Novel devices & applications

At the first sight, the exhibited phenomena look very diverse but, and this is the uniqueness of the materials that are under investigation in our research group, the elements that control these phenomena, such as carrier doping and strong correlation of the carriers, are universal in these materials. With the possibility to design and construct artificial materials on demand, for example in thins films using the high pressure RHEED controlled pulsed laser deposition systems developed by us, new opportunities become available for novel device concepts.

Several projects are currently carried out in this research area:

Piezoelectric thin film for energy harvesting device Nowadays, there is a huge requirement in using renewable power supplies, such as batteries. A more efficient and environmental friendly power device is clearly required, instead of using the electrochemical batteries and to lengthen the lifetime of portable electronic device

Thin film PiezoMEMS The SmartPie program aims on development of PiezoMEMS (Piezo Micro Electro Mechanical Systems), consisting of all-oxide heteroepitaxial films on silicon substrates.

Piezoelectric PZT capacitors using metallic SRO electrodes Ferroelectric PZT thin films, due to the low coercive field and high remnant polarization near the morphotropic phase boundary, have been widely investigated for applications in non-volatile random access memory devices.

Organic single-crystal devices with inorganic dielectrics In this project, molecular organic (pentacene) single-crystal devices (field-effect transistors) with high quality inorganic dielectrics are being studied.

Thin film O2 and NOx sensors Objective of this project is to investigate and fabricate miniature gas sensors, based on thin films made by PLD. By combining thin film technology with smart sensor designs, we are aiming for low-cost, miniature sensors which can compete with costly, commercially available bulk sensors.