CAREER: Leading to Accelerated Discoveries in High-Throughput Ultrafast Laser-Driven Processing of High Entropy Alloy Nanoparticles

这个教师早期职业发展（CAREER）奖支持基础研究，使高熵合金纳米粒子（HEA NPs）的高通量创建。HEA NP是其中多种元素（通常为五种或更多种）以纳米尺度均匀混合的结构。这种制造纳米颗粒的技术提供了大量的HEAs组合物，这些组合物能够形成独特的微观结构，从而产生新的物理特性，这些特性可以应用于催化等领域，以减少工业过程的能耗。实现HEA NP的独特潜力的一个关键挑战是缺乏可以访问NP的大组成和维度空间并推进对过程-结构-性质相关性的基本理解的制造过程。该研究项目旨在开发一种激光驱动的方法，该方法可以可靠地生成HEA NP，并控制广泛的组成和尺寸范围。该项目旨在生成广泛的HEA NPs材料库，这可以加速研究，以了解NPs的跨尺度（原子到纳米）结构及其与电和等离子体催化特性的相关性。该项目的综合教育计划将向K-12，本科和研究生水平的学生和教师的广泛社区传播研究活动。这些举措旨在提高工程师的熟练劳动力，改善代表性不足的美国人口的参与。该项目旨在开发一种高通量的方法，通过采用纳秒脉冲激光驱动的颗粒形成方法来创建具有大组成和尺寸空间的HEA NP。在组合多层/合金纳米薄膜（1-30 nm）上的脉冲激光加工促进了在基底上制造各种组成的良好限定的隔离液滴形HEA NP。这些纳米颗粒是通过激光诱导的熔融相去湿现象，再加上热驱动的质量传输和超快凝固在纳秒的时间尺度。这种假设驱动的方法的成功将有助于加速对形成机制、控制因素、元素分布和微观结构的基本理解。利用传统的和先进的数据科学驱动的表征方法，如4D扫描透射电子显微镜，将解决组成和微观结构的复杂性，以填补知识空白，了解激光材料的相互作用，创造纳米粒子。这些结果将有更广泛的影响，推进微观结构与HEA纳米粒子的电和等离子体催化性能的相关性的基础科学。该项目将为HEA NP创建新的材料库，并为催化和其他领域的应用开辟未来的机会。该项目由先进制造计划、激励竞争力研究既定计划（EPSCoR）和金属和金属纳米结构计划共同资助。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award supports fundamental research that enables high-throughput creation of high entropy alloy nanoparticles (HEA NPs). HEA NPs are structures where multiple elements (typically five or more) are homogeneously mixed at nanoscale dimensions. This technique of fabricating NPs offers access to a large number of compositions of HEAs that have the ability to form unique microstructures, leading to new physical properties which can be applied in areas like catalysis in order to reduce the energy consumption of industrial processes. A key challenge to realizing the unique potential of HEA NPs is the lack of manufacturing processes that can access a large compositional and dimensional space of NPs and advance the fundamental understanding of process-structure-property correlations. This research project will aim to develop a laser-driven method that reliably allows the generation of HEA NPs with control over broad composition and size ranges. This project aims to generate extensive material libraries of HEA NPs, which can accelerate research to understand the across-the-scale (atomic-to-nano) structure of NPs and their correlation with the electro- and plasmonic catalytic properties. The integrated educational program of this project will disseminate the research activities to a broad community of students and teachers at the K-12, undergraduate, and graduate levels. These initiatives aim toward increasing the skilled workforce of engineers with improved participation of underrepresented American populations.This project aims to develop a high-throughput methodology to create HEA NPs with large compositional and dimensional space by employing a nanosecond pulsed laser-driven particle formation method. The pulsed laser processing on combinatorial multilayer/alloy ultrathin films (1-30 nm) facilitates the fabrication of well-defined isolated droplet-shaped HEA NPs of various compositions on substrates. These NPs are formed through the laser-induced melt-phase dewetting phenomenon, coupled with thermally-driven mass transport and ultrafast solidification in the nanosecond timescale. The success of this hypothesis-driven methodology will facilitate an accelerated fundamental understanding of the formation mechanism, governing factors, elemental distribution, and microstructures. The utilization of conventional and advanced data science driven characterization methods, such as 4D scanning transmission electron microscopy, will resolve the compositional and microstructural complexities to fill the knowledge gaps in understanding laser-material interactions for creating NPs. These results will have broader implications for advancing the fundamental science of microstructure correlations with the electro- and plasmonic catalytic properties of HEA NPs. The project will lead to the creation of new material libraries for HEA NPs and open up future opportunities for applications in catalysis and other areas. This project is jointly funded by the Advanced Manufacturing Program, the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), and the Metals and Metallic Nanostructures Program.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.