Symposium CC: Hierarchically Self-assembled Materials–From Molecule to Nano and Beyond

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Hierarchically Self-assembled Materials—From Molecule to Nano and Beyond

Natural materials have evolved over billions of years to optimize combinations of properties like high modulus and low density and high strength and toughness.  Many proven natural designs are hierarchical, with structures on multiple scales prioritized according to function.  Mimicking these designs in robust manufacturable materials using scalable processing techniques remains a grand challenge of materials science and engineering.  This symposium will focus on hierarchical materials assembly, converging so-called bottom-up self-assembly and molecular-synthesis approaches with top-down lithography and patterning techniques to develop tool kits for the fabrication and integration of functional hierarchical materials.

The goal of this symposium is to provide a forum for researchers around the world to exchange the latest advances in this rapidly evolving field.  While previous efforts have focused on controlled 2D and 3D fabrication over a limited range of scales, developments of new molecular and building block designs and strategies of functionalization are essential for directing structure and property control over multiple scales.  The commercial application of hierarchical self-assembled materials awaits fundamental understanding of their synthesis and processing and their collective and combined properties, e.g., charge transport, thermal, mechanical, optical, and electrochemical properties.  Moreover, tremendous challenges remain in the controllable incorporation of these building blocks within advanced hierarchical materials systems and the manufacture of such systems with high reliability and controlled defect density.

The symposium will cover materials synthesis and characterization over the broad range of length scales relevant to hierarchical materials.  It will focus on molecular and building-block self assembly, new synthesis and characterization approaches, and computational approaches for the prediction of optimized designs and the characterization of complex behaviors arising from hierarchical materials structures and compositions.  The practical utilization of hierarchical materials in sensing, self healing, structural lightweight materials, biological, electronic and photonic applications, and energy conversion and storage will be addressed.

Session topics will include:

  • Molecule and building-block design, functionalization, and synthesis for hierarchical assembly and materials (e.g., nanoparticles, polyoxometallates, MOFs, proteins, viruses, DNA, etc.)
  • Correlation of structure-property relationships at and across different length scales
  • Conformal coating strategies of 3D nanostructures
  • Rapid fabrication of materials through combination of “top-down” and “bottom-up” methods for multiple-length-scale structure and function
  • Multicomponent self assembly
  • Applications of hierarchically structured materials that show correlations of their structure, property, and form at and across different length scales
  • Confined/directed/templated self assembly over multiple scales
  • Theoretical understanding/studies of hierarchical assembly behavior for optimized material structures and properties
  • Specific synergetic properties of hierarchically structured materials for practical applications such as electronics, optics, and energy storage
  • Hierarchically assembled membrane, separation, and self-healing systems

Invited speakers include:

Thomas Bein (Univ. of Munich, Germany), Jeffrey Brinker (Sandia National Labs), Paul Braun (Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), Markus Buehler(Massachusetts Inst. of Technology), Frank Caruso(Univ. of Melbourne, Australia), Bruce Dunn (Univ. of California, Los Angeles), Jonah Erlebacher (Johns Hopkins Univ.), Sharon Glotzer  (Univ. of Michigan), Taeghwan Hyeon (Seoul National Univ., Korea), Lei Jiang (Inst. of Chemistry, China), Christopher Li  (Drexel Univ.), Zhiqun Lin (Georgia Inst. of Technology),Jun Liu (Pacific Northwest National Lab), Yunfeng Lu (Univ. of California, Los Angeles), Stephen Mann (Univ. of Bristol, United Kingdom), Jeffrey Moore (Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), Michael Rubner (Massachusetts Inst. of Technology), Samuel Stupp (Northwestern Univ.), Ting Xu (Univ. of California, Berkerley), Yadong Yin (Univ. of California, Riverside), Gleb Yushin (Georgia Inst. of Technology).

Symposium Organizers

Hongyou Fan
Sandia National Laboratories
Advanced Materials Laboratory
1001 University Blvd. SE
Albuquerque, NM 87106
Tel 505-272-7128, Fax 505-272-7336
hfan@sandia.gov 

Donghai Wang
Pennsylvania State University
Dept. of Mechanical and
Nuclear Engineering
State College, PA 16802
Tel 814-863-1287, Fax 814-863-4848
dwang@psu.edu 

Earl Stromberg
Lockheed Martin Aeronautics
MZ 2893
P. O. Box 748, Fort Worth, TX 76101
Tel 817-763-7376
earl.w.stromberg@lmco.com 

Ilhan Aksay
Princeton University
Dept. of Chemical and Biological Engineering
Princeton, NJ 08544
Tel 609-258-4393
iaksay@princeton.edu 

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