Course Outlines

Four short courses are being developed under the NSF grant and will take place at the EMSL facility in Richland Washington, however the location of the theory course has yet to be determined. Course scheduling, the objective and instructors are noted in the following course outlines. For the 2-week courses, the first day at EMSL will be used for badging and orientation. Classes will continue through Friday and resume on Monday. In some cases, at the end of the second week students will be offered transportation to the University of Washington, where a guided tour of the campus, science departments and the Center for Nanotechnology will be given. In addition, a small seed support from this NSF grant has been provided to develop a full 10-week (1-quarter course), interdisciplinary, undergraduate course at the UW.

2-Week Intensive Short Courses

• Classes will meet in the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory
• Housing is available at the PNNL Guest House
• Charge is $30 a night, but upon request housing scholarships are available
• Classes normally have 3 or 4 lectures a day, plus small project laboratory time.
• For laboratory access at the national laboratory, some additional information (and process time) is needed for those who are not US citizens. Contact Heather Bradshaw for details (hc.bradshaw@pnl.gov).
• Prof. Lai-Sheng Wang (ls.wang@pnl.gov) course coordinator
• Syllabus

First week:
• Nanocluster generation through MBE, aggregation and laser vaporization. Mass spectrometry study of clusters, TOF mass spectrometry. Photoelectron spectroscopy lab.
• Electron Shell and Metallic droplet models. Electronic structure of clusters, photoionization and photoelectron spectroscopy. Photoelectron techniques and time-of-flight photoelectron analyzer. Molecular to bulk transition, nonmetal to metal transitions.
• Transition metal clusters, aluminum, oxide and carbide clusters. Novel clusters and nonstoichiometric molecules. Chemical reactivity of clusters and cluster surface analogy. Cluster structure determinations, ion mobility and electron diffraction.
• The Stern-Gerlach experiments and magnetic clusters. Discovery of C60 and properties of fullerenes Solid C60, electron and hole doping - high temperature superconductors. Carbon nanotubes and their properties.

Second week:
• Laser-Surface Interaction and Laser Surface lab. Beam-surface scattering, nanostructure formation and Beam-Surface Lab. Synthesis of Carbon Nanotubes and Nanowires.
• Scanning electron microscopy, and SEM of Nanotube samples. Transmission electron microscopy and TEM of Nanotube samples.
• Molecular beam epitaxy and MBE Lab. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and application to materials, and XPS Lab. Scanning tunneling microscopy, and STM Lab.
• Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Optical Imaging, Single Molecule/imaging Lab, Nano-ice films and Nano-ice film Lab.

Lecture Content
• Important nanoscale systems and their novel properties (clusters, dots, films) (2 h)
• Nucleation and growth: diffusion of adatoms, nucleation theory, crystal growth (4 h)
• Elastic (epitaxial and compositional) stresses and their distribution in model nanoscale systems; effects of stress on structure and properties of quantum dots and films (2 h)
• Self-organization: morphological and compositional nanoscale pattern formation (2 h)
• Atomic-scale theory of nanostructures (2h)
• Computational modeling: structure and stability (molecular dynamics, multiscale approaches) (2 h)
• Mechanical, lattice dynamics, cluster properties (2 h)
• Electronic/optical/magnetic properties of nanostructures (quantum effects) (4h)

Lab projects:
• Lab #1: Classical (continuum) nucleation and growth
• Lab #2: Formation of self-assembled arrays of III-V semiconductor quantum dots.
• Lab #3: Pattern formation in self-assembled alloy monolayers.
• Lab #4: Molecular dynamics simulations of material structure and properties.
• Lab #5: Quantum dots and Coulomb blockade devices.

First week:
• Oxide nanostructures created by Physical Vapor Deposition methods. Explore the physical properties of oxides that make them important to optical, electronic and magnetic applications.
• Creation of oxide nanostructures using Molecular Beam Epitaxy, Ballistic Deposition.
• Creation of oxide nanostructures using CVD, and solution chemistry.
• Fabrication of nanomaterials using molecular self-assembly. Assemble into organized systems, such as monolayers, bilayers, micelles, vesicles and supramolecular lattices.

Second week:
• Explore ordered macromolecular structure, with nanometer scale features. Utilize self-assembled monolayers as structural templates for secondary materials synthesis, i.e. mesoporous silica.
• Combine multiple generations of molecular self-assembled layers to create highly ordered, nanostructured hybrid materials.
• Synthesize nanoclusters inside a medium, such as semiconductors, glass, and ceramic media, using ion beams.
• Display the "smart surface" nanocomposite concept based on the ion implantation plus thermal processing approach.

First week:
Structure and properties of isolated clusters section.
• Gas-phase clusters analyzed by mass spectrometry. The evolution of the electronic structure as a function of size characterized by photoelectron spectroscopy.
• Other gas phase methods used to characterize gas phase clusters, such the Stern-Gerlach experiment for magnetic clusters and chemical reactivity determinations of size-selected clusters. The physical, chemical, and electronic properties of fullerenes, fullerites, and carbon nanotubes will be discussed, as well as metallic clusters.

Shape, composition and distribution of nanoparticles section.


• High-resolution Auger electron microscopy, Scanning Probe Methods (AFM/STM).
• Electron microscopy (SEM/TEM); particle size analysis.

Second week:
Structure and properties of nanomaterials section.
• High-resolution x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and x-ray photoelectron diffraction, Auger electron spectroscopy, thin film x-ray diffraction, and nuclear reaction analysis.
• Ion channeling, Rutherford backscattering spectroscopy, low energy electron diffraction, time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry, and ellipsometry.

Properties of system with nanometer dimensions section.

• For liquid environments - field flow fractionation, particle and charge analyzer, atomic force microscopy.
• For "bulk" properties - x-ray diffractometry, Fourier transform infrared spectrometry, Mossbauer and Raman spectroscopies.