The innovation engine for new materials

Block Copolymer Directed Hybrids: Experiments, Theory and Applications

Seminar Group: 

Speaker: 

Prof. Ulrich Wiesner

Address: 

Materials Science and Engineering
Cornell University, Ithaca NY

Date: 

Monday, May 4, 2015 - 10:00am

Location: 

MRL Room 2053

Host: 

Prof. Rachel Segalman

Solutions to global problems including energy conversion and storage and clean water require increasingly complex, multi-component hybrid materials with unprecedented control over hierarchical length scales and local order. This talk will give examples for the rational design of novel functional hybrid materials with hierarchical order from the near-molecular to the meso-scale. These materials are based on block copolymer self-assembly directed inorganic components into organic-inorganic hybrid materials. Discussion will include formation of porous materials with amorphous, polycrystalline, and epitaxially grown single-crystal structures. Experiments will be compared to theoretical predictions to provide physical insights into formation principles. The aim of the described work is to understand the underlying fundamental chemical, thermodynamic and kinetic formation principles enabling generalization of results over a wide class of materials systems. Examples will include the formation of hierarchical structures at equilibrium as well as via processes far away from equilibrium. Targeted applications of the prepared systems will include the development of mesoporous electrodes for energy conversion and storage devices, asymmetric ultrafiltration membranes, as well as the formation of metamaterials for optical devices and sensors.

 

 

References

1.)   Z. Li, K. Hur, H. Sai, T. Higuchi, A. Takahara, H. Jinnai, S. M. Gruner, U. Wiesner, Theory Assisted Design of 3D Networked Binary Metal Nanoparticle -Triblock Terpolymer Superstructures, Nat. Comm. 5 (2014), 3247.

2.)   T. Suteewong, H. Sai, R. Hovden, D. Muller, M. Bradbury, S. M. Gruner, U. Wiesner, Multicompartment mesoporous silica nanoparticles with branched shapes: An epitaxial growth mechanism, Science 340 (2013), 337-341.

3.)   H. Sai, K. W. Tan, K. Hur, E. Asenath-Smith, R. Hovden, Y. Jiang, M. Riccio, D. A. Muller, V. Elser, L. A. Estroff, S. M. Gruner, U. Wiesner, Hierarchical porous polymer scaffolds from block copolymers, Science 341 (2013), 530-534.

4.)   H. Arora, P. Du, K. W. Tan, J. Hyun, J. Gratzul, H. L. Xin, D. Muller, M. Thompson, U. Wiesner, Block Copolymer Self-Assembly Directed Single-Crystal Homo- and Heteroepitaxial Nanostructures, Science 330 (2010), 214-219.