Electrochemical noise

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Electrochemical noise (ECN) is the generic term given to fluctuations of current and potential. When associated with corrosion, it is the result of stochastic pulses of current generated by sudden film rupture, crack propagation, discrete events involving metal dissolution and hydrogen discharge with gas bubble formation and detachment. The technique of measuring electrochemical noise uses no applied external signal for the collection of experimental data.

The ECN technique measures the signal perturbations which are low level fluctuations of the corrosion potential between two nominally identical electrodes which can be used in the mechanistic determination of corrosion type and speed. The fluctuations are usually of low amplitude, less than 1  mV and of low frequency bandpass filtered RMS value (DC and high frequency AC components removed). The noise corresponds with the low level frequency noise (differential of the ZRA) signal but has a much lower amplitude when general corrosion is involved. The major source of noise can be ascribed to macroscopic random-stochastic phenomena. They include partial faradaic currents adsorption / desorption, surface coverage, corrosion cracking and mechanical erosion processes. A common feature of this 1/f Poisson spectra is that it differs from the "white" Gaussian noise in which accuracy increases as the square root of the measurement time.

The technique considers the reactions occurring at the metal–solution interface and suggests two currents flowing on each electrode as a result of the anodic and cathodic reactions. Once regarded as a source of bias and error that compromised electrochemical measurements it is now regarded as a rich source of information. The technique is widely used within the Corrosion engineering world as a useful Corrosion Monitoring technique.

The ECN phenomenon belongs to the general category of random low frequency stochastic processes described by either probability density function equations or in statistical terms. These random processes are either stationary or non-stationary. The first moments of a stationary process are invariate with time.

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Phase noise

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The power spectrum of a time series describes the distribution of power into frequency components composing that signal. According to Fourier analysis, any physical signal can be decomposed into a number of discrete frequencies, or a spectrum of frequencies over a continuous range. The statistical average of a certain signal or sort of signal as analyzed in terms of its frequency content, is called its spectrum.

Spectrum analyzer Electronic testing device

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In mathematics and statistics, a stationary process is a stochastic process whose unconditional joint probability distribution does not change when shifted in time. Consequently, parameters such as mean and variance also do not change over time. To get an intuition of stationarity, one can imagine a frictionless pendulum. It swings back and forth in an oscillatory motion, yet the amplitude and frequency remain constant. Although the pendulum is moving, the process is stationary as its "statistics" are constant. However, if a force were to be applied to the pendulum, either the frequency or amplitude would change, thus making the process non-stationary.

In electrical engineering, partial discharge (PD) is a localized dielectric breakdown (DB) of a small portion of a solid or fluid electrical insulation (EI) system under high voltage (HV) stress. While a corona discharge (CD) is usually revealed by a relatively steady glow or brush discharge (BD) in air, partial discharges within solid insulation system are not visible.

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Cyclic voltammetry

Cyclic voltammetry (CV) is a type of potentiodynamic electrochemical measurement. In a cyclic voltammetry experiment, the working electrode potential is ramped linearly versus time. Unlike in linear sweep voltammetry, after the set potential is reached in a CV experiment, the working electrode's potential is ramped in the opposite direction to return to the initial potential. These cycles of ramps in potential may be repeated as many times as needed. The current at the working electrode is plotted versus the applied voltage to give the cyclic voltammogram trace. Cyclic voltammetry is generally used to study the electrochemical properties of an analyte in solution or of a molecule that is adsorbed onto the electrode.

Dielectric spectroscopy

Dielectric spectroscopy measures the dielectric properties of a medium as a function of frequency. It is based on the interaction of an external field with the electric dipole moment of the sample, often expressed by permittivity.

Radio noise

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Noise (electronics) Random fluctuation in an electrical signal

In electronics, noise is an unwanted disturbance in an electrical signal.

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Concrete electrical resistivity can be obtained by applying a current into the concrete and measuring the response voltage. There are different methods for measuring concrete resistivity.

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Noise refers to many types of random, troublesome, problematic, or unwanted signals.

Switching noise jitter Type of interference created by switching-mode power supplies

Switching Noise Jitter (SNJ) is the aggregation of variability of noise events in the time-domain on the supply bias of an electronic system, in particular with a voltage regulated supply bias incorporated with closed-loop (feedback) control, for instance, SMPS. SNJ is measurable using real-time spectral histogram analysis and expressed as a rate of occurrence in percentage. The existence of SNJ was firstly demonstrated and termed by TransSiP Inc in 2016 and 2017 at the Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC), and reviewed with experts at Tektronix prior to be featured as a case study published by Tektronix. The discovery of SNJ was also featured in multiple articles published by Planet Analog magazine and EDN Network. Difficult to filter using conventional LC networks due to variability in both time and frequency domains, SNJ can introduce random errors in analog to digital conversion, affecting both data integrity and system performance in digital communications and location-based services

Scanning vibrating electrode technique (SVET), also known as vibrating probe within the field of biology, is a scanning probe microscopy (SPM) technique which visualizes electrochemical processes at a sample. It was originally introduced in 1974 by Jaffe and Nuccitelli to investigate the electrical current densities near living cells. Starting in the 1980s Hugh Isaacs began to apply SVET to a number of different corrosion studies. SVET measures local current density distributions in the solution above the sample of interest, to map electrochemical processes in situ as they occur. It utilizes a probe, vibrating perpendicular to the sample of interest, to enhance the measured signal. It is related to scanning ion-selective electrode technique (SIET), which can be used with SVET in corrosion studies, and scanning reference electrode technique (SRET), which is a precursor to SVET.

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