Rational Design and Processing of Multifunctional Nanocomposites

由聚合物基质和纳米颗粒组成的纳米复合材料提供了巨大的潜在材料性能的设计空间，这在很大程度上取决于这两个组分的性能和它们的空间排列。复合材料继承了聚合物基质良好的柔韧性和加工性，以及纳米颗粒的导电性和催化活性等理想特性，如机械强度、独特的光学、电学或磁性。更重要的是，由于纳米粒子在聚合物基质中的强耦合效应和策略排列，它们往往会赋予新的性质。该奖项支持合理设计和加工由多铁核/壳纳米颗粒和嵌段共聚物组成的多功能纳米复合材料的基础研究。这项研究将加强目前对这些新型聚合物基多功能纳米结构材料的结构-性能关系的理解。这些材料将用于先进的自旋电子学、电容器、致动器、换能器、电磁传感器和通信等设备。该研究项目将与纳米科学教育相结合，通过研究生、本科生、高中理科教师和高中生参与多层次的学习体验。磁电多铁体在同一化合物中既表现出磁序又表现出电极化。它们被公认为是下一代多功能材料。这些材料中的铁电和铁磁有序之间的强耦合导致了磁场诱导的电极化，反之，电场诱导的磁化。将多铁核/壳纳米粒子选择性地引入到理想的嵌段共聚聚合物结构域中，制备具有长程有序结构的嵌段共聚物/多铁纳米粒子多功能纳米复合材料的能力，可能为开发具有可控介电常数和磁导率的小型化多功能电磁材料和器件开辟新的途径。本研究旨在合理设计和制备具有长程有序结构的多功能纳米复合材料。研究小组将设计和设计单分散的多铁纳米粒子与聚合物在表面捆绑，通过将多铁核/壳纳米粒子掺入嵌段共聚物的目标块来处理多铁纳米复合材料，并探索纳米复合材料的铁电和铁磁性能。

Nanocomposites composed of polymer matrix and nanoparticles offer a vast design-space of potential material properties, depending greatly on the properties of the two constituents and their spatial arrangement. Composites inherit good flexibility and processability from the polymer matrix and desirable features such as mechanical strength, unique optical, electrical, or magnetic properties, as well as conductivity and catalytic activity from nanoparticles. More importantly, they often impart new properties due to the strong coupling effect and strategic arrangement of the nanoparticles in the polymer matrix. This award supports fundamental research on rational design and processing of multifunctional nanocomposites composed of multiferroic core/shell nanoparticles and block copolymers. This research will enhance the current understanding of the structure-property relationships for these novel polymer-based, multifunctional nanostructured materials. These materials will be used in devices for applications such as advanced spintronics, capacitors, actuators, transducers, electromagnetic sensors and communication. The research project will be integrated with nanoscience education through the involvement of graduate students, undergraduate students, high school science teachers, and high school students in a multilevel learning experience.Magnetoelectric multiferroics exhibit both magnetic order and electrical polarization in the same compound. They are recognized as next generation multifunctional materials. The strong coupling between the ferroelectric and ferromagnetic orders in these materials renders a magnetic field-induced electrical polarization, and conversely, an electric field-induced magnetization. The ability to selectively incorporate multiferroic core/shell nanoparticles into the desired block copolymer domains to yield block copolymer/multiferroic nanoparticle multifunctional nanocomposites with long-range hierarchical order may open up a new avenue for developing miniaturized multifunctional electromagnetic materials and devices with controlled dielectric permittivity and magnetic permeability. This research aims to rationally design and process multifunctional nanocomposites with long-range hierarchical order. The research team will design and engineer monodisperse multiferroic nanoparticles tethered with polymers on the surface, process multiferroic nanocomposites via incorporating multiferroic core/shell nanoparticles within the target block of block copolymer, and explore the ferroelectric and ferromagnetic properties of nanocomposites.