Phase transitions and separations at interfaces

技术进步越来越依赖于自然界中不存在的材料。然而，我们从大自然及其发明中寻找材料研究解决方案的灵感和想法。自然界在材料科学中教会我们的是，最复杂的解决方案是复杂的、自组装的材料，它们只存在于热力学平衡之外，在整体和表面上具有不同的性质。要在实验室中采取同样的方法，需要跨学科的方法。我们需要表面化学和表面物理来调整表面的性质，我们需要材料科学和工程来制造和修改衬底，我们需要非平衡热力学和化学动力学来定义具有降维或层状结构的可操作材料。这一领域的进展来之不易，因为日益复杂的系统显示了广泛的竞争过程；设计的改进伴随着竞争的影响，这些影响对其他重要材料的性能不利。目前的项目旨在解决材料制造中的一种特殊类型的挑战：异质系统中的相分离和相变过程。我们都知道水和油不能混合；如果你强迫它们在一起，它们就会开始分离。分离体系的最终平衡并不有趣；然而，如果我们能够冻结一个中间的、部分分离的状态，那么我们可能已经获得了具有新性质的体系，并有望获得新的应用。相分离发生在许多过程中，从薄膜或半导体系统的异质结构生长到人造或天然生物膜的形成。我们的研究旨在了解这些动态过程的许多方面，并探索以可预测的方式干预甚至引导它们的可能性。

Technological advances rely increasingly on materials which do not exist in nature. Yet, we look at nature and its inventions for inspiration and ideas for materials research solutions. What nature teaches us in materials science is that the most sophisticated solutions are materials that are complex, that self-assemble, that exist only outside the thermodynamic equilibrium, that have different properties in bulk and at their surfaces. To take the same approach in the laboratory requires an interdisciplinary approach. We need Surface Chemistry and Surface Physics to tailor the properties at the surface, we need Materials Science and Engineering to manufacture and modify the substrates, and we need Non-equilibrium thermodynamics and Chemical kinetics to define an operational material with reduced dimensions or layered structures. Advances in this field do not come easy as increasingly complex systems display a wide range of competing processes; a designed improvement is accompanied by competing efefcts that are adverse for other important materials properties. The current project aims at tackling one particular type of challenge in materials manufacturing: phase separation and phase transition processes in heterogeneous systems. We all know that water and oil don't mix; if you force them together they start to separate. The final equilibrium of separated systems is not interesting; however, if we can freeze an intermediate, partially separated state, then we may have obtained a system with novel properties and, hopefully, novel applications. Phase separations occur in many processes, ranging from thin film or heterostructure growth of semiconductor systems to the formation of artifical or natural biomembranes. Our research aims at understanding the many aspects of these dynamic processes and explore possibilities to interfere or even steer them in a predictable fashion.