In conjunction with the NOVA TV science program, the Penn MRSEC collaborated with Penn and Drexel University Materials Science Departments to arrange the first Philly Materials Science & Engineering Day on Feb. 5, 2011, which introduced the general public in the
The topological insulating materials offer conductive surface states that can be useful for quantum computing, catalysis, and other applications.
Protein assembly at the air-water interface (AWI) occurs naturally in many biological processes, and provides a method for creating ordered biomaterials. However, the factors that control protein self-assembly at the AWI are generally not well understood.
The objective of this Seed is to understand cooperative electronic, optical and electromagnetic phenomena emerging from the interactions of nanoscale building blocks. Recent work encompasses synthesis of nanoparticles (figure right) and nanowires, and the investigation of how nanocrystals can drive geometrical rearrangement in polymersome micelles (figure right).
Pioneering experiments reported [upper left] the ability of ferroelectric domain orientation to switch surface chemistry on and off, finding unambiguous evidence that the polarity of a ferroelectric surface can have a strong impact on the energetics of physisorption.
We have developed analytic methods that establish molecular constraints to photochemical efficiency in the engineering and construction of molecular photochemical materials and devices useful to addressing the global energy challenge. The absence, to-date, of analytic procedures has seriously handicapped progress in the development of photochemical devices.
We have designed specialized protein molecules that organize around carbon nanotubes into an atomistically-predefined pattern. Targeted design of such self-organization is a powerful tool for engineering at the nano scale. For example, we have shown that our protein/nanotube hybrid can be used to generate a regularly-spaced array of gold nano-particle.
Design & engineering of modern devices increasingly requires complex nano-
An isostatic lattice is one at the threshold of mechanical stability. The square and kagome lattices (see Figure 1a-b) in two dimensions are examples of isostatic lattices. A 2D kagome lattice of N sites has of order N1/2 zero-energy bulk modes under periodic boundary conditions.
