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Green building materials have drawn more and more attention of the Chinese Government. Carbon footprint research on typical building materials products in China is of great significance to promote the sustainable development of building materials industry and realize the objectives of series actions on carbon dioxide emissions control in China. This paper explores the calculation method for carbon emissions of building materials products by taking rock wool sheet products as an example based on the life cycle idea and the characteristics of China's building materials industry. It also puts forward effective emission reduction suggestions through a comparative analysis of carbon emissions in different stages of rock wool production. The results show that the carbon emissions during the production of rock wool sheet is 1471.77 kgCO2eq/t, in which, the proportion of carbon emissions in the raw materials production stage is the highest, accounting for 58%.

With the emphasis of national policies on green manufacturing and the recognition of the people for green development, expanding the green assessment of products will be the general trend. In this study the life cycle assessment method was used to compile a list of resources, energy consumption and pollutant emissions during the life cycle of typical ordinary gypsum plasterboard and functional phase-change gypsum plasterboard, the key environmental impact indicators of both products during the life cycle calculated, the key stages affecting the environmental performance of products analyzed and identified, and the difference in environmental impacts between phase-change gypsum plasterboard and ordinary gypsum plasterboard compared and analyzed, for guiding the selection of green building materials and the development of ecological building materials. The results show that the global warming potential of phase-change gypsum plasterboard is 3.42 kgCO2 equivalent/m2, the non-renewable resource depletion potential is 2.25×10-5 kgSb equivalent/m2, the respiratory inorganic is 1.97×10-3 kgPM2.5 equivalent/m2, the eutrophication is 1.21×10-3 kgPO43- equivalent/m2, and the acidification is 9.47×10-3 kgSO2 equivalent/m2. Compared with ordinary gypsum plasterboard, the phase-change gypsum plasterboard shows the biggest increase by 874.03% in non-renewable resource depletion potential. The major environmental impact of ordinary gypsum plasterboard in the life cycle is mainly from energy use, and the transport process is the main stage of eutrophication. The use of phase-change materials in the phase-change gypsum plasterboard is the main stage causing environmental impact.

Rapid economic growth is often accompanied by ecological environment problems arising from resource and energy development, industrial production, etc. Consumers are increasingly concerned about environmental problems in consumer markets and prefer to buy "green" products. How consumers identify "green" products and how the country guides in choosing such products have become issues of great concern in the building materials industry. In this paper, the author has built the preliminary quantized model of green product index for sanitary wares by analyzing the green product index of sanitary wares and defining the green attributes of sanitary wares from such four aspects as consume attribute, resource attribute, energy attribute and environmental attribute.

Eleven new species of the ant-loving beetle genus Pselaphodes Westwood, 1870 (Pselaphinae: Tyrini) are described from China: P. aduncus sp. nov. (Yunnan), P. anjiensis sp. nov. (Zhejiang), P. antennarius sp. nov. (Guizhou), P. baoxingensis sp. nov. (Sichuan), P. daweishanus sp. nov. (Yunnan), P. elongatus sp. nov. (Yunnan), P. maolanensis sp. nov. (Guizhou), P. paraculeus sp. nov. (Guangxi, Guizhou), P. posticus sp. nov. (Jiangxi), P. prominulus sp. nov. (Jiangxi, Guangxi), and P. songxiaobini sp. nov. (Xizang). Pselaphodes spinosus Champion, 1925, originally known from northern India, is newly recorded from China (Xizang). Male habitus and major diagnostic characters of all treated species are illustrated. A revised checklist and a map summarizing the distributions of the world species of Pselaphodes are provided.

Next generation 5G millimeter wave (mmWave) communications systems have recently generated a slew of novel device designs and fabrication approaches [1–2]. mmWave antenna on glass substrate with through-glass-vias (TGVs) structure is one of the promising candidates to achieve 2.5D interposer and 3D packaging applications. In this study, we developed a novel approach for fabricating a 1×4 mmWave phased array antenna on a selected low-loss glass substrate with a single (TGV) structure for 28 GHz 5G mmWave wireless communication applications. The new approach includes double-sided PVD Ti/Cu deposition, double-sided highly conformal Cu plating, double-sided lithography, TGV sidewall Cu protection, Ti/Cu wet etching and double-sided photoresist (PR) stripping. In addition, characterization results of the fabricated 1×4 series-connected patch antenna array are also presented in this article. The measured data shows antenna efficiencies greater than 70% and realized peak gains of at least 10 dBi at carrier frequencies ranging from 27.8 GHz to 28.85 GHz. These results confirm that good antenna performance can be achieved successfully through this novel fabrication approach on a low RF loss glass substrate.

A new species of the Dianous bimaculatus complex from China is described: D. hubeiensis Tang & Huang, sp. n. from Hubei Province. New distributional records are reported for Dianous flavoculatus Puthz, 1997 and D. hainanensis Puthz, 1997. A key to Chinese species of the Dianous bimaculatus complex is provided

Plastic pipe is a kind of new pipeline material and its output has been increasing in recent years. It is still mainly used for water supply and drainage of buildings and municipal utility industry as well as for safe drinking in rural areas, about half of all plastic pipelines are used for buildings, and the proportion of these pipelines used in other fields is also increasing. Plastic pipeline system's influence on the environment within its life cycle is the focus of researches in recent years. Based on life cycle assessment (LCA), this paper assesses the common water supply and drainage pipelines (PPR, PE and PVC-U) for buildings for resource and energy consumption, non-renewable resource consumption (ADP) of pollution gas emission, greenhouse effect (GWP), acidification effect (AP) and eutrophication (EP) and inhalable inorganics (RI) generated in the process of life cycle from raw material exploitation to produce production and other environmental influence closely related to the national energy conservation and emission reduction policy. The result shows that the influence indexes of non-renewable resource consumption for functional unit of PPR pipe, PE pipe and PVC-U pipe are 2.22×10-5 Kg antimony eq./ kg, 1.51×10-5 Kg antimony eq./ kg, 6.82×10-6 Kg antimony eq./ kg; those of acidification effect are 1.92×10-2kg SO2 eq./ kg, 1.96×10-2g SO2 eq./ kg, 3.90×10-2kg SO2 eq./ kg; those of eutrophication are 2.39×10-3kg PO43-eq./ kg, 2.36×10-3kg PO43-eq./ kg, 3.40×10-3kg PO43-eq./ kg; those of inhalable inorganics are 6.46×10-3 kg PM2.5 eq./ kg, 6.30×10-3 kg PM2.5 eq./ kg, 1.91×10-2 kg PM2.5 eq./ kg; those of greenhouse effect are 3.72kg CO2 eq./ kg, 3.60kg CO2 eq./ kg, 7.93kg CO2 eq./ kg. This result shows that the environmental influence of PPR, PE and PVC-U pipes mainly depends on the raw materials required for producing pipes, so the key of plastic pipeline greening is to reduce the consumption of virgin resin. This investigation creates a database about plastic pipeline's influence on environment within its full life cycle for the purpose of laying a foundation for calculating intrinsic energy in a building, promoting selection of green building material, facilitating the realization of green building objective, and improving the knowledge of developer, constructor and user to potential influence of the pipeline system within its life cycle.

The missing type depository information, along with a diagnosis of Pselaphodes ampliatus sp. nov., P. bagmatius sp. nov., P. loebli sp. nov., P. rotundatus sp. nov., and P. symmetricus sp. nov. are provided to validate the names under the conditions required by the ICZN (1999).

Four new species of Pselaphodes Westwood are described from southern Asia: P. femoralis sp. n. (China, Thailand), P. incisus sp. n. (China, Laos), P. suthepensis sp. n. (Thailand), and P. thailandicus sp. n. (Thailand), supported by illustrations of male habitus and major diagnostic characters. One of the new species (P. femoralis) exhibits considerable intraspecific variation in the aedeagal structure, but may be readily distinguished by a stable combination of unique male external features.

This research attempted to design a brand new capacitive tactile sensor that can sense both normal and shear forces as a touch sensor for biomedical and rehabilitation applications. With the specially developed laser-induced metallization (LIM) technology, this tactile sensor can be fabricated directly on the surface of humanoid robot fingers.

Two new Chinese species of the tyrine genus Nomuraius Hlaváč, N. excavatus Huang & Yin, sp. n. (Guangxi), and N. nanlingensis Huang & Yin, sp. n. (Guangdong), are described and illustrated. The identification key and distributional map of the genus are updated to include the new data.

A novel laser induced metallization (LIM) is developed for 3 dimensional molded interconnect devices (3D-MIDs). A special laser-activable solution is firstly sprayed on top of the substrate, followed by laser direct structuring (LDS) and the electroless plating. The metal patterns can be transferred from the CAD data on almost any complex surface. Compared to the direct LDS, our spray method has smaller linewidth (30 μm) and much more flexibility on the substrate choosing. For example, the substrate can be plastic, glass, or ceramic. In addition, the laser-activable solution on top of the substrate also plays a role of the insulator. As a result, the multilayer patterns can be made by simply repeating the spray method on the same surface. Moreover, since this method is capable of making patterns layer-by-layer, the capacitors and inductances can be direct integrated with the circuit design. In this report, a 2G/3G/4G (all-in-one) antenna is tested by using our spray method. The return loss reaches the 3:1 VSWR standard, and the radiation efficiency is larger than 60% within the operation frequency.

An advanced LED multi-die-bonding integration using a fluidic self-assembly technique is proposed in the field of flip chip packages. Different form the conventional pick-and-place methods for a single LED die bonding, the fluidic approach is a relatively new design and a batch process, which can achieve not only die self-alignment but die self-assembly. Here, the size of LED die is 1-mm-square chip with the thickness of 0.3 mm. Due to the smaller size of LED die, the die-bonding process is still in need of finding a suitable approach and breakthrough. In this study, our design of fluidic self-assembly device is based on the experimental test and simulation results. The device design is the gas-flow channels with the magnetism. The width, height and length of each gas-flow channel are 1.1 mm, 0.5 mm, and 1 cm, respectively. With the restriction of the channel width, this structure design can control well to die self-alignment. In addition, the design of two circular structures in the channel can form a flat rim to achieve the die self-assemble. This mechanism of fluidic approach can be useful to the LED die self-alignment and self-assembly in the future batch processing.

A pixelized backlight with polarization recycling had been previously developed and demonstrated with significant efficiency improvement especially due to elimination of color filter. However, the volume is bulky and the symmetric LED layout makes it incompatiable with current LCD panel format. New development uses LED array and makes asymmetric layout to resolve both issues. A pixelized backlight which sizes 80mm X 140mm has been designed and prototyped for mobile phone applications.

In this paper, we combined localized electrochemical deposition and electroless plating process for fabricating the metal pattern with the large area on flexible membrane. The pattern of the anode plate can rapidly transfer to the cathode membrane by localized electrochemical deposition. The thickness of the pattern can be increased by electroless plating process. The width of the mask pattern was close to the width of the final pattern. The anode plate can be used over fifty times for this process until the pattern was electrolyzed completely. This method provides a possible low cost approach to fabricate high metal structures on the flexible substrate with large area. It may have the potential to be applied in the fabrication of e-paper, flexible printed circuit and eventually adapted to roll-to-roll process.

A novel laser induced metallization (LIM) technologies is developed for multi-layer antenna designs in mobile phones. A special laser-activatable solution is firstly sprayed on top of the substrate, followed by laser structuring and the electroless plating. The metal patterns can be made on almost any complex surface. The substrate can be plastic, metal, glass, or ceramic. The multilayer metal patterns can be made by simply repeating the spray method on the same surface. And equivalent capacitive or inductive structures can be directly integrated with the antenna designs. In this paper, a 2G/3G/4G SMD (surface mountable device) antenna and a two-layer near-field-communication (NFC) antenna is tested by using our proposed LIM method. Acceptable impedance matching and radiation performances can be achieved for the tested WWAN/ LTE antenna within the desired operating frequencies. The read distance of the tested NFC antenna prototype reaches 3 cm.

This article present a compact and internal multilayer thin-film WWAN/LTE mobile phone antenna design implemented by novel LITA (Laser-Induced Integrated Thin-Film Antenna) technologies jointly developed by ITRI and ACON in Taiwan. Through the proposed LITA technologies, metal layouts of antennas can be formed on the internal surface of a mobile phone casing successfully with conformal, thin-film type, multi-layer and highly integrating characteristics. Compared to the well-known LDS (Laser Direct Structuring) technologies, the proposed LITA technologies have advantages for achieving more flexibility on substrate choosing and multilayer thin-film antenna layouts implementation in practical applications. The constructed prototype is analyzed and discussed in this paper.

ACON is a reliable company in field of electric components of IT & Communications industry. Besides providing the good quality shipments to customers, ACON always pays much attention to new technology development, especially in wireless communication products. Wireless Communications BU. (business unit) is the major division of ACON and it mainly deals with production of wireless communication products such as antennas, RF connectors and cables, wireless modules and LNA (low-noise amplifier), etc. ACON has very strong R&D capability in dual-sides of Taiwan and China including experienced RF engineer and complete measuring equipments. In addition, ACON also keep constant innovation in antenna manufacturing process and leads the new spec. for the foresighted antenna product design.

This paper discusses an electroless nickel plating technique. EDTA and potassium sodium tartrate are selected as chelating agents, and both are suitable for producing deposition layers of nanometer scale. The technique is applied to a copper roller mold, the deposition rate is measured at various operation temperatures, and layer thickness is measured by a surface contour meter. The quality of the deposition layer is characterized by SEM, and micrographs show that sharp angles can be reproduced by the deposition layer.

A color-filterless backlight utilizing reflective and refractive element in the light guide plate for light extraction and color pixel separation has been integrated with polarization recycling scheme based on wire grid polarizer and quarter wave plate on reflector. All the functional elements modulate and direct light path in a predictable way and therefore can work together properly to improve the efficiency loss at color filter and down polarizer simultaneously.

High aspect ratio (AR) through glass interposer filling has been widely investigated and developed in the recent years. Most efforts put on blind via filling by using the agitation (i.e., air agitation, cathode rotation, paddle agitation, etc.) or periodic pulse reverse (PPR) plating technique to help improvement of filling performance and enhancement of mass transfer of each component in plating electrolyte. However, high aspect ratio through hole filling has been less addressed because the void or seam defects are easily formed in the through hole. In this study, the AR>10 (AR~12) through glass hole filling with defect-free has been successfully demonstrated under stagnant condition, as shown in Figure 1 by using DC mode of fixed current density plating. Based on the operation condition, the equipment design is simple and the lifetime of additives could be long. Furthermore, the thickness difference between Cu overburden (3.51 μm) and dimple (2.88 μm) is around 0.7 μm, implying that the Cu surface is nearly flat, as shown in Figure 2. This achievement is because the additive of leveler could effectively inhibit the Cu deposition on the Cu seed layer surface, but it does not inhibit Cu deposition in the through hole center. Therefore, the butterfly pattern could be formed in the early stage of Cu filling. Besides, the relatively flat Cu surface is beneficial to post Cu removal process, such as expensive CMP process. Figure 1

A soft lithography process has been developed to transfer a pattern directly from a flat PDMS stamp to a stainless steel cylindrical substrate using an SAM ink, without any need to physically attach the stamp to a roller. The process uses standard semiconductor wafer processing equipment, along with specially designed elements to adapt to the cylindrical substrates. The entire process can be applied to batch processing and thus can be directly applied to manufacturing. This technique was demonstrated by fabricating a steel herringbone journal bearing with a diameter of 1.5 mm. The HGJB is an important element which is used for high-speed rotating spindles of electro-mechanical systems such as hard disk drives, CD-Rom drives, and DVD drives in the consumer electronics industry. In this case, the pattern had a dimension of 85 microns and depth of 3 microns. Features as deep as ten microns and as narrow as two microns have been also demonstrated.

In this study, the flow injection analysis was applied to the enzyme-entrapped electrode on a chip for sensing glucose. The on-chip microelectrode was fabricated by the standard photolithography in clean-room environment and the microfluidic channel height of 100 μm on the chip was formed by poly(dimethylsiloxane). The conducting polymer, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene), PEDOT, was electropolymerized to entrap the coexisting glucose oxidase (GOD) by cyclic voltammetry (CV). The amount of enzyme entrapped in the matrix measured spectroscopically was about 0.101 U/cm2. At a flow rate of 10 ml/hr, the working electrode (Pt/PEDOT/GOD, WE1) was set at 0.7 V (vs. Ag/AgCl) and sensing of H2O2 was carried out by injecting samples with various concentrations of glucose (Glu). A linear relationship between the sensing current and the glucose concentration, ranging from 1 to 20 mM, was obtained with a sensitivity of 8 nA mm−2 mM−1. The response time and the recovery time were about 30 and 230 s, respectively. For a single-potential test, the oxidation currents of 0.08 mM ascorbic acid (AA) and a blend of 0.08 mM AA and 10 mM Glu reached 31.3% and 145.5%, respectively, when compared with the oxidation current of 10 mM Glu alone. However, when a pre-reactor (WE2) was set at the same potential (0.7 V) before the main enzyme integrated electrode (WE1), the oxidation current for the above mixed solution reached 99.6% of the original one.

This article presents a novel 11 GHz 2-port antenna array design for mobile phone applications with diverse end-fire radiation patterns. The constructed prototype uses novel LIM (Laser Induced Metallization) technologies of ITRI to implement two symmetrical patch antennas closely integrated at both side areas of a corner of a mobile phone casing successfully. The antenna grounds and radiating patches are respectively formed on inside and outside surfaces of the casing without occupying limited available space of the mobile phone circuit board. Good isolation can also be achieved between the two antenna ports. The proposed antenna solution can be used for MIMO, beamforming or beam-switching applications in the future.

This article presents an internal multiband WWAN/LTE 2-port antenna array implemented by novel LIM (Laser Induced Metallization) technologies developed by ITRI in Taiwan. Through the proposed LIM technologies, the metal layouts of antennas and decoupling structures can be formed on surfaces of mobile phone casing successfully with a compact, conformal and highly integrating characteristic. Compared to the well-known LDS (Laser Direct Structuring) technologies, the proposed LIM technologies spray a special laser-activatable colloid on surface of supporter materials to replace prior metal-particle-mixed plastics of LDS for achieving more flexibility on substrate choosing in practical applications. The constructed prototype is discussed and analyzed in the paper.

This article presents an integrated 11 GHz microstrip array antenna implemented by novel LIM (Laser Induced Metallization) technologies of ITRI. Through the proposed LIM technologies, the metal layouts of radiating patches, feeding network and antenna ground can be formed on surfaces of handset casing successfully with conformal and highly integrating characteristics. Compared to the well-known LDS technologies, the LIM technologies spray a special laser-activatable colloid on surface of supporter materials to replace prior metal-particle-mixed plastics of LDS for achieving more flexibility on substrate choosing in practical applications. The constructed prototype is discussed and analyzed in the paper.

The thin film deposition property and the process difference during the wafer size migration from 12" (300 mm) to 18" (450 mm) in the Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) equipment is improved and reduced, respectively, when the chamber hardware is designed with the help of 3D full chamber modeling and 3D experimental visual technique developed in this work. The accuracy of 3D chamber simulation model is demonstrated with the experimental visual technique measurement. With the CVD chamber hardware design of placing the inlet position and optimizing the distance between the susceptor edge and the reactor wall, the better thin film deposition property and the larger process compatibility during the wafer size migration from 12" (300 mm) to 18" (450 mm) for the industry cost reduction can be achieved. Non-dimensional Nusselt parameter is also found to be the effective indicator to monitor the thin film deposition property.

By using nanoparticulate Ag as the activator to replace Pd, glyoxylic acid to replace formaldehyde as the reducing agent, 2,2’–bipyridine, K4Fe(CN)6, PEG-2000, Ascorbic acid, and Bis-(3-sodiumsulfopropyl disulfide) (SPS) as additives, we develop a Cu electroless plating bath to deposit Cu on activated polyimide substrates for flexible electronic devices. Polarization curves are recorded to elucidate the effect of additives over anodic behaviors of glyoxylic acid on activated substrates. Cyclic voltammetric measurements are carried out to clarify the responses of additives on both anodic and cathodic reactions occurring during electroless Cu deposition. SEM is used for observing the morphology of Cu deposition on Ag nanoparticle catalyzed polyimide substrates. XRD is adopted to determine the crystalline structure of Cu deposit. The quality of Cu deposit is inferred from electrical resistivity measurements. We demonstrate an optimized formula for relatively smooth Cu film with strong adhesion to the substrate.

The major efficiency loss in current liquid crystal displays(LCD) are the absorption in polarizers and color filter, and both can be resolved with decent backlight design which takes light polarization and color separation into consideration. Those improvement schemes on the backlight normally will not trade off the image quality readily achieved in the commercial LCD. Both polarization and color separation schemes for the backlight are reviewed with categorization on the basic concept, followed by the proposal of possible combinations for both direct lit and edge lit configuration with the consideration on the availability of associated components. Two total solutions, including polarization conversion module for LED and pixelized backlight with RGB LED for direct lit and edge lit respectively, are given with demonstration of preliminary result achieved so far as the efficiency improvement schemes for LCD backlight.

In this paper, we present a low cost approach to produce large-area polymer sheets with sub-wavelength nanostructures. The fabricated polymer films would have great potentials to attach to optical or solar-cell-related consumer products when anti-reflection/anti-glaring is mandatory. We employed a special electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) plasma process to fabricate the SWSs with large area directly on silicon substrates. Homogeneously distributed nanotips on the full 4 inch silicon substrate were fabricated by using gas mixtures of silane, methane, argon and hydrogen. An Ni-Co metal mold with a hardness of 550 HV was produced through the replication of the Si mold by electroplating. Afterwards, the molding process was applied to manufacture the nanostructures in PMMA plates in large volume. The nanostructures in PMMA plates with aspect ratios of 4 and diameters of 150 nm were fabricated. The fabricated PMMA sheets could generate the gradient of the refractive indices, absorb the light and greatly reduce the reflectivity. Compared with the PMMA without SWSs, the reflectivity of PMMA with SWSs decreased dramatically from 4.25% to 0.5% at the wavelength of light from 400 to 800 nm.