Nanoscale reactions studied with new device made in Fab Lab

A new device to measure the mechanical, optical and thermal properties of nanoscale chemical reactions, created partially in the Maryland NanoCenter’s Fab Lab, was the subject of a journal article and a review paper showcasing the device and demonstrating its use.

‘Murray et al. present a novel apparatus designed to take a whole range of measurements into account in order to create a complete picture of nanoscale reactions,’ said a review article about the device's description, recently published in the Review of Scientific Instruments. ‘It combines a quartz crystal microbalance, used to detect changes of mass due to chemical or physical processes, in a pressure- and temperature-controlled environment with instrumentation for optical, calorimetric and electrical measurements.’

Joseph Murray, the first author of the paper, is a post-doctoral research associate with Prof. Jeremy Munday, of the department of electrical and computer engineering, Institute for Research in Electronics and Applied Physics, and the Chemical Physics Graduate Program.

The device used lithography and metallization tools in the Fab Lab to create the devices and its ellipsometry for measurements.

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Apparatus for combined nanoscale gravimetric, stress, and thermal measurements

Rev. Sci. Instrum. 89, 085106 (2018)

doi:10.1063/1.5040503

Published October 30, 2018