Fluidized bed granulation by spraying purified water as a binder liquid was carried out to prepare granule consisting mainly of insoluble inorganic compounds. The effect of changes in moisture content on granule growth was investigated experimentally by using an online particle imaging processor. It was found that granule growth mechanism in fluidized bed granulation can be explained by relationship between moisture content and plastic limit of the powder. Increase of mass median diameter after forming nuclear particle was observed when the moisture content exceeded the threshold of moisture content and its value was almost the same as the plastic limit. It was also indicated that the free water on the particle surface caused secondary granulation and pores in the particle caused breakage of the secondary granule in drying stage. The mass median diameter could be controlled by determining the water spraying endpoint.

The surface and interface of nano and fine particles affect characteristics of the particles directly because they just contact with their surrounding phases. Thus, it is necessary to understand the surface of particles for the applications of nano and fine particles as electronic materials. In this review, we have focused our attention on the surface design and control of nanoparticles. The up-to-date characterization techniques for nanoparticles surfaces such as Zeta potentials, X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), Thermogravimetry-Differential Thermal Analysis (TG-DTA), Transmision/Scanning Electron Microscopy (TEM/SEM), In-situ Observation by Heating TEM are summarized as well as the typical surface protecting methods. Moreover, our recent progress on the development of metal nano and fine particles with various surface protecting layers for the application of electrical materials and future printed electronics are demonstrated.

Thermally conductive polymer composites offer new possibilities for the thermal management in electronic devices. An approach of current interest to improve the thermal conductivity of polymer composites is the addition of high thermally conductive fillers with different shape and size. This paper described an overview of the microstructural design techniques for polymer composites with high thermal conductivity, and recent progress and advances that have been made on the enhancement of thermal conductivity of the polymer composites.

Microfluidics is a fascinating tool for colloidal materials design. It precisely controls the interface of immiscible fluids in a microchannel such as droplets, slug flow and jet flow. Monodisperse droplets prepared by microfluidic emulsification are readily converted into monodisperse particles by solvent diffusion. Furthermore, controlling the inner phase separation leads to construct the capsule structure containing oil or aqueous liquid. Based on the same concept, the rapid solidification from jet flow enables wet-spinning of nanofibers. In this review, we show our experimental procedure and the leading results and discuss key factors to develop such a microfluidic process to produce well-defined materials.