggests that the U-shaped hollow cathode ion source produces tiny carbon nanoclusters at greater concentration as compared to the cylindrical cathode. Similarly, the density of tiny nanoclusters enhances greatly with the increasing pressures (e.g., 75 mbar). In addition, the AFM morphology of the nanoclusters shows that they are more agglomerated at relatively lower pressure (e.g., 25 mbar). This may be due to the higher fragmentation of carbon soot with the increasing pressure because of more collisions among gas molecules and carbonaceous species. At controlled and optimized Ne-gas pressures and source geometry, carbon nanoclusters of the desired sizes can be fabricated, which may become promising candidates for nanoscale electronics, optoelectronic, and spintronic devices.

Recently, we are facing a notable surge in the demand for the development of new materials with high specific capacitance and lower over-potentials for advanced energy storage and electrocatalytic water splitting applications. Here, we report nanocomposite electrode materials composed of 2-dimensional Ti3C2Tx MXene and BiFeO3 nanoparticles with high specific capacitance and energy density. Ti3C2Tx was etched from Ti3SiC2 using the hydrothermal method. BiFeO3 nanoparticles were synthesized using sol-gel technique. The nanocomposite was synthesized using a straightforward and cost-effective double-solvent solvothermal method, and it was characterized using XRD, SEM, EDX, FTIR, and Raman spectroscopy. Three kinds of nanocomposites were synthesized with different concentrations of BiFeO3 nanoparticles. The cyclic voltammetry measurements revealed that the nanocomposite with optimized composition exhibited superior capacitive behaviour when compared to the individual components i-e- Ti3C2Tx and BiFeO3, with a specific capacitance of 420 F/g and a specific energy density of 90.6 J/g at a scan rate of 2 mV/sec. The nanocomposite exhibits a low charge transfer resistance of 1.485 Ω, making it a suitable candidate for electrode of supercapacitors. Additionally, the MXene and BFO nanocomposite showed improved HER and OER performance, with low overpotentials of 24.6 mV and 574.9 mV, respectively, at a current density of 10 mAcm−2 for 18 hrs. The strong electronic coupling between MXene nanosheets and BFO nanoparticles accelerates OER and HER kinetics and increasing its potential use in electrocatalytic applications.