Projects
CURRENT PROJECTS
Smart surface design for efficient ice protection and control - SURFICE (International Training Network H2020-MSCA-ITN-2020, grant no: 956703)
The project will address three major research objectives: (i) investigate icing physics on complex surfaces to understand and model ice formation, accretion and adhesion; (ii) achieve rational design for anti-icing materials and coatings based on a novel concept of discontinuity-enhanced icephobicity; and (iii) develop new technologies for efficient ice prevention and control. The proposed anti-icing solutions will be directly applied in aeronautics, energy systems and sensor technologies, as well as glass manufacturing and automotive industry through industrial partners. The group of AMC will work on the second objective.
13 early stage researchers hired to work in 11 European Institutions.
Functional & Dynamic 3D Nano-MicroDevices by Direct Multi-Photon Lithography - 5D Nanoprinting (FET Open Advancing and Emerging Technologies, Grant no. 899349)
The project aims at the development of a multifunctional platform integrating graded structural, patternable, conductive, and stimuli-responsive materials with sub-micrometer resolution. AMC and her group will work on the sensing material and achieve local piezoelectric transduction with ZnO deposited by area-selective atomic layer deposition (ALD). Normally, vapor-based deposition techniques enable the deposition over the entire substrate area. In this case, though, the possibility of obtaining high-resolution ZnO patterns (1–40 mm feature sizes) will be explored by creating areas with differential ZnO growth rate.
5D-Nanoprinting Logo
ERC Proof of Concept - Smart Skin
With Smart Skin we will create a prototype for electronic skins based on the device developed drug the Smart Core project. In addition, we will test the exploitability of this product.
PAST PROJECTS
Smart Core/shell nanorods arrays for artificial skin - Smart Core (ERC Starting Grant 2015 No. 715403)
The goal of this project is to integrate temperature and humidity together with pressure sensing in a single novel hybrid material in site-specific geometrical layouts in order to achieve sensing with spatial resolution down to 1mm and lower.
More info are available at the dedicated “ERC project” page
Drug encapsulation & delivery
We are exploring a new way of encapsulating drugs inside the meshes of iCVD polymers. The iCVD techniques allows to deposit polymers also on delicate drug solutions that withstand the vacuum conditions. The polymer wrinkles the surface of the drug thin film forming an intimate contact with the underlying pharmaceutical. The presence of the polymer helps suppressing the drug crystallization also at elevated temperature and when exposed to the vapors of several solvents.
Multi Stimuli-responsive materials. Three S (FP7-PEOPLE-2013-IIF)
Initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition (iCVD) is used to develop a light-responsive hydrogel, whose water uptake changes with light irradiation. The base structure of the hydrogel is a crosslinked hydroxyethyl methacrylate polymer. By a post-deposition reaction we attach azobenzene moieties to the hydrogel.
Upon UV-light the azobenzene changes its conformation, increasing the polarity of the hydrogel. The increase in polarity leads to a higher swelling in water. Controllable degree of swelling can be used for different applications, e.g. light-stimulated movement or artificial muscles.
Proton Conductive Polymers (PCP) by initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition. Pro-CVD (FWF funds - P 26993)
PCPs are obtained by the combination of monomer units containing acid and hydrophobic groups. When immersed in water, the acid groups allow the passage of protons through the material, while the hydrophobic components ensure the integrity of the polymer backbone.
PCPs are difficult to synthesize by conventional copolymerization methods because of the different solubility of the monomers. We propose to use the initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition (iCVD) to synthesize the PCP.
iCVD is a dry polymerization method, which does not involve the use of solvents and therefore allows to easily copolymerize acid and hydrophobic monomers. The chemical structure of the PCPs can be finely tuned during the iCVD process, in order to obtain the best combination of proton conductivity and stability in a water solution.