At the Advanced Research Center for Nanolithography (ARCNL) we carry out exciting fundamental physics research at the highest possible level with relevance to key technologies in nanolithography. We contribute to the production of ever smarter and smaller electronics, while at the same time pushing the boundaries of our fundamental insight into the workings of nature.
The research field of tribology, devoted to contact formation, friction and wear phenomena down to the atomic scale, is of direct and pressing relevance to the manufacture of semiconductor devices. Friction-induced stresses and deformations on the scale of only a few atomic spacings are starting to challenge the future of nanolithography technology, limiting the achievable feature size in semiconductor chips.
In this project, you will deposit salts onto silicon wafers and investigate how salt crystals, sandwiched between stiff solids, influence the friction and wear behavior of those stiff solids. The project is largely experimental in will involve friction/wear experiments at the mN and or nN scale. The references below give an impression of the types of experiments that can be conducted during the internship.
References
1. Leriche et al. Wear 528, 204975 (2023).
2. Hsia et al. Tribol. Int. 142, 105983 (2020).
3. Desarnaud et al. Sci. Reports.6, 30856 (2016).
4. Hsia et al. Phys. Rev. Res. 3, 043204 (2021).
5. Peng et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 131, 226201 (2023).