Summer 2007
In this Issue:
Focus On Metamaterials
New Laser Center for Training and Research Opens
The Multiwave Materials Processing Center is still under construction, Dr. Todd explained on a rainy day in March as we walked from her office in Earth-Engineering Sciences Building to a locked side entrance of Research West a stone's throw away. "Part of the reason for creating this new facility is that it is open to non-US citizens," she said. "Although ARL and the Penn State ElectroOptics Center have some of the best laser facilities in the country, you can't just go in and teach students how to operate the equipment. They have to be escorted, the technicians do the work, and there are restrictions on foreign students. So we created this open facility to do both teaching and research in collaboration with ARL, EOC, the College of Engineering, and the Materials Research Institute."
What sets the Multiwave Center apart from other laser processing labs is their concept of using beams of different energies, such as the very high powered 10.6 micron wavelength carbon dioxide laser along with the Neodymium:YAG laser with a 1.06 micron wavelength and the very short wavelength Excimer laser which is used in semiconductor manufacturing and eye surgery, to create a new type of surface that you couldn't get using each one by itself.
The Center is only a month old, and is still a work in progress. In one of the two labs on opposite sides of a newly painted hallway, Dr. Jian Xu, an assistant professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics, has set up a laser system and deposition chambers. In one chamber Dr. Xu makes nanoscale quantum dots - semiconductor crystals that trap electrons - then transfers the quantum dots to the second chamber and attaches them to biological molecules. His biofunctionalized quantum dots require laser processing.
Across the hall in the second lab, post-docs Puneit Dua and Ravindra Akarapu were at work on the laser plasma project. There was still equipment in boxes and not all of the lasers were hooked up. By Materials Day in April, Dr. Todd hoped to open the lab for tours and have all the equipment up and running.
Akarapu turned on one of the powerful lasers and Dua donned a welding mask and peered into the laser chamber. The concentrated laser beam shot out of a tube onto a metal plate and within a few seconds we heard a crack and a corner of the plate shattered.
"We are doing experiments on alumina plate showing you can create a plasma and redeposit species in it," Todd explained. "We will study how species (the ionized particles, electrons, and atoms) get incorporated into a plasma, and how you can feed other species into a plasma to help sustain it," Todd said. "Another idea is to try and create plasmas with lasers and put those together with plasmas from microwaves. I don't think anyone has put those two together before. But we'd like to try."
The U.S. lags far behind Europe and Japan in laser technology. There are few places where students can be trained in the field in this country, which gives the Center the opportunity to create national leadership in laser materials research and training. " With this new center, it will be possible to span from basic research to prototype to process, plus develop students for the workforce," Todd said. " Industry, if they're interested, can support basic research here, then take the research over the wall to ARL and develop a prototype."
Some 50 faculty in multiple colleges and units across campus and as far as Hershey have expressed interest in laser interaction with materials. Graduate education in laser materials processing is currently a five-course program from which students choose four courses for a certificate. In the next phase of course development, Todd plans to introduce a laser optics certificate option. The interest has been great enough to support the graduate program and help support the Center. "We can create a unique facility here," she said, "but we are right at the beginning."
Judith Todd is P.B. Breneman Department Head Chair, Department of Engineering Science and Mechanics. Validate to view address - Send Email via form
