2011-2016 Archives
Previous IRGs
2016 IRG 1
NEW SEMICONDUCTORS FROM AN UNSTABLE WORLD: MANIPULATING STRAIN, STABILITY, DIMENSIONALITY AND FLEXIBILITY
The range of possible semiconductor materials and materials properties is extensive and barely explored. Materials processing routes that allow fabrication of single-crystalline semiconductor structures for which one or more dimensions are smaller than 100 nm (dots, ribbons, membranes) provide opportunities to realize material states and behaviors that are unconventional and unexpected. IRG 1 examines how the combination of nanoscale patterning and structuring, strain manipulation, and phase engineering can be used to push semiconductor materials from their natural ‘bulk’ states to realize unique and undiscovered functionality.
2016 IRG 2
ULTRASTABLE GLASSES: NEW MATERIALS AND NEW INSIGHTS
Glasses are ubiquitous across materials types and technological applications but their structure – property – processing relationships and underlying fundamental physics remain poorly understood. IRG 2 uses cross-fertilization of ideas and techniques for organic and inorganic glasses to design ultrastable glassy materials and use them to address these fundamental problems in glass science. These efforts include using physical vapor deposition to synthesize glassy thin films with widely varying stability, systematic coherent electron nanodiffraction to measure glass structure and dynamics, and high thermal ramp-rate calorimetry to investigate polyamorphism. Simulations and materials informatics guide the design of new glasses, and provide molecular-level insight into mechanical properties, thin film growth, and molecular motions. IRG 2 investigates both organic and inorganic glasses, including small molecules, metals, and ceramics, enabling identification of cross-cutting phenomena and mechanisms inherent to the glassy state.
2016 IRG 3
FUNCTIONAL LIQUID CRYSTALLINE ASSEMBLIES, MATERIALS AND INTERFACES
By addressing fundamental issues related to soft, LC-based materials on multiple length scales via the integration of complementary experimental and theoretical tools, IRG 3 provides a foundation of knowledge with broad potential for impact on the design of hierarchical and active soft materials. Key fundamental issues IRG 3 investigates include the equilibrium and the non-equilibrium, dynamic behaviors of molecules at interfaces of anisotropic soft materials, interfacial ionic phenomena in LC systems, dynamic mechanical and transport properties of several classes of LC gels, including concepts of molecular frustration and surface-driven ordering transitions, and the structure and energetics of the cores of LC defects, including cores that host ad sorbates. The challenge of designing these complex LC material systems is addressed by IRG 3 through the development of new experimental techniques, multi-scale theory and simulation, and new methods of synthesis and processing.
Super Seed
Active nanomembranes and their surfaces
The “Active nanomembranes and their surfaces” Super Seed project addresses fundamental issues related to understanding and controlling the surface mediated interactions of atomically and molecularly thin nanomembranes (e.g. two-dimensional and ultrathin crystalline materials) with their environment. Fundamental aspects that the Super Seed investigates include understanding how the morphology, topography, chemical patterning, and composition of the surfaces of a nanomembrane synergistically influence its interactions with fluids, molecules, ions, and soft matter. This understanding will enable the realization of nanomembrane materials with new properties and phenomena that will make it possible to advance water purification, sensing, and energy storage applications and to address important questions in electrochemistry, microscopic fluid dynamics, and biophysics.