Self-assembly of a terbium(III) 1D coordination polymer on mica

• Quentin Evrard,
• Giuseppe Cucinotta,
• Felix Houard,
• Guillaume Calvez,
• Yan Suffren,
• Carole Daiguebonne,
• Olivier Guillou,
• Andrea Caneschi,
• Matteo Mannini and
• Kevin Bernot

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2440–2448, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.234

• . After drying of the cyclohexane under a gentle flux of nitrogen gas, the samples were maintained at 300 K and a relative humidity of 90% for 24 h. Atomic force microscopy measurements. AFM imaging was performed with a P47-PRO instrument (NT-MDT co. Zelenograd, Moscow, Russia) using a NSC-36 silicon tip

Semitransparent Sb₂S₃ thin film solar cells by ultrasonic spray pyrolysis for use in solar windows

• Jako S. Eensalu,
• Atanas Katerski,
• Erki Kärber,
• Lothar Weinhardt,
• Monika Blum,
• Clemens Heske,
• Wanli Yang,
• Ilona Oja Acik and
• Malle Krunks

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2396–2409, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.230

• building electricity demand can be produced on site [1]. Solar windows can be split into two groups: perforated grids of opaque solar cells, such as silicon, or one continuous semitransparent thin film solar cell (dye-sensitized, perovskite, quantum dot, etc.) [1]. Perforated solar windows, comprised of

Deterministic placement of ultra-bright near-infrared color centers in arrays of silicon carbide micropillars

• Stefania Castelletto,
• Abdul Salam Al Atem,
• Faraz Ahmed Inam,
• Hans Jürgen von Bardeleben,
• Sophie Hameau,
• Ahmed Fahad Almutairi,
• Gérard Guillot,
• Shin-ichiro Sato,
• Alberto Boretti and
• Jean Marie Bluet

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2383–2395, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.229

• enhancement of the optical emission between 850 and 1400 nm of an ensemble of silicon mono-vacancies (VSi), silicon and carbon divacancies (VCVSi), and nitrogen vacancies (NCVSi) in an n-type 4H-SiC array of micropillars. The micropillars have a length of ca. 4.5 μm and a diameter of ca. 740 nm, and were

• element method simulations. Our study provides the pathway for device design and fabrication with an integrated ultra-bright ensemble of VSi and NCVSi for in vivo imaging and sensing in the infrared. Keywords: color centers; micropillars; proton irradiation; quantum sensing; silicon carbide; vacancy

• ; Introduction Silicon carbide (SiC) is an established material for many electronic devices and has also been considered for photonics applications recently. After the improvement of the purity of the material and the isolation of point defects (primarily vacancies), SiC has been considered to host physical

Multiwalled carbon nanotube based aromatic volatile organic compound sensor: sensitivity enhancement through 1-hexadecanethiol functionalisation

• Nadra Bohli,
• Meryem Belkilani,
• Juan Casanova-Chafer,
• Eduard Llobet and
• Adnane Abdelghani

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2364–2373, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.227

• characterisation Transmission electron microscopy characterisation In order to carry out high-resolution transmission electron microscope characterisation, MWCNTs were deposited onto a silicon substrate. Then, a sputtering process was conducted to deposit the Au nanoparticles. Afterwards, Au-decorated MWCNTs were

Integration of sharp silicon nitride tips into high-speed SU8 cantilevers in a batch fabrication process

• Nahid Hosseini,
• Matthias Neuenschwander,
• Oliver Peric,
• Santiago H. Andany,
• Jonathan D. Adams and
• Georg E. Fantner

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2357–2363, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.226

• Abstract Employing polymer cantilevers has shown to outperform using their silicon or silicon nitride analogues concerning the imaging speed of atomic force microscopy (AFM) in tapping mode (intermittent contact mode with amplitude modulation) by up to one order of magnitude. However, tips of the

• developed a batch fabrication process to integrate silicon nitride tips with an average tip radius of 9 ± 2 nm into high-speed SU8 cantilevers. Key aspects of the process are the mechanical anchoring of a moulded silicon nitride tip and a two-step release process. The fabrication recipe can be adjusted to

• any photo-processable polymer cantilever. Keywords: Atomic force microscopy (AFM); durability; imaging speed; polymer cantilever; silicon nitride tip; Introduction Atomic force microscopy (AFM) cantilevers have been developed for numerous applications since the invention of scanning probe microscopy

Liquid crystal tunable claddings for polymer integrated optical waveguides

• José M. Otón,
• Manuel Caño-García,
• Fernando Gordo,
• Eva Otón,
• Morten A. Geday and
• Xabier Quintana

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2163–2170, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.209

• passive, turning them into tunable devices able to drive and modulate light signals. One possible way that has attracted increasing interest in the last five years is the use of photonic circuits based on silicon. Silicon photonics can be employed in the NIR range at wavelengths longer than 1100 nm. This

• material paves the way to the use of large wafers, well-known efficient microelectronic processes and remarkable cost savings. Silicon waveguides can be developed on silicon dioxide, resulting in silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer structures compatible to CMOS processes [5]. This opens the possibility of

• integrating electronic and photonic components in the same circuit. The main drawback for silicon waveguides to become tunable devices is the big difference in refractive indices between the core (Si, n > 3.0) and the cladding (SiO2, n < 1.50). This difference confines the propagating wave inside the core

Nitrogen-vacancy centers in diamond for nanoscale magnetic resonance imaging applications

• Alberto Boretti,
• Lorenzo Rosa,
• Jonathan Blackledge and
• Stefania Castelletto

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2128–2151, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.207

Microbubbles decorated with dendronized magnetic nanoparticles for biomedical imaging: effective stabilization via fluorous interactions

• Da Shi,
• Justine Wallyn,
• Dinh-Vu Nguyen,
• Francis Perton,
• Delphine Felder-Flesch,
• Sylvie Bégin-Colin,
• Mounir Maaloum and
• Marie Pierre Krafft

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2103–2115, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.205

• dendronized IONPs are incorporated within the DPPC shell of the MBs or located at the surface of the shell (Figure 8), mixed films composed of phospholipid and nanoparticles were prepared by spin-coating on silicon wafers. The morphology of the films was investigated by AFM in the peak–force tapping mode. We

• dendronized IONPs Thin films of DPPC, dendronized IONPs and DPPC/dendronized IONP mixtures were prepared by spin-coating on silicon wafers [49]. To this end, a dispersion of dendronized IONPs in water (1 mg L−1) was freeze-dried and then dissolved in ethanol for preparing a dispersion with a concentration of

• dispersion was obtained by diluting this 1 mM dispersion. Silicon wafers were cleaned for 30 min in a sonication bath containing ethanol/milli-Q water (1:1), followed by 2 min in a plasma cleaner. A droplet (15 µL) of DPPC, dendronized IONPs or mixed DPPC/dendronized IONP dispersions was deposited on a

The importance of design in nanoarchitectonics: multifractality in MACE silicon nanowires

• Stefania Carapezzi and
• Anna Cavallini

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2094–2102, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.204

• . Especially semiconductor NWs offer the unique promise to boost the performance of semiconductor devices by quantum effects. In this respect, silicon NWs [4][5][6][7] are key elements in the field of nanotechnology, given that they can be integrated in the microelectronic industry, which is mainly Si-based

• nucleophilic substitution reaction takes place, which causes silicon atoms to be etched/removed from the substrate. The metal layer, which is not consumed during the process, simply sinks down while the uncovered parts of the substrate form the tips of the NWs. Indeed, no consummation occurs when gold is used

• single value but a range of values of a) E = 80–120 GPa [33] and of b) γHF from 0.5 mN/m [34] to 10.2 mN/m [35]. A value of θ = 70° has been found for silicon surfaces and HF [36]. The range of values for the capillary force has thus been estimated to be 3–65 pN, which is orders of magnitude greater than

Ion mobility and material transport on KBr in air as a function of the relative humidity

• Dominik J. Kirpal,
• Korbinian Pürckhauer,
• Alfred J. Weymouth and
• Franz J. Giessibl

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2084–2093, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.203

• to be taken into account that measurements at such low pressure rather relate to the outer atmosphere than to ambient conditions. However similar observations have been made by Asay et al. under ambient conditions, who showed on silicon oxide the growth of three monolayers up to RH = 30%, an

• Wastl et al. in [23], by comparing the rip-off distance of the meniscus for a sapphire and a silicon tip. In order to observe a significant temporal evolution of the sample surface we chose KBr, a soft and easily soluble salt (650 g/L in H2O at 20 °C) [24]. KBr crystallizes in the rock-salt structure

Green and scalable synthesis of nanocrystalline kuramite

• Andrea Giaccherini,
• Giuseppe Cucinotta,
• Stefano Martinuzzi,
• Enrico Berretti,
• Werner Oberhauser,
• Alessandro Lavacchi,
• Giovanni Orazio Lepore,
• Giordano Montegrossi,
• Maurizio Romanelli,
• Antonio De Luca,
• Massimo Innocenti,
• Vanni Moggi Cecchi,
• Matteo Mannini,
• Antonella Buccianti and
• Francesco Di Benedetto

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2073–2083, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.202

• Naturale, Sistema Museale di Ateneo dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, Via La Pira 4, 50121 Firenze, Italy 10.3762/bjnano.10.202 Abstract The new generation of solar cells aims to overcome many of the issues created by silicon-based devices (e.g., decommissioning, flexibility and high-energy

• ; Introduction In the last decade, advances in materials science and nanoscience have led to the development of new solar cell technologies. Today, they hold promise to overcome the environmental issues created by silicon-based devices. Such devices are difficult to decommission, their production requires energy

• efficient with respect to those used for silicon-based solar cell production [2][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27]. Most of these processes yield nanocrystalline materials that can be easily dispersed in inks [28][29][30][31][32][33], leading to a plethora of new applications, even processing

Synthesis of highly active ETS-10-based titanosilicate for heterogeneously catalyzed transesterification of triglycerides

• Muhammad A. Zaheer,
• David Poppitz,
• Khavar Feyzullayeva,
• Marianne Wenzel,
• Jörg Matysik,
• Radomir Ljupkovic,
• Aleksandra Zarubica,
• Alexander A. Karavaev,
• Andreas Pöppl,
• Roger Gläser and
• Muslim Dvoyashkin

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 2039–2061, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.200

• -polarization (CP) spectrum presented in Figure 13B. It is worth mentioning that the CP technique facilitates polarization transfer from protons to silicon to acquire spectra of the latter. The HPDEC spectrum of the P-ETS-10/60 sample in Figure 13A shows four peaks in the range between −85 and −110 ppm, where

• seen for Na,K-ETS-10, i.e., coordinated as Si(3Si, 1Ti). They show relative areas of 43% and 34%, respectively. In comparison to the spectrum of Na,K-ETS-10, the intensity of the peak centered at −97.3 ppm is reduced due to the partial hydroxylation of the silicon atoms after treatment. In the CP

• a slightly reduced relative area of 17%. The loss in silicon atoms with this resonance comes mainly from the hydroxylation that shifts the peak of the resulting species to −96.4 ppm. The HPDEC spectrum of the C-P-ETS-10/60 material in Figure 13A clearly shows that the Si(2Si, 1Ti, 1OH) species at

Gold-coated plant virus as computed tomography imaging contrast agent

• Alaa A. A. Aljabali,
• Mazhar S. Al Zoubi,
• Khalid M. Al-Batanyeh,
• Ali Al-Radaideh,
• Mohammad A. Obeid,
• Abeer Al Sharabi,
• Walhan Alshaer,
• Bayan AbuFares,
• Tasnim Al-Zanati,
• Murtaza M. Tambuwala,
• Naveed Akbar and
• David J. Evans

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1983–1993, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.195

• from Sigma-Aldrich; potassium carbonate was purchased from BDH; hydroxylamine hydrochloride (99%) was purchased from Lancaster Synthesis; carborundum (fine-grade silicon carbide) was purchased from Parchem; carboxyl-PEG 5000-SH, (1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)carbodiimide hydrochloride) (EDC), N

• , VA). Methods CPMV propagation CPMV propagation followed our previously published method [38]. Black-eyed peas plant (Vigna unguiculata) were grown from seeds, obtained locally, in a greenhouse for 10 days. Primary leaves were rubbed with carborundum (fine-grade silicon carbide abrasive) and treated

Porous silver-coated pNIPAM-co-AAc hydrogel nanocapsules

• William W. Bryan,
• Riddhiman Medhi,
• Maria D. Marquez,
• Supparesk Rittikulsittichai,
• Michael Tran and
• T. Randall Lee

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1973–1982, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.194

• deposited on clean silicon wafers and thoroughly dried at room temperature overnight before obtaining the SEM images. The images at low magnification were taken to demonstrate good dispersion. The image analysis for size distribution was carried out using ImageJ software. Bare pNIPAM-co-AAc hydrogel

• was equilibrated to the desired temperature, optical measurements of the particles were acquired. FTIR spectral data was obtained using a Nicolet Nexus FTIR 670 spectrometer. Aqueous solutions of the hydrogel particles and pDADMAC were directly deposited onto a silicon wafer and dried under vacuum

Synthesis and potent cytotoxic activity of a novel diosgenin derivative and its phytosomes against lung cancer cells

• Liang Xu,
• Dekang Xu,
• Ziying Li,
• Yu Gao and
• Haijun Chen

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1933–1942, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.189

• under ambient conditions with a silicon cantilever with L = 115 μm, W = 25 μm, and T = 605 nm. For TEM measurements, the DiP and P2P were diluted with ddH2O to a concentration of 10 μg/mL. 8.5 μL of the dispersion was dripped on the copper grid and dried in air overnight before imaging. Cell cultures

Processing nanoporous organic polymers in liquid amines

• Jeehye Byun,
• Damien Thirion and
• Cafer T. Yavuz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1844–1850, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.179

• granules were covered with organic layers, presumably excess EDA. The solution was transferred on a silicon wafer to analyze the morphology changes by SEM as function of the heating time. When treated at high temperature for a short period of time (ca. 1 min), the granules were combined in a heap to form a

Nanoarchitectonics meets cell surface engineering: shape recognition of human cells by halloysite-doped silica cell imprints

• Elvira Rozhina,
• Ilnur Ishmukhametov,
• Svetlana Batasheva,
• Farida Akhatova and
• Rawil Fakhrullin

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1818–1825, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.176

• -suspended in the medium to 106 cells·mL−1and mixed with PAAm-co-DADMAC (1 wt %). After 10 min of incubation with the polycation solution, the cells were washed thrice with buffer to remove excess polyelectrolyte. Next, a thin silicon film was formed on the pre-functionalised cells. The working solution was

• , Bruker, USA) operating in a PeakForce Tapping mode in air. The cells incubated with imprints for 15 minutes were washed with buffer; the precipitate was kept in glutaraldehyde (Sigma) for 1 hour, then washed with buffer and Milli-Q. Standard silicon nitride ScanAsyst-Air probes (Bruker) with resonance

Growth dynamics and light scattering of gold nanoparticles in situ synthesized at high concentration in thin polymer films

• Corentin Guyot,
• Philippe Vandestrick,
• Ingrid Marenne,
• Olivier Deparis and
• Michel Voué

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1768–1777, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.172

• the optical response of the film. Other causes of the local changes of the optical response such as temperature-induced thickness and refractive index change of the substrate can also be neglected. The thermal expansion coefficient of silicon oxide (0.24 × 10−6 K−1) and its thermo-optic coefficient dn

Stationary beam full-field transmission helium ion microscopy using sub-50 keV He⁺: Projected images and intensity patterns

• Michael Mousley,
• Santhana Eswara,
• Olivier De Castro,
• Olivier Bouton,
• Nico Klingner,
• Christoph T. Koch,
• Gregor Hlawacek and
• Tom Wirtz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1648–1657, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.160

• MgO deflection pattern. Supporting Information File 112: Description of supporting videos 1 and 2, SIMION results and methods (defocus and size on sample plane), a defocus series for a polycrystalline silicon sample, a magnification of images showing distortion of grid squares and a photograph of the

Subsurface imaging of flexible circuits via contact resonance atomic force microscopy

• Wenting Wang,
• Chengfu Ma,
• Yuhang Chen,
• Lei Zheng,
• Huarong Liu and
• Jiaru Chu

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1636–1647, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.159

• PMMA–Au–PMMA sandwich structure with a thick PMMA film as the bottom layer, a patterned Au layer as the middle, functional circuit layer, and a thin PMMA film as the top protection layer, as schematically shown in Figure 1. The bottom layer was first coated on a clean silicon substrate by spin casting

• (PC) and polyimide (PI) for the bottom and top layers, and Au, Cu, Ti, Ag and Mg for the middle layer. The mechanical parameters of these materials are listed in Table 2. The Young’s modulus and Poisson’s ratio of the silicon substrate are 160 GPa and 0.278, respectively. Cantilever vibration model

• the same as that in the analytical calculations. Since the model is axisymmetric, we used the two-dimensional FEA simulations for simplicity. The width of the sample was set to 2 µm and the thickness of the silicon substrate was 10 µm. Mesh refinement was applied near the tip–sample contact area. The

Chiral nanostructures self-assembled from nitrocinnamic amide amphiphiles: substituent and solvent effects

• Hejin Jiang,
• Huahua Fan,
• Yuqian Jiang,
• Li Zhang and
• Minghua Liu

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1608–1617, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.156

• /Max-2500 X-ray diffractometer (Japan) with Cu Kα radiation (λ =1.5406 Å). The operating voltage was 40 kV and a current of 200 mA was used. The samples were cast on silicon substrates and dried in air for XRD measurements. Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy was recorded with a Bruker

High-temperature resistive gas sensors based on ZnO/SiC nanocomposites

• Vadim B. Platonov,
• Marina N. Rumyantseva,
• Alexander S. Frolov,
• Alexey D. Yapryntsev and
• Alexander M. Gaskov

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1537–1547, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.151

• dispersed silicon carbide (SiC). In this work, ZnO and SiC nanofibers were synthesized by electrospinning of polymer solutions followed by heat treatment, which is necessary for polymer removal and crystallization of semiconductor materials. ZnO/SiC nanocomposites (15–45 mol % SiC) were obtained by mixing

• composite nanomaterials using highly dispersed silicon carbide (SiC). The unique physical and chemical properties of silicon carbide – wide band gap (Eg = 2.4–3.2 eV), high Debye temperature 1400 K, high thermal conductivity of 4.9 W/cm·K, low reactivity to oxygen and water vapor – ensure the stability of

• composite materials with respect to temperature, radiation, chemical and mechanical effects [6][7]. It has been shown that in MO/SiC nanocomposites containing metal oxide (MO) and nanostructured SiC, the presence of silicon carbide inhibits the growth of MO crystallites at high temperatures [8]. The

Development of a new hybrid approach combining AFM and SEM for the nanoparticle dimensional metrology

• Loïc Crouzier,
• Alexandra Delvallée,
• Sébastien Ducourtieux,
• Laurent Devoille,
• Guillaume Noircler,
• Christian Ulysse,
• Olivier Taché,
• Elodie Barruet,
• Christophe Tromas and
• Nicolas Feltin

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1523–1536, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.150

• maximal Feret diameters are determined by SEM and the NP height is measured by AFM. In this context, a kind of new NP repositioning system consisting of a lithographed silicon substrate has been specifically developed. This device makes it possible to combine AFM and SEM size measurements performed

• metrology has been recently defined in the semiconductor industry [6][7][8]. In fact, the challenges posed by the constraints of Moore’s law with a continuous shrinkage of transistor dimensions are huge in terms of metrology. The abandonment of a technology based only on silicon and the emergence of 3D

• silicon substrates through the spin-coating method detailed in [11]. This method yields well-dispersed nanoparticles on the substrate while maximizing the number of isolated NPs preventing agglomeration of the NPs. NP SEM images have been recorded using a Zeiss ULTRA-Plus field-emission (FE) microscope

Energy distribution in an ensemble of nanoparticles and its consequences

• Dieter Vollath

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1452–1457, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.143

• scattered on a sheet of silicon oxide. Additionally, these particles were separated by an oleic acid coating of 2 nm. Woods et al. [5] determined the magnetic noise power as a function of temperature during the superparamagnetic transition. For this example, the experimental data obtained from 5 nm

Growth of lithium hydride thin films from solutions: Towards solution atomic layer deposition of lithiated films

• Ivan Kundrata,
• Karol Fröhlich,
• Lubomír Vančo,
• Matej Mičušík and
• Julien Bachmann

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2019, 10, 1443–1451, doi:10.3762/bjnano.10.142

• electrode layers and substrates, for example to silicon into which the lithium can easily diffuse. In addition, several highly reactive precursors, such as Grignard reagents or n-butyllithium (BuLi) are only usable in solution. In theory, it is possible to use BuLi and water in solution to produce thin