BRITE Relaunch: Manufacturing Multilayers of Molecularly-Bonded Inorganic Nanointerfaces for Accessing and Tuning Novel Properties

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).

Nanocomposites – which combine two or more distinct materials where at least one of the materials has dimensions of 100 nm or less – are everywhere and are crucial for a wide variety of applications, ranging from automobiles, aircrafts and spacecrafts, buildings, sports equipment, travel packaging, to energy devices and electronics. The proportion of each material in a nanocomposite can be controlled to produce a composite material with properties that differ from each of the original components.

A prominent goal is a combination that produces a material that is both lightweight and has high mechanical strength. Nanocomposites can also lead to extraordinary electrical or hardness properties that are not seen in the individual constituents. This Boosting Research Ideas for Transformative and Equitable Advances in Engineering (BRITE) Relaunch project aims to expand the boundaries of nanocomposite design and synthesis with a focus on these electrical and hardness properties.

This project will advance the manufacturing process for these nanocomposites, expand knowledge and techniques related to the characterization of these materials, and develop models for the relationship between the structural variations and the properties so that they can be predicted and controlled through the manufacturing process. The knowledge gained will support the design and manufacturing of a new group of nanocomposites with properties that cannot be obtained from either conventional nanocomposites or natural biomaterials.

This research will directly expose graduate and undergraduate students to multiple enriching collaborations with theorists and experimentalists in the USA and Sweden. Results from this work will enhance existing undergraduate and graduate courses on electronic properties, materials characterization and advanced structure. K-12 outreach efforts will include: engaging with high-school students and teachers; and supporting students from underrepresented sections of the society to encourage them to build careers in STEM-related fields.

Mixing component materials in specific configurations allows access to property combinations that are not realized in individual materials, and the property enhancements are generally governed by the simple rules of mixtures. The researched work involves a merger of interface science, molecularly-engineered materials discovery, and nanomanufacturing.

The overarching goal is to establish a platform for the manufacture of a completely new class of high-interface-fraction multilayered nanomaterials with inorganic nanolayers glued with organic nanolayers to realize unusual properties beyond the rules of mixtures. This includes materials with giant magnetoresistance and superhardness. Such structures offer new possibilities to access, amplify and tune novel properties from superposition of effects from multiple nanoglued interfaces, and even realize a scenario wherein the interface properties become the materials’ properties.

Manufacturing such nanocomposites with unprecedented interface-dominated properties is anticipated to transformatively impact and expand the frontiers of a diversity of emergent technologies. Specifically, this project will: synthesize nanoglued inorganic multilayers by hybrid atomic/molecular layer deposition techniques for different nanoglue structures and chemistries; characterize the thermal, chemical, and microstructural stability of the hybrid multilayers; unearth the effects of different facets of nanoglue structure and chemistry, and inorganic layer features, on mechanical and electrical properties; and develop models of nanoglue-induced property-enhancements to enable the realization of novel property combinations.

The results are anticipated to open up new vistas for materials design and manufacturing beyond rule of mixtures, transcend crystallographically-constrained inorganic-organic hybrid materials, and facilitate synthetic materials and properties that are not accessible in current materials.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.