Thermal interface materials with high thermal conductivity and low hardness are crucial to the heat dissipation of high-power electronics. In this study, a high magnetic field was used to align the milled carbon fibers (CFs, 150 μm) in silicone rubber matrix to fabricate thermal interface materials with an ordered and discontinuous structure. The relationship among the magnetic field density, the alignment degree of CFs, and the properties of the resulting composites was explored by experimental study and theoretical analysis. The results showed higher alignment degree and enhanced thermal conductivity of composites under increased magnetic flux density within a certain curing time. When the magnetic flux density increased to 9 T, the CFs showed perfect alignment and the composite showed a high thermal conductivity of 11.76 W/(m·K) with only 20 vol% CF loading, owing to the ordered structure. Meanwhile, due to the low filler loading and discontinuous structure, a low hardness of 60~70 (shore 00) was also realized. Their thermal management performance was further confirmed in a test system, revealing promising applications for magnetic aligned CF–rubber composites in thermal interface materials.

Emerging as a light, flexible and highly thermally conductive material, graphene-based membranes have attracted extensive attention in thermal management field. However, the preparation of high-quality graphene-based membranes usually involves complex processes and thermal annealing at ultra-high temperature, which limits their large-scale application in thermal management field. In our study, reduced graphene oxide-Ni-hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose (RGO-Ni-HPMC) composite membrane was prepared from catalytic pyrolysis of hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose (HPMC) with Ni nanoparticles to generate multilayer graphene and form phonon transport channels between adjacent graphene layers. Further, our study shows that the RGO-Ni-HPMC composite membrane has a good heat dissipation effect at the hot spots at high temperature. The average temperature of hot spots is reduced by 11.5 °C. It is expected to solve the heat dissipation problem of high-power electronic equipment.

The effect of 0–1.0 at.% Al additions on grain refinement and phase transformation of the Mg-2.0Gd-1.2Y-0.5Zn-0.2Mn (at.%) alloy containing a long period stacking ordered (LPSO) phase was investigated in this work. The addition of Al promoted the formation of the Al₂RE phase in the Mg-2.0Gd-1.2Y-0.5Zn-0.2Mn (at.%) alloy, and the dominant secondary phases in the as-cast Mg-2.0Gd-1.2Y-0.5Zn-0.2Mn-1.0Al (at.%) alloy were the Mg₃RE phase, LPSO phase, and Al₂RE phase. With increased Al addition, the area fraction of the Al₂RE phase increased monotonously, while the area fraction of LPSO phase and Mg₃RE phase decreased gradually. The orientation relationship between the Al₂RE phase and the α-Mg matrix was determined to be _Al2RE//_α-Mg, {101}_Al2RE//{10$\overline{1}$0}_α-Mg, which was not affected by Zn and Mn concentrations in the Al₂RE phase. Since the Al₂RE particles with a size more than 6 μm located at the center of grains could act as nucleants for α-Mg grains, the average grain size of the as-cast alloys decreased from 276 μm to 49 μm after 1.0% Al addition. The effect of the Al addition on the grain refinement of the Mg-2.0Gd-1.2Y-0.5Zn-0.2Mn alloy was comparable to that of the Zr refined counterpart.

As an alternative route for aromatics and hydrogen production, methane dehydroaromatization (MDA) is of significant academic and industrial interest due to the abundance of natural gas resources and the intensive demand for aromatics and CO_x-free hydrogen. In the present work, a simulation study on MDA in membrane reactors (MRs) was performed with the aim of co-producing aromatics and CO_x-free hydrogen with a highly improved efficiency. The effects of various parameters, including catalytic activity, membrane flux and selectivity, as well as the operating conditions on the MR performance were discussed with respect to methane conversion, hydrogen yield, and hydrogen purity. The results show that catalytic activity and membrane flux and selectivity have significant impacts on CH₄ conversion and H₂ yield, whereas H₂ purity is mainly dominated by membrane selectivity. A highly improved MDA is confirmed to be feasible at a relatively low temperature and a high feed pressure because of the hydrogen extraction effect. To further improve MDA in MRs by intensifying H₂ extraction, a simple configuration combining a fixed-bed reactor (FBR) and an MR together is proposed for MDA, which demonstrates good potential for the high-efficiency co-production of aromatics and CO_x-free hydrogen.