MVC 15 Awards Gallery

“TETRIS – Materials Research Style”

Maria Hilse, Faculty, Materials Research Institute

Artist’s Perspective: Purely coincidental, this snapshot, which reminded me of the popular game Tetris perfectly captures the essence of Epitaxy – the approach to fabricate thin crystalline films. Isolated building blocks of the material accumulate on the surface as nuclei represented by the gray islands in specific surface lattice sites, referencing the substrate surface mesh in light blue that impose a certain crystallographic shape and arrangement upon the nuclei. The continued supply of atoms and diffusion of adatoms along the surface mesh eventually leads to the formation of a fully coalesced film pictured by the purple area.

In my role as scientist in materials research, I try to optimize this formation process, or in other words, with every sample I produce, I play Tetris – Materials Research Style. Can you master it?

Scientific Process: This image was obtained by a scanning electron microscope from one of my thin film samples of FeSe on a SrTiO3(100) crystal surface that was grown by molecular beam epitaxy.

FIRST PLACE

“The White Cliffs of Dover”

Benjamin Aronson, Graduate Student, Materials Science and Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: Oftentimes, we become myopic in our perspective of our work, our day-to-day lives, and the world around us. It becomes easy to view a drastic event in our lives as the end of good times. However, the White Cliffs of Dover serve to remind us that history repeats itself at multiple time and length scales. Much in the same way that the true Cliffs of Dover were formed through the sedimentation of minerals and fossilized remains over millions of years, the coating formed on the surface of the metal substrate through the deposition of sputtered atoms over several hours. Likewise, the great forces of the glacial lake outburst floods that cleaved the British Isles from mainland Europe can be compared to the brittle fracture of the coating-substrate system in liquid nitrogen. Now we stand in the present and appreciate the insight gained by viewing the structural characteristics of the coating, similar to the countless travelers over the years who gazed upon the Cliffs from the English Channel. It is important to remember that even in an unideal situation, such as an imperfect brittle fracture or a major geological catastrophe, there is always the opportunity to appreciate that which was previously unseen..

Scientific Process: Chromium coatings have the potential to offer significant improvements in corrosion protection over a variety of metal substrates. This protection is afforded by the passive Cr2O3 film that forms on the surface of the coating in a broad range of operating conditions. To make full use of this passivating capability, a dense and uniform coating microstructure is required. Direct current magnetron sputtering (DCMS) was used to deposit the coating shown in this image, utilizing the kinetic energy transferred by the momentum of the ionized carrier gas (Ar) to densify and refine the structure into the Zone T morphology. This particular scanning electron micrograph captures the coating surface and cross-sectional view following a brittle fracture. In this approach, the coated substrate is submerged in liquid nitrogen and then subjected to a rapid bending moment, causing the sample to fracture along the grain boundaries.

SECOND PLACE

“Waves: In the Deep End of Additive Manufacturing”

Nancy Huang, Graduate Student, Materials Science and Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: When I was in high school, I wanted to become a marine biologist and study the ocean floor. While my career aspirations have changed drastically and I now study additively manufactured metals, I still see the oceans that inspired my past self in additive manufacturing, from the fishscale-like patterns of melt pools, to this image of grains colored by circularity. Even though I do not know how to swim, I am not afraid of going into the deep end (of additive manufacturing).

Scientific Process: In laser powder bed fusion additive manufacturing, a high energy laser melts and fuses powder in a layered fashion to create a 3D part. As the laser interacts with the powder, melt pools are formed and columnar grains grow along the direction of the thermal gradient during cooling. Smaller and more circular grains crystallize at the bottom of the melt pool due to the slower cooling rate at that region. This image captures the grains of an additively manufactured aluminum alloy using electron backscatter diffraction. Grains are colored by circularity, with more irregular and non-circular grains being dark blue.

THIRD PLACE

“An OH1 Crystallization in a Galaxy Far, Far Away”

Martin Terrazas Lopez, Graduate Student, Electrical Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: The goal of growing crystals is usually to make the crystal grains large and free of defects. While, the defects of this crystal render this particular sample a failure, the image still puts me in awe as the orthorhombic crystals form a shape that is reminiscent of an explosion in space, full of debris and streaks that resembles of comets and rocks being ejected from the epicenter; the dark circle representing the shockwave traveling through the remnants of the celestial object. Zooming out of the picture, the film is no more than 50 nanometers thick. The colors are what the microscope camera interpreted through the cross-polarized crystal film, showing the relative orientation of the molecules normal to the surface of the glass and giving a depth to the near 2D film. While the film is a mere spontaneous formation, it helps me realize that there is art in failure, and I am Picasso.

Scientific Process: C19H18N2O (OH1) is a prospective material for nonlinear optics, but growing crystals large enough for practical application has been a challenge. To grow large crystal grains, a solution of OH1 in acetone was spin coated on a glass substrate in hopes of achieving thicknesses in the nanometer range. It appears that the centripetal forces arrange the center-most molecules radially so that an end is pointing towards the center of spin. When enclosed in an acetone atmosphere, the molecules rearrange themselves in an orthorhombic crystalline lattice. Using cross-polarized microscope allows the crystal grains to be distinguished, which results in an image resembling an explosion. The distinct ring is a result of some residue left from the spin coater. If these crystals can be grown at a sufficiently large size in a confined cavity, there is the possibility of achieving strong coupling between light (photon) and matter (electron/hole).

FIRST PLACE

“Nano cookie”

Hyunju Ahn, Electrical Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: This disk-shaped and vertically well-etched device seems like a cookie to me. This cookie is a miniature masterpiece, a confectionery wonder crafted with painstaking precision at the nano-scale. But this is too tiny to eat! No one might be satisfied with this size of only 350 nm thickness! It even can not be seen with the naked eye and requires specialized equipment such as an electron microscope to be observed. The different-sized pillars and holes are artistically arranged like toppings on top of the cookie and keeping symmetry and periodicity.

Scientific Process: This nanostructure composed of amorphous silicon pillars is part of a futuristic single photon source based on a semiconductor epitaxial quantum dot. This was fabricated by using e-beam lithography and dry etching, which enable us to get tiny and high aspect ratio nanometer-sized geometry. This structure manipulates the phase of the emitted light from a single quantum dot to enhance photon collection efficiency. The total diameter and height of this device are around 6 um and 350 nm, respectively. The minimum feature size in this structure is 38 nm.

SECOND PLACE

“A Smiling Face: an image displaying enhancer-driven expression of a bacterial reporter gene in the optic lobes of fruit fly’s brain.”

Zhi-Chun Lai, Faculty, Biology

Artist’s Perspective: A “smiling face” is visible in the brain.

Scientific Process: Expression of the Drosophila (fruit fly) yan gene in the developing brain is normally regulated by a transcriptional enhancer. This expression pattern in the larval brain is identified and visualized in transgenic flies that express a bacterial lacZ gene under the control of the yan gene enhancer.

THIRD PLACE

“A Micro Citadel under Siege”

Lidan Zhang, Graduate Student, Electrical Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: Dark clouds loom over. Three bombers stripe by: crosshair centered, countdown murmured, payloads dropped, house burned. Behind them, the sky turns bloody and red, though the sun has yet to come. Slate-gray waves crash against the ramparts from all sides, they whirl and purl, white foams trailing green algaes and pink flesh. Panic peeps out through the slits of boarded windows. A spire stands solitarily in the corner, pitying, mourning. At the center of the city, a machine gun roars to life, its neck cranking high. Trembling fingers, long sleeves, an oversized helmet—the gunner is only twelve years old.
Hours passing by, the dawn finally comes, but the people are gone, not a living soul on the street, only the dark and shattered remains, piling up like chipped tetrominoes in a fall-out Tetris game, holes as deep as inverted skyscrapers, swallowing, gobbling.
The silence wakes God up. He gets out of his bed, strolls to the window, looking down upon the fallen city, musing. Then he takes out his newly-bought Iphone 16 and snaps this picture, a relic for future mankind.

Scientific Process: The image captured by a scanning electron microscope showcases a Nanoscribe creation using a two-photon polymerization technique. The mask’s unique “buildings” have different heights, creating femtosecond-scale time delays that vary spatially for the incident light. This mask allows a regular camera to capture non-repetitive ultrafast events that were once invisible to us. With the help of advanced computer algorithms, these events can be reconstructed at an astonishing speed of one trillion frames per second.

FIRST PLACE

“Electronic Soup: A Peek at the Fundamental Bonding of Molecules” 

Alyssa Santos, Graduate Student, Chemistry

Artist’s Perspective: As budding, young scientists, we learn about electrons and how they form bonds. Covalent bonds that are characterized by the sharing of electrons are further classified into sigma and pi bonds. We imagine sigma bonds as somewhat cylindrical regions that sit between atoms to hold them together. Pi bonds are more like clouds that sit above and below the atoms involved where they add strength to the connections being formed. Together, these are shown as the vividly colored orbitals, drawing the viewer’s eyes to arguably the most important interactions occurring within the structure. Under the molecule, the electrons within the gold cluster swirl around freely as part of the metallic bonding that holds it together, shown by the translucent mist of orbitals beneath the surface. Combined, these images give the viewer a peek at the fundamental arrangement of electrons in molecules as well as the electronic soup of metals, bringing a visual to a typically abstract concept

Scientific Process: A new class of molecules called N-heterocyclic carbenes (NHCs) have catapulted to the forefront of metallic surface and nanoparticle studies, particularly due to their surface bond stability. Much of the current literature explores how these NHCs attach to gold, silver, and copper surfaces and nanoparticles by studying their sigma donation and pi back-bonding. This image depicts the fundamental bonding of these structures via intrinsic bonding orbitals. The upper left orbitals reflect sigma bonds that pull electrons from the ring system into the bond between carbon and gold. The upper right reflects the pi back-bonding, where gold in return pushes electrons back to carbon. The bottom two images show the pi systems within the aromatic rings, creating a highway for the electrons. Underneath lies a gold cluster, where metallic bonds are delocalized and allow for the free flow of electrons as seen by the representative delocalized orbitals that weave amongst the gold atoms.

SECOND PLACE

“A Study on Lithiation of S8 on Ni2P Nanoparticle’s (001) Surface to Improve Li-S Battery Cathode Kinetics and Stability: Depiction of Sulfur’s Transformation via Li Polysulfide Intermediates and Associated Charge Density Difference over the Catalyst Surface.”

Ricardo Amaral, Graduate Student, Energy and Mineral Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: As a science communicator, my objective is to make the language of materials science more accessible to a broad audience. Through my work, I seek to inspire others to tackle the challenges facing our world, particularly in the development of novel high-energy density battery systems. I strive to demystify complex concepts and convey the excitement and potential of this field through clear and concise language, highlighting the significance of scientific discoveries and their real-world applications.

Scientific Process: The increasing demand for clean and renewable energy has created a critical need for high-capacity, long-lasting, low-cost, and safe battery systems. In this setting, density functional theory (DFT) calculations have become essential in understanding electrochemical reaction mechanisms and screening potential energy storage materials. At Dzade’s MMT group, we employ advanced theoretical methods to accelerate the exploration of high-performance battery materials, focusing on understanding their structural stability, electronic properties, and reaction mechanisms. In this work, we employed accurate first-principles calculations based on DFT to unravel the adsorption chemistry of sulfur and lithium polysulfides on nickel phosphide (Ni2P), a promising host material for Li-S battery applications. The binding geometries, adsorption energies, and electronic structures (ie. Bader charge analysis, charge density difference, and projected density of states) were systematically characterized.

THIRD PLACE

“T7- phage plays PacMan with E. coli microcolony”

Andres Valdez, Postdoctoral Scholar, Biomedical Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: On solid surfaces, bacteria form colonies. If adding phage, they form plaques. We use our simulator to study plaque events (formation, growth, and collapse). The predictions of our simulator explain the shapes observed in plaques. And allow us to re-engineer different phage – E.coli configurations aiming for efficient colony annihilation.

Plaque dynamics can be fun…

Scientific Process: Bacteriophages are among the most ubiquitous entities in nature. They are natural predators of bacteria. Here we study the interactions between T7-phage and E. coli’s microcolony. On a solid surface, E. coli forms colonies. The colony provides structural resistance and protection to the E. coli cells. In laboratory observations, we see that phage changes the shape of the colony. Our simulator solves in simultaneous three frameworks (i) nutrient diffusion and consumption, (ii) E.coli’s (individual and collective) dynamics, and (iii) phage dynamics.

“Who loves the sun”

Furkan Tuker, Graduate Student, Materials Science and Engineering

Artist’s Perspective: Similar to capturing this beautiful and symmetric image, many of the breakthroughs in science was achieved by an accident or without having a specific goal. The questions is that is this a result of coincidence or is this the way for the the universe to unfold?

Scientific Process: The photo is an SEM image of SiO2/epitaxial graphene (EG) lateral heterostructure. The circle in the center of the image is EG patterned by optical lithography. Then, 75 nm SiO2 was e-beam evaporated on n-type Silicon Carbide (SiC) to act as an isolation layer between the SiC and metal leads to prevent shorting. Therefore, the wavy thin film around the EG circle is evaporated SiO2 via lift-off process. However, due to the residual resist on the SiC, SiO2 was crumbled after lift-off, exhibiting beautiful and symmetric appearance.