PCCM researchers have discovered a new method for making gratings: by prying apart two rigid plates that sandwich a thin, glassy polymeric film. The process fractures the film into complementary sets of ridges on each plate, with the ridges on one corresponding to the valleys on the other.
The continual decrease in microelectronic device feature size, captured in the famous "Moore's Law", has come in part from a decrease in the wavelength of light used in the photolithographic steps used to pattern these features. Today, the most advanced production photolithography uses 193 nm ultraviolet (UV) light from an ArF excimer laser.
At low temperatures, the electrons in most layered transition-metal chalcogenides undergo a phase transition into an interesting, highly-ordered state called the charge-density-wave (CDW), in which the electron density spontaneously acquires a weak, periodic spatial modulation. In a small subset of materials, the CDW state is destroyed and replaced by the superconducting state.
Fundamental MRSEC research often leads to new technologies that in turn create innovative start-up companies. QD Vision and Luminus Devices are two exciting examples of this process.
Poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET), a widely used engineering thermoplastic for carpet, clothing (fibers), tire cords, soda bottles and other containers, film, automotive, electronics, displays etc., will contribute several billion pounds of waste to landfills this year alone! According to the American Plastics Council, PET packaging was originally used for soft d
Penicillin, long used in medications, is now being studied as a coating, a novel weapon against bacteria that could protect medical implants and the surgical tools used to insert them.
Active interface architectures, exhibiting structural sensitivity to the presence of chemical species or light, are of interest for sensor and functional nanostructure applications. LCMRC researchers have demonstrated that it is possible to use liquid crystals to read out the state of a photoactive monolayer with great sensitivity to the incident wavelength.
