• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2011.05a
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• pp.6.1-6.1
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• 2011

Nanoscale block copolymer (BCP) patterns have been pursued for applications in sub-30 nm nanolithography. BCP self-assembly processing is scalable and low cost, and is well-suited for integration with existing semiconductor fabrication techniques. However, one of the major technical challenges for BCP self-assembly is limited tunability in pattern geometry, dimension, and functionality. We suggest methods for extending the degree of tunability by choosing highly incompatible polymer blocks and utilizing solvent vapor treatment techniques. Siloxane BCPs have been developed as self-assembling resists due to many advantages such as high etch-selectivity, good etch-resistance, long-range ordering, and reduced line-edge roughness. The large incompatibility leads to extensive degree of pattern tunability since the effective volume fraction can be easily manipulated by solvent-based treatment techniques. Thus, control of the microdomain size, periodicity, and morphology is possible by changing the vapor pressure and the mixing ratio of selective solvents. This allows a range of different pattern geometry such as dots, lines and holes and critical dimension simply by changing the processing conditions of a given block copolymer without changing a polymer chain length. We demonstrate highly extensive tunability (critical dimension ~6~30 nm) of self-assembled patterns prepared by a siloxane BCP with extreme incompatibility.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.33 no.10
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• pp.377-384
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• 2023

Exploring earth-abundant, highly effective and stable electrocatalysts for electrochemical water splitting is urgent and essential to the development of hydrogen (H₂) energy technology. Iron-cobalt layered double hydroxide (FeCo-LDH) has been widely used as an electrocatalystfor OER due to its facile synthesis, tunable components, and low cost. However, LDH synthesized by the traditional hydrothermal method tends to easily agglomerate, resulting in an unstable structure that can change or dissolve in an alkaline solution. Therefore, studying the real active phase is highly significant in the design of electrochemical electrode materials. Here, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are used as template precursors to derive FeCo-LDH from different iron sources. Iron salts with different anions have a significant impact on the morphology and charge transfer properties of the resulting materials. FeCo-LDH synthesized from iron sulfate solution (FeCo-LDH-SO₄) exhibits a hybrid structure of nanosheets and nanowires, quite different from other electrocatalysts that were synthesized from iron chloride and iron nitrate solutions. The final FeCo-LDH-SO₄ had an overpotential of 247 mV with a low Tafel-slope of 60.6 mV dec^-1 at a current density of 10 mA cm^-2 and delivered a long-term stability of 40 h for the OER. This work provides an innovative and feasible strategy to construct efficient electrocatalysts.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.386-386
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• 2012

For white light emitting diode (LED) applications, it has been reported that Y3Al5O12:Ce3+ (YAG:Ce) in nano-sized phosphor performs better than it does in micro-sized particles. This is because nano-sized YAG:Ce can reduce internal light scattering when coated onto a blue LED surface. Recently, there have been many reports on the synthesis of nano-sized YAG particles using bottom-up method, such as co-precipitation method, sol-gel process, hydrothermal method, solvothermal method, and glycothermal method. However, there has been no report using top-down method. Top-down method has advantages than bottom-up method, such as large scale production and easy control of doping concentration and particle size. Therefore, in this study, nano-sized YAG:Ce phosphors were synthesized by a high energy beads milling process with varying beads size, milling time and milling steps. The beads milling process was performed by Laboratory Mill MINICER with ZrO2 beads. The phase identity and morphology of nano-sized YAG:Ce were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) and field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), respectively. By controlling beads size, milling time and milling steps, we synthesized a size-tunable and uniform nano-sized YAG:Ce phosphors which average diameters were 100, 85 and 40 nm, respectively. After milling, there was no impurity and all of the peaks were in good agreement with YAG (JCPDS No. 33-0040). Luminescence and quantum efficiency (QE) of nano-sized YAG:Ce phosphors were measured by fluorescence spectrometer and QE measuring instrument, respectively. The synthesized YAG:Ce absorbed light efficiently in the visible region of 400-500 nm, and showed single broadband emission peaked at 550 nm with 50% of QE. As a result, by considering above results, high energy beads milling process could be a facile and reproducible synthesis method for nano-sized YAG:Ce phosphors.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.588-588
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• 2013

Nanoscale noble-metals have attracted enormous attention from researchers in various fields of study because of their unusual optical properties as well as novel chemical properties. They have possible uses in diverse applications such as devices, transistors, optoelectronics, information storages, and energy converters. It is well-known that nanoparticles of noble-metals such as silver and gold show strong absorption bands in the visible region due to their surface-plasmon oscillation modes of conductive electrons. Silver nanocubes stand out from various types of Silver nanostructures (e.g., spheres, rods, bars, belts, and wires) due to their superior performance in a range of applications involvinglocalized surface plasmon resonance, surface-enhanced Raman scattering, and biosensing. In addition, extensive efforts have been devoted to the investigation of Gold-based nanocomposites to achieve high catalytic performances and utilization efficiencies. Furthermore, as the catalytic reactivity of Silver nanostructures depends highly on their morphology, hollow Gold nanoparticles having void interiors may offer additional catalytic advantages due to their increased surface areas. Especially, hollow nanospheres possess structurally tunable features such as shell thickness, interior cavity size, and chemical composition, leading to relatively high surface areas, low densities, and reduced costs compared with their solid counterparts. Thus, hollow-structured noblemetal nanoparticles can be applied to nanometer-sized chemical reactors, efficient catalysts, energy-storage media, and small containers to encapsulate multi-functional active materials. Silver nanocubes dispersed in water have been transformed into Ag@Au nanoboxes, which show highly enhanced catalytic properties, by adding $HAuCl_4$. By using this concept, $SiO_2$-coated Ag@Au nanoboxes have been synthesized via galvanic replacement of $SiO_2$-coated Ag nanocubes. They have lower catalytic ability but more stability than Ag@Au nanoboxes do. Thus, they could be recycled. $SiO_2$-coated Ag@Au nanoboxes have been found to catalyze the degradation of 4-nitrophenol efficiently in the presence of $NaBH_4$. By changing the amount of the added noble metal salt to control the molar ratio Au to Ag, we could tune the catalytic properties of the nanostructures in the reduction of the dyes. The catalytic ability of $SiO_2$-coated Ag@Au nanoboxes has been found to be much more efficient than $SiO_2$-coated Ag nanocubes. Catalytic performances were affected noteworthily by the metals, sizes, and shapes of noble-metal nanostructures.

• Composites Research
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.378-393
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• 2022

As an emerging power generation technology, triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) have received increasing attention due to their boundless promise in energy harvesting and self-powered sensing applications. The recent rise of soft robotics has sparked widespread enthusiasm for developing flexible and soft sensors and actuators. TENGs have been regarded as promising power sources for driving actuators and self-powered sensors, providing a unique approach for the development of soft robots with soft sensors and actuators. In this review, TENG-based soft robots with different morphologies and different functions are introduced. Among them, the design of biomimetic soft robots that imitate the structure, surface morphology, material properties, and sensing/generating mechanisms of nature has greatly benefited in improving the performance of TENGs. In addition, various bionic soft robots have been well improved compared to previous driving methods due to the simple structure, self-powering characteristics, and tunable output of TENGs. Furthermore, we provide a comprehensive review of various studies within specific areas of TENG-enabled soft robotics applications. We first explore various recently developed TENG-based soft robots and a comparative analysis of various device structures, surface morphologies, and nature-inspired materials, and the resulting improvements in TENG performance. Various ubiquitous sensing principles and generation mechanisms used in nature and their analogous artificial TENG designs are demonstrated. Finally, biomimetic applications of TENG enabled in tactile displays as well as in wearable devices, artificial electronic skin and other devices are discussed. System designs, challenges and prospects of TENGs-based sensing and actuation devices in the practical application of soft robotics are analyzed.