Nanotechnology Now

Our NanoNews Digest Sponsors
Heifer International



Home > Press > Strengthening thin-film bonds with ultrafast data collection

Temperature and structure: Graph shows heat absorbed by a thin film of aluminum as its temperature increased. Inset boxes show electron diffraction patterns captured by DTEM as temperature changes. The patterns reveal the crystal structure and orientation of the aluminum. At low temperatures, pattern is characteristic of a face-centered-cubic crystal structure. When the sample is heated past the large melting peak, the spots disappear indicating that the aluminum has lost its crystal structure due to melting.

Credit: NIST
Temperature and structure: Graph shows heat absorbed by a thin film of aluminum as its temperature increased. Inset boxes show electron diffraction patterns captured by DTEM as temperature changes. The patterns reveal the crystal structure and orientation of the aluminum. At low temperatures, pattern is characteristic of a face-centered-cubic crystal structure. When the sample is heated past the large melting peak, the spots disappear indicating that the aluminum has lost its crystal structure due to melting.

Credit: NIST

Abstract:
When studying extremely fast reactions in ultrathin materials, two measurements are better than one. A new research tool invented by researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Johns Hopkins University and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) captures information about both temperature and crystal structure during extremely fast reactions in thin-film materials.*

Strengthening thin-film bonds with ultrafast data collection

Gaithersburg, MD | Posted on October 23rd, 2014

The combined device will help scientists study new materials and processes used to make advanced technologies, including state-of-the-art semiconductors and flat-screen display devices, says David LaVan, a NIST materials scientist who co-led the study.

Modern electronics manufacturing often pushes the limits of current measurement technology. Making a flat-screen display requires bonding a large sheet of a pure, rare material to an underlying metal substrate with as few defects as possible. To do so, manufacturers typically sandwich a thin film between the two materials and heat it rapidly to high temperatures, causing it to react and bond the metals.

This method usually works, but industry researchers would like to optimize the process. And existing tools to describe what's happening in the reactive thin film provide only incomplete information. One such technique, nanocalorimetry, can track very precisely large temperature changes—at rates up to ,1000 degrees Celsius per millisecond—that occur at a very small scale. Such a measurement can alert researchers to a material's phase transitions, for example, when a metal melts. But nanocalorimetry tells researchers little about the actual chemical processes or microstructural changes they are measuring as a material heats up or cools down.

To study these changes, LaVan's LLNL collaborators Geoffrey Campbell, Thomas LaGrange and Bryan Reed developed a different device, the dynamic transmission electron microscope (DTEM). In traditional transmission electron microscopy, diffraction and transmission patterns made by electrons passing through a thin sample provide information about how the sample's atoms are arranged. But TEM typically requires that the sample maintain one crystal structure for an extended period, as the microscope's detector captures enough electrons to generate an image.

DTEM, by contrast, captures structural information very rapidly. It relies on a pulsed laser to send short, bright blasts of electrons through a sample. LaVan and his colleagues at NIST and Johns Hopkins realized that if the LLNL group's DTEM laser pulses were synched with a rapid temperature rise, the researchers could simultaneously track phase transitions and structural changes in materials they were studying. "It's like peanut butter and chocolate," LaVan says. "If we can somehow get these two instruments working simultaneously, we'll have the whole story."

But first the researchers needed to shrink the circuitry for their nanocalorimeter to a tenth of its original size, so that it could fit inside the microscope. The researchers also needed to write new software to synchronize the microscope's electron pulses with the nanocalorimeter's rapid heating pulses. "To get [the devices] to work together was really a substantial effort from three different research groups," LaVan says.

Finally, LaVan and team member Michael Grapes, a research associate at NIST, and graduate student in materials science Timothy Weihs' group at Johns Hopkins, flew the redesigned nanocalorimeter to Livermore, synchronized it with the DTEM, and ran tests on thin films of materials such as aluminum, whose microstructural and thermal properties are well understood. The scientists found that, as expected, the nanocalorimeter recorded phase transitions at the same time the DTEM recorded structural changes, and both sets of measurements were consistent with their study materials' known properties.

The research team is already moving on to study other, less well-understood materials. Recently, the scientists have used their combined nanocalorimeter-DTEM to measure what happens when aluminum and nickel combine to form thin-film alloys. The team's study provides, for the first time, simultaneous structural and thermal data on this reaction at high heating rates, LaVan says.

###

* M.D. Grapes, T. LaGrange, L.H. Friedman, B.W. Reed, G.H. Campbell ,T.P. Weihs and D.A. LaVan. Combining nanocalorimetry and dynamic transmission electron microscopy for in situ characterization of materials processes under rapid heating and cooling. Review of Scientific Instruments 85, 084902. Published online Aug. 18, 2014.

####

For more information, please click here

Contacts:
Michael Baum

301-975-2763

Copyright © National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

If you have a comment, please Contact us.

Issuers of news releases, not 7th Wave, Inc. or Nanotechnology Now, are solely responsible for the accuracy of the content.

Bookmark:
Delicious Digg Newsvine Google Yahoo Reddit Magnoliacom Furl Facebook

Related News Press

News and information

Researchers develop artificial building blocks of life March 8th, 2024

How surface roughness influences the adhesion of soft materials: Research team discovers universal mechanism that leads to adhesion hysteresis in soft materials March 8th, 2024

Two-dimensional bimetallic selenium-containing metal-organic frameworks and their calcinated derivatives as electrocatalysts for overall water splitting March 8th, 2024

Curcumin nanoemulsion is tested for treatment of intestinal inflammation: A formulation developed by Brazilian researchers proved effective in tests involving mice March 8th, 2024

Laboratories

A battery’s hopping ions remember where they’ve been: Seen in atomic detail, the seemingly smooth flow of ions through a battery’s electrolyte is surprisingly complicated February 16th, 2024

NRL discovers two-dimensional waveguides February 16th, 2024

Catalytic combo converts CO2 to solid carbon nanofibers: Tandem electrocatalytic-thermocatalytic conversion could help offset emissions of potent greenhouse gas by locking carbon away in a useful material January 12th, 2024

Three-pronged approach discerns qualities of quantum spin liquids November 17th, 2023

Previously unknown pathway to batteries with high energy, low cost and long life: Newly discovered reaction mechanism overcomes rapid performance decline in lithium-sulfur batteries September 8th, 2023

Display technology/LEDs/SS Lighting/OLEDs

Light guide plate based on perovskite nanocomposites November 3rd, 2023

Simple ballpoint pen can write custom LEDs August 11th, 2023

Novel design perovskite electrochemical cell for light-emission and light-detection May 12th, 2023

3D-printed decoder, AI-enabled image compression could enable higher-res displays December 9th, 2022

Thin films

Understanding the mechanism of non-uniform formation of diamond film on tools: Paving the way to a dry process with less environmental impact March 24th, 2023

New study introduces the best graphite films: The work by Distinguished Professor Feng Ding at UNIST has been published in the October 2022 issue of Nature Nanotechnology November 4th, 2022

Software

Visualizing nanoscale structures in real time: Open-source software enables researchers to see materials in 3D while they're still on the electron microscope August 19th, 2022

Luisier wins SNSF Advanced Grant to develop simulation tools for nanoscale devices July 8th, 2022

CEA and Spectronite Develop Software Radio For Spectrally Efficient Backhaul Solutions: Adapted for Spectronite’s X-Series Modem for 5G Systems, the Technology Enables Carrier Aggregation that Provides Radio Links with 10Gb/s Capacity March 4th, 2022

Oxford Instruments’ Atomfab® system is production-qualified at a market-leading GaN power electronics device manufacturer December 17th, 2021

Govt.-Legislation/Regulation/Funding/Policy

What heat can tell us about battery chemistry: using the Peltier effect to study lithium-ion cells March 8th, 2024

Researchers’ approach may protect quantum computers from attacks March 8th, 2024

The Access to Advanced Health Institute receives up to $12.7 million to develop novel nanoalum adjuvant formulation for better protection against tuberculosis and pandemic influenza March 8th, 2024

Optically trapped quantum droplets of light can bind together to form macroscopic complexes March 8th, 2024

Chip Technology

New chip opens door to AI computing at light speed February 16th, 2024

HKUST researchers develop new integration technique for efficient coupling of III-V and silicon February 16th, 2024

Electrons screen against conductivity-killer in organic semiconductors: The discovery is the first step towards creating effective organic semiconductors, which use significantly less water and energy, and produce far less waste than their inorganic counterparts February 16th, 2024

NRL discovers two-dimensional waveguides February 16th, 2024

Memory Technology

Interdisciplinary: Rice team tackles the future of semiconductors Multiferroics could be the key to ultralow-energy computing October 6th, 2023

Researchers discover materials exhibiting huge magnetoresistance June 9th, 2023

Rensselaer researcher uses artificial intelligence to discover new materials for advanced computing Trevor Rhone uses AI to identify two-dimensional van der Waals magnets May 12th, 2023

TUS researchers propose a simple, inexpensive approach to fabricating carbon nanotube wiring on plastic films: The proposed method produces wiring suitable for developing all-carbon devices, including flexible sensors and energy conversion and storage devices March 3rd, 2023

Discoveries

What heat can tell us about battery chemistry: using the Peltier effect to study lithium-ion cells March 8th, 2024

Researchers’ approach may protect quantum computers from attacks March 8th, 2024

High-tech 'paint' could spare patients repeated surgeries March 8th, 2024

Nanoscale CL thermometry with lanthanide-doped heavy-metal oxide in TEM March 8th, 2024

Announcements

What heat can tell us about battery chemistry: using the Peltier effect to study lithium-ion cells March 8th, 2024

Curcumin nanoemulsion is tested for treatment of intestinal inflammation: A formulation developed by Brazilian researchers proved effective in tests involving mice March 8th, 2024

The Access to Advanced Health Institute receives up to $12.7 million to develop novel nanoalum adjuvant formulation for better protection against tuberculosis and pandemic influenza March 8th, 2024

Nanoscale CL thermometry with lanthanide-doped heavy-metal oxide in TEM March 8th, 2024

Interviews/Book Reviews/Essays/Reports/Podcasts/Journals/White papers/Posters

Researchers develop artificial building blocks of life March 8th, 2024

How surface roughness influences the adhesion of soft materials: Research team discovers universal mechanism that leads to adhesion hysteresis in soft materials March 8th, 2024

Curcumin nanoemulsion is tested for treatment of intestinal inflammation: A formulation developed by Brazilian researchers proved effective in tests involving mice March 8th, 2024

Nanoscale CL thermometry with lanthanide-doped heavy-metal oxide in TEM March 8th, 2024

NanoNews-Digest
The latest news from around the world, FREE




  Premium Products
NanoNews-Custom
Only the news you want to read!
 Learn More
NanoStrategies
Full-service, expert consulting
 Learn More











ASP
Nanotechnology Now Featured Books




NNN

The Hunger Project