This instrument development project delivers a versatile, shared-use experimental platform to enable ultrafast, pulsed laser measurements to systematically determine the properties and investigate fundamental physical processes in a variety of new optical, magnetic and electronic materials of interest for application in solar cells, information storage, low-power computing and signal processing. The platform is available for use to researchers nationwide, via the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure initiative. It, vitally, also serves in the education and training of the next-generation of scientists and engineers in advanced instrument design and ultrafast laser measurement techniques for materials.
The instrument combines robust commercial components with custom-built subsystems to provide the experimental flexibility necessary to support diverse measurement needs. The laser pulses are tunable over a wide spectral range (258 nm to 2500 nm) and temporal characteristics (25 fs to 10 ps) with a repetition rate from 1 kHz to 1 MHz. The instrument integrates a magneto-optic cryostat to vary the temperature (1.7 K to 350 K) and magnetic field (up to 7 T) environment of the sample and allow steady-state to radio-frequency (15 GHz) electrical excitation and detection. Custom-designed optical subsystems enable laser pulse stretching and compression, programmable spatial modulation of the pulses, and scanning confocal microscopy. Control software, with remote front panels, allows virtual use. Examples of studies supported by the instrument include vibrational coupling and charge-carrier dynamics in perovskite thin films, determination of anisotropic elastic properties for engineered functional materials, magnon-phonon coupling in novel magnetostrictive materials, and intrinsic internal quantum efficiency and ultrafast electron dynamics of materials used in solar absorber devices.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
