LSU researchers have discovered a way to arrange nanoparticles into a single layer, a challenge scientists have been trying to achieve for decades.
Kevin McPeak, an associate professor of chemical engineering, and his partners used underwater acoustic vibrations to create a monolayer of nanoparticles.
McPeak started this project in 2015 as a side project. Now, nearly a decade of research later he published his work in January of last year.
Cameron Bachar, a third year doctoral student, had been working on the project since he was a junior in high school. Bachar explained that the research will allow scientists to create large-area nanostructures that can be used for a multitude of things.
He said nanostructures can be used in solar cells, robotics, catalysis and more. However, making them on a large scale with no defects is difficult, Bachar said. He added that doing so takes a lot of time and money.
“So with this research, we have a much better understanding of this mechanism of using low-frequency capillary waves to create these closely-packed arrays, which can be used to make nanostructures,” Bachar said.
McPeak compared the use of acoustic vibrations to create the monolayers to playing pool. He said doing so is like putting the balls inside the triangle rack to move them around where they are packed tightly together.
“And so we thought, well, could we do something like that at this air water interface. So could we vibrate the air water interface to get these particles to rearrange and come together and form a better, more perfect mono layer,” McPeak said.
These structures are used in several different types of research including medicine, energy, electronics and the environment.
Throughout his research, McPeak used several high school students to help him. McPeak explained the importance of exposing young students to hands-on science to take away the fear of not knowing what to do.
Science is about failure and learning from those failures McPeak explained. He said it is important for people to know science beyond the polished and finished version.
“What is hidden is all the work and all the failure and all the trials and tribulations that lead to that,” McPeak said. “But that’s part of the job, and so exposing kids to that, exposing them to real experimental science and then watching them grow from that is very cool.”
Bachar said his decision to pursue research as a career was shaped from working in research at an early age.
“When I started as a chemical engineering undergrad at LSU, I found myself being drawn more to the research side of things as opposed to the industry side, so having that basis of already having worked in a lab in high school gave me a good head start to jump into research again,” Bachar said.
A monolayer allows more research to be done without the natural defects the nanoparticles typically create. McPeak continues to work on nanoparticle research and developing ways to expand this technology further.
