Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Size And Chemistry Selective Membranes From Block Polymer Templates, Ryan A. Mulvenna

Open Access Dissertations

The use of block polymers continues to gain attention with their myriad applications in industry for advanced applications in biology, medicine, electronics, and separations. The ability of block polymers to self assemble into ordered states on the nanometer level makes these materials suitable for applications that mandate structural order on this scale. By tuning the chemistry of these block domains, we may explore their utilization for advanced separations.

In this dossier, we detail the efforts into the controlled radical polymerization of polyisoprene-b-polystyrene-b-poly( N,N-dimethylacrylamide) (PI-PS-PDMA) via. a facile reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) mechanism. For this …

Assembly Of Surface Engineered Nanoparticles For Functional Materials, Xi Yu

Open Access Dissertations

Nanoparticles are regarded as exciting new building blocks for functional materials due to their fascinating physical properties because of the nano-confinement. Organizing nanoparticles into ordered hierarchical structures are highly desired for constructing novel optical and electrical artificial materials that are different from their isolated state or thermodynamics random ensembles. My research integrates the surface chemistry of nanoparticles, interfacial assembly and lithography techniques to construct nanoparticle based functional structures. We designed and synthesized tailor-made ligands for gold, semiconductor and magnetic nanoparticle, to modulate the assembly process and collective properties of the assembled structures, by controlling the key parameters such as particle-interface …

Self-Assembly Of Nanoparticles At Liquid-Liquid Interfaces, Kan Du

Open Access Dissertations

In this thesis, we studied the self-assembly of nanoparticles at liquid metal-water interfaces and oil-water interfaces. We demonstrated a simple approach to form nanostructured electronic devices by self-assembly of nanoparticles at liquid metal surfaces. In this approach, two liquid-metal droplets, which were coated with a monolayer of ligand-stabilized nanoparticles, were brought into contact. They did not coalesce but instead remained separated by the nanoparticles assembled at the interface. Devices formed by this method showed electron transport between droplets that was characteristic of the Coulomb blockade, where current was suppressed below a tunable threshold voltage because of the energy of charging …