Dinsmore at the UMass Materials Research Science and Engineering Center demonstrated a simple and robust approach to fabricating nano-scale electrical contacts to nanoparticles. PEGfunctionalized nanoparticles assemble spontaneously on droplets of liquid metal; when two droplets are brought into contact, they remain separated by the nanoparticles at the interface (top figure). Junctions formed by this method show electron transport that is limited by the nanoparticles (bottom figure). The conductance can be tuned by a gate electrode to make transistors at the micronscale.

Picoprojection is the latest advanced display technology enabled by ferroelectric liquid crystal on silicon microdisplays, developed by LCMRC spin-off company, industrial partner, and collaborator Displaytech, now a division of Micron, Inc.. LCMRC researchers pursue new liquid crystal materials and alignment systems enabling low power consumption bistable liquid crystal switching.

A designer protein combining ZnS mineralizing activity with IgG adaptor capability was built and used for easy and rapid aqueous synthesis of immuno-QDs. The particles consist of a ≈ 4 nm ZnS wurtzite core, can be derivatized with a wide variety of unmodified antibodies, and have ultrasmall (14 nm) diameters.

Expanding outreach with portable SEM for K-12 math/science. Last year MRSEC graduate students at the University of Arkansas brought cutting edge microscopy to local middle-school students and allow them to explore the world of nanoscience in real-time.   This year our focus expanded to regional high-school students. The microscope is a portable scanning electron microscope (SEM).   The SEM allows the students to explore the world of the “nano”.

  We have made the first experimental observation of the Aharonov-Bohm effect in neutral excitons. In classical mechanics the motion of an electrical charged particle is only affected if the particle enters a region of space with a magnetic or electric field.

Stabilized emulsions containing the oscillating Belousov - Zhabotinsky chemical reaction (BZ) show interesting dynamics. Each drop acts as an independent chemical clock. However, they chemically communicate and exhibit collective behavior. In (a) six BZ drops are contained in a  capillary tube. The  white bars are light, which set the oscillators in the reduced state. Drops 1 & 6 are always exposed to light, setting the boundary conditions. Drops 3 & 4 are

  A simple computational model demonstrates the assembly of self-limited filamentous bundles. The images are taken from dynamic Monte Carlo simulations in which "chiral" subunits ( with a preference to form twisted arrays of one "handedness") spontaneously assemble under different interaction strengths and degrees of chirality.  

Background: Most organic devices, from organic light emitting diodes to organic spintronic devices vertical devices, where the essential interfaces are buried and thus not subject to investigation.