ME 4875/MTE 575 - C18

Introduction to

Nanomaterials and Nanotechnology

Lecture 2 - Applications of Nanomaterials + Projects

1

Course Project

2

• In-class: teams of 4 students

• Online: individual

• If you are an online student who is on campus and

wants to do a group project, you still can – email me

• Project involves:

– Literature review of one application of nanotechnology

– Prepare a report (detailed)

– Prepare an ~8-minute presentation – in-class only

– Presentations will be on last three days of class

• Detailed templates and grading rubrics will be posted

on Canvas

Project Topic

3

• Students who are doing a group project should rank

their preferences from the provided list of 15 topics –

due on Canvas by 11.59pm on Friday

• Prof and TA will then organize the students into groups

that have the same interest, trying to give every student

one of their top choices – groups will be announced on

Tuesday

• These 15 project topics are very broad – the group

must choose a more specific application of

nanomaterials within the broad topic

• Online students who are doing an individual project can

select any topic, and can consult with me

Project Content

4

• How does the application work?

• Why is a nanomaterial needed?

• Which nanomaterial is/could be used?

• What are the unique size-dependent properties of

the nanomaterial?

• How is the nanomaterial made?

• How is the nanomaterial

imaged/measured/characterized?

Project Topics

5

1. Solar Cells

2. Batteries

3. Structural Materials

4. Thermoelectrics

5. Computing (transistors)

6. Memory (magnetic, flash, etc)

7. Drug delivery

8. Biological Sensing

(In no particular order)

9. Chemical Sensing

10. Catalysis

11. Energetic Materials

12. Piezoelectrics

13. Robotics

14. Photonics

15. Coatings

• Team project students should EACH read and cite ≥ 5 highly relevant papers

• Individual project students should read and cite ≥ 5 highly relevant papers

• Literature Databases -

– WPI provides on-campus access to scientific papers from most journals

– Search scientific papers across a wide range of disciplines using

• Webofknowledge.com

• Google Scholar

• Different ways to search

– Title, topic, Boolean, exact phrases

• Different ways to filter

– Number of citations, date published, relevance

• Cite Literature, make sure not to plagiarize

– Names of authors, article title, journal name, issue, volume and page numbers, year

• Recommend using a bibliographic software such as Endnote to manage citations easily6

Literature Review

• Presentation template will be provided on Canvas

• Keep it simple, clear and well-organized

• More graphics, less text

7

Presentation Guidelines

• Quantum dot solar cells

• Band gap tuning

• Multiple exciton generation

• Hot-carrier collection

• Efficient carrier collection

8

0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

0 1 2 3 4

Sp

ectr

al

Irra

dia

nce

(W/m

2/n

m)

Photon Energy (eV)

CdSe quantum dots

Chem. Soc. Rev. , 2011, 40, 1512-1546

Solar Cells

9

C. K. Chan and Y. Cui, Nature Nanotechnology 3, 31 (2008).

Li insertionFundamental battery parameters:

- Energy density

- Power density

- Cycle life and safety

- Cost

Batteries

10SCIENCE Vol 339, 2013

Structural Materials

DARPA

New material which exploits

super-elasticity of nanowires

11

Thermoelectric generators depend on materials with high electrical conductivity

but low thermal conductivity.

The ratio of electrical and thermal conductivity of a material can be tuned by

shaping it as a nanowire, in which heat-carrying phonons are scattered off the

rough sidewalls

Hochbaum et al. Nature, 2007

4 nm10

μm

smooth nanowires

rough nanowires

Thermoelectrics

12

• Limitations of conventional silicon MOSFETs

• New devices: Single electron transistors,

tunneling junctions, nanocrystal, nanowire,

nanotube, atomic layer transistors.

Al

Top

Gate

HfO2

SiO2

S D

Conventional MOSFET

Nanocrystal transistor

Nanotube transistors

Computing (Transistors)

Atomic layer transistors

13

IEEE Spectrum

Quantum-mechanical phenomena of electron tunneling and spin-

dependent electron tunneling are used to make high-performance

computer memories such as flash and MRAM.

These devices rely on the ability to make layered materials with highly

controlled nanoscale thicknesses.

Nature Physics 4, 17 - 18 (2008)

Computer Memory

14

Drug Delivery

• micelles

• nanoparticles

• magnetic nanoparticles

Targeted drug delivery using:

15

Biological Sensing

• nanoparticle contrast agents

• carbon nanotube fluorescent

sensors

• many others

Michael Strano, MIT

16

0 2000

1400

800

1200

1000

Time (s)

Conduct

ance

(nS

)

5

4

3

2

4

3

5

6

7

8

9

5

8

76

4000

pH

Chemical Sensing

conductive coredepletion layer

17

Catalysis

gold nanoparticles

nanostructured MoS2

nanostructuring increases surface area, but also

increases reactivity per unit surface area!

18

Energetic Materials

Example: 2Al + 3CuO → Al2O3 + 3Cu + lots of heat

• directional propulsion

• nano-actuators

19

Z.L. Wang and Song, Science 312 (2006)

Vs>0 (Vs )

Vs<0(Vs )

Vs=0

+

-

ZnO

Due to the ability of nanowires to undergo large elastic deformations, piezoelectric

materials in the form of nanowires could be used to convert mechanical energy to

electrical energy with higher efficiency than bulk materials.

Z. L. Wang, Nano Lett., 2009, 9 (3)

AC generator based on piezoelectric ZnO nanowires

Piezoelectrics

Robotics

20

Alex Zettl

2-stroke carbon nanotube motor

Bio-inspired flagellum motors

Photonics

21

photonic crystals

plasmonics

metamaterials

(invisibility cloaks)

Coatings

22

superhydrophobicity

super-adhesion

anti-reflection

Project Topics (again)

23

1. Solar Cells

2. Batteries

3. Structural Materials

4. Thermoelectrics

5. Computing (transistors)

6. Memory (magnetic, flash, etc)

7. Drug delivery/Nanomedicine

8. Biological Sensing

(In no particular order)

9. Chemical Sensing

10. Catalysis

11. Energetic Materials

12. Piezoelectrics

13. Robotics

14. Photonics

15. Coatings

How to Rank Topics

24

• Fill out your preferences using the form on Canvas

• Rank topics from 1-15, with your most preferred topic as # 1 (rate all)

• Be adventurous

• Preferences due by 11.59 pm on Friday