Berkeley Lab

Double perovskite nanocrystals and watching the structure formation of solution-cast perovskite films

By Greg Su Double perovskites are promising forms that may help address issues of lead toxicity in standard perovskite structures. Jakob Dahl from UC Berkeley reported on the synthesis of lead-free double perovskite nanocrystals of the form Cs2AgMX6. These nanocrystals can be made down to 10 nanometers in size. At these size scales, quantum confinement […]

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Materials and Devices for Brain-like Computing

By Alberto Salleo The “Materials and Devices for Brain-like computing” explored technologies for next generation computing -widely believed to benefit from taking inspiration from biology- as well as technologies that mimic nature or can integrate with living matter. Dr. Talin (Sandia National Lab) and Prof. Strukov (UC Santa Barbara) described new devices that can be […]

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Panel Discussion: Materials Discovery and Design to Enable a Circular Materials Economy

By Francesca Toma Panelists: Martin Mulvihill – Safer Made, Justin Bours – Cradle to Cradle; Peter Christensen – Berkeley Lab, Julie Schoenung – UC Irvine, Linda Gaines – Argonne National Lab The Circular Materials Economy Symposium hosted a panel discussions with speakers and audience. In circular economy, it is important to understand that the end […]

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Multimodal In-situ Methods at the Materials Interface

By Elyse Schriber The symposia at the Molecular Foundry user meetings are always a fantastic way to end the user meeting as we get introduced to these large scale broad topics during the plenary sessions and then get an opportunity to focus on individual fields of interest. During the Multimodal In-situ Methods at the Materials […]

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Materials Selection in the Circular Economy: Choosing Safer Alternatives

By Francesca Toma A talk by Julie Schoenung, Professor and Chair of the Department of Materials Science at University of California, Irvine Prof. Schoenung talked about hazards and safety data sheets and the need of protect ourselves. Safety data sheets are self-reported and there exist concerns about how accurately companies report data. NIOSH is the […]

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Day 2: Breakout Symposia

Here we are on day 2 of the annual User Meeting! Today we have 8 breakout symposia covering a broad spectrum of nanoscale science: Morning SessionsMetal Halide Perovskites: Opportunities, Challenges, Future DirectionsMultimodal In situ Methods at the Materials Interface Materials Discovery and Design to Enable a Circular Materials Economy Materials and Devices for Brain-like Computing Afternoon SessionsNew […]

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A poster slam limerick and our evening reception

The final act of the plenary session was the poster slam, emcee(squared) by Foundry staff scientist Sinéad Griffin, who, when challenged to start off with a rap, instead followed the literary tradition of her home country and delivered a clever limerick to get things going. All of the 19 Slam participants were students who were […]

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Soft Electronics for the Human Body

John Rogers, a Professor at Northwestern University, closed out the Plenary session with a talk on engineering soft electronic materials for medical purposes. His research group has been working on developing materials for electronic devices that are not only bendable, but also stretchable, so that they can adhere and contour to the unpredictable surface of […]

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Gaining joint access to the ALS and Molecular Foundry

By Brooke Kuei One topic that has been brought up every year at the Molecular Foundry User Meeting has been streamlining collaborations with the Advanced Light Source (ALS). At this year’s User Meeting, there was a dedicated session on joint access to the ALS and the Molecular Foundry that discussed the different ways that users […]

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From new uses for radioactive elements to carbon nanotube forests

By Keiko Munechika The afternoon session kicked off Rebecca Abergel, who is a staff scientist at Chemical Sciences Division at LBNL. Actinides are radioactive materials at the very bottom of the periodic period. Prof. Abergel discussed how fundamental understanding of bonding chemistry between actinides elements and selective ligands are much needed for the development of […]

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