Characterization of the microscopic tribological properties of sandfish (Scincus scincus) scales by atomic force microscopy

• Weibin Wu,
• Christian Lutz,
• Simon Mersch,
• Richard Thelen,
• Christian Greiner,
• Guillaume Gomard and
• Hendrik Hölscher

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2618–2627, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.243

• for 5 min and with a 1 µm diamond suspension for 8 min (DP-suspension M products purchased from Struers, Willich, Germany). This procedure resulted in scratch-free surfaces and a surface roughness of Ra < 0.01 µm, determined by optical profilometry (Sensofar Plµ neox, Barcelona, Spain). The water

Au–Si plasmonic platforms: synthesis, structure and FDTD simulations

• Anna Gapska,
• Marcin Łapiński,
• Paweł Syty,
• Wojciech Sadowski,
• Józef E. Sienkiewicz and
• Barbara Kościelska

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2599–2608, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.241

• image of the as-prepared film is shown in Figure 2a. The surface of the as-deposited film is not smooth. Some roughness can be noticed, which increases during annealing. It can be seen in Figure 2b that annealing already at 150 °C caused the appearance of voids in the film, which can be a consequence of

Friction reduction through biologically inspired scale-like laser surface textures

• Johannes Schneider,
• Vergil Djamiykov and
• Christian Greiner

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2561–2572, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.238

• friction forces encountered for sliding speeds between 40 and 70 mm/s. For even slower sliding, a more classical mixed lubrication contact is formed, as it is also encountered for samples textured with dimples [15]. The surface roughness of the steel discs after the experiments was Ra ≈ 200 nm. The discs

• detrimental effect by introducing a scale-like surface morphology for smaller sliding speeds was observed. Surface profilometry on the discs after the experiments revealed surface roughness values of Ra ≈ 250 nm, demonstrating that the discs became slightly rougher. Occasional signs of adhesive wear events

• friction coefficient for the steel-on-ceramic contact are significantly larger compared to the steel and polymer counter bodies presented above. This might be due to the significantly larger surface roughness of the aluminium oxide discs compared to the PEEK and 100Cr6 ones. Unfortunately, it is

High-temperature magnetism and microstructure of a semiconducting ferromagnetic (GaSb)_1−x(MnSb)_x alloy

• Leonid N. Oveshnikov,
• Elena I. Nekhaeva,
• Alexey V. Kochura,
• Alexander B. Davydov,
• Mikhail A. Shakhov,
• Sergey F. Marenkin,
• Oleg A. Novodvorskii,
• Alexander P. Kuzmenko,
• Alexander L. Vasiliev,
• Boris A. Aronzon and
• Erkki Lahderanta

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2457–2465, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.230

• 150 nm and the surface roughness does not exceed 6 nm. This is in a good agreement with the data presented in Table 1, which were estimated from the duration of the deposition process. The image analysis confirms a homogeneous composition throughout the film thickness without any substantial contrast

Evidence of friction reduction in laterally graded materials

• Roberto Guarino,
• Gianluca Costagliola,
• Federico Bosia and
• Nicola Maria Pugno

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2443–2456, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.229

• simulation from a Gaussian statistical distribution (to account for surface roughness) with mean values denoted with µs(m) and µk(m), respectively. The standard deviation on the local coefficients of friction are denoted with σµs and σµk, respectively. If the block i is at rest, the static friction force Ffr

• or using different processes in order to have a varying roughness and thus varying local friction coefficients. Secondly, a surface with a gradient in the frictional properties can be obtained by appropriately fabricating and arranging microscopic structures of variable geometries or sizes, giving

• nature, or in the local frictional properties, e.g., by controlling the roughness or the microstructure, for the design of advanced sliding interfaces. A reduction in the static friction up to almost 30%, with respect to the corresponding non-graded material, can thus be achieved. Schematic of the

Thickness-dependent photoelectrochemical properties of a semitransparent Co₃O₄ photocathode

• Malkeshkumar Patel and
• Joondong Kim

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2432–2442, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.228

• focused ion beam system (FIB, FEI, Quanta 3D FEG). The elemental compositions in the cross sections of the Co3O4 layers in the working electrode were determined as line profiles by an energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) attachment to the FETEM. Thickness and average surface roughness of the deposited

Adhesive contact of rough brushes

• Qiang Li and
• Valentin L. Popov

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2405–2412, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.225

• , the pull-off force becomes dependent on the previously applied compression force and disappears completely at some critical roughness. For roughness with a subcritical value, the pressure dependence of the pull-off force qualitatively follows the known theory of Fuller and Tabor with moderate

• modification due to finite size effect of the brush. Keywords: adhesion; brushes; contact splitting; pressure sensitive adhesion; roughness; Introduction The study of adhesive contacts has been largely enhanced by studies of the extremely effective adhesion pads of geckos [1]. For example, the adhesion can

• heights (simulating the relative roughness of surfaces in contact). We will show that the adhesion of statistical brushes can be described by a small number of simple analytical dependencies based both on Kendall’s theory of flat-ended stamps [20] and the Fuller and Tabor theory of adhesive contacts [15

High-throughput micro-nanostructuring by microdroplet inkjet printing

• Hendrikje R. Neumann and
• Christine Selhuber-Unkel

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2372–2380, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.222

• , which has been reported both for Si, SiO2 and NiTi [29][30]. However, as the plasma treatment takes place after the inkjet printing process, a change in roughness will not influence the droplet size, but might influence further functionalization steps. The droplet boundary description was set in the

• situated on the grain boundaries. Droplet size is a function of surface roughness Figure 4 presents the diameter distribution of micelle solution droplets for each sample. The droplets on poly-Si have a comparable size with a tight variation range of only about 5 µm. The distribution is symmetric, whereby

• shown in Figure 5A, poly-Si has the lowest roughness of 48 pm, followed by a-Si 400 (850 pm), and a-Si 200 (1.25 nm). The NiTi samples have a much higher roughness (freestanding NiTi foil: 2.35 nm), i.e., 6.5 times the roughness of the a-Si 200 sample. Obviously, rougher surfaces lead to smaller

Performance analysis of rigorous coupled-wave analysis and its integration in a coupled modeling approach for optical simulation of complete heterojunction silicon solar cells

• Ziga Lokar,
• Benjamin Lipovsek,
• Marko Topic and
• Janez Krc

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2315–2329, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.216

• random roughness are still well represented [3]. Spatial 2D discrete Fourier transform of staircase distributions is applied to all (N) sublayers, obtaining a discrete power spectrum of distribution for each sublayer. These Fourier components are then combined with wavevectors in a matrix describing

Influence of the thickness of an antiferromagnetic IrMn layer on the static and dynamic magnetization of weakly coupled CoFeB/IrMn/CoFeB trilayers

• Deepika Jhajhria,
• Dinesh K. Pandya and
• Sujeet Chaudhary

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2198–2208, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.206

• steps from 0 to 7 nm. The IrMn spacer layer was deposited at a lower growth rate (i.e., 0.17 Å/s compared to 1.3 Å/s for CoFeB) for better uniformity and lower interfacial roughness. In another sample series, the tIrMn was kept constant at 2 nm while the thickness of the top and bottom FM layers tCoFeB

• was varied (5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 nm). No cooling of the samples in an external magnetic field through the Néel temperature (TN) was performed. For accurately estimating the thicknesses of individual layers and interfacial roughness, X-ray reflectivity (XRR) measurements were performed using a

• IrMn layer depends on the thickness of the IrMn layer. It is evident that the IrMn interfacial roughness is slightly higher for tIrMn ≥ 5 nm. Below 5 nm, the interface is quite smooth with roughness values of about 0.5 nm. This increase in interfacial roughness might be arising due to the increase in

Filling nanopipettes with apertures smaller than 50 nm: dynamic microdistillation

• Evelyne Salançon and
• Bernard Tinland

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2181–2187, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.204

• probably also the surface roughness. Moreover, the very small aperture range, our particular focus, was not explored in this work. When high back-pressure is applied to the filling fluid, we showed in a previous article that the fluid meniscus follows an air-flow Poiseuille law [14] enabling the size of

Phosphorus monolayer doping (MLD) of silicon on insulator (SOI) substrates

• Noel Kennedy,
• Ray Duffy,
• Luke Eaton,
• Dan O’Connell,
• Scott Monaghan,
• Shane Garvey,
• James Connolly,
• Chris Hatem,
• Justin D. Holmes and
• Brenda Long

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2106–2113, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.199

• . Starting wafers were of good quality showing roughness values (RMS) below 0.2 nm (Figure 3). After MLD processing, the roughness values slightly increase to approximately 0.3 nm but this may be due to small oxide fragments on the surface, which remain from the cap removal process. Otherwise the surface

A scanning probe microscopy study of nanostructured TiO₂/poly(3-hexylthiophene) hybrid heterojunctions for photovoltaic applications

• Laurie Letertre,
• Roland Roche,
• Olivier Douhéret,
• Hailu G. Kassa,
• Denis Mariolle,
• Nicolas Chevalier,
• Łukasz Borowik,
• Philippe Dumas,
• Benjamin Grévin,
• Roberto Lazzaroni and
• Philippe Leclère

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2087–2096, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.197

• nominal thickness of the P3HT-COOH deposit (13 nm) is similar to the roughness of the columnar assembly. No correlation is observed between the columnar topography and the corresponding surface potential image (Figure 5b), which shows variations within [260; 500] mV. By comparison with the data of Figure

The structural and chemical basis of temporary adhesion in the sea star Asterina gibbosa

• Birgit Lengerer,
• Marie Bonneel,
• Mathilde Lefevre,
• Elise Hennebert,
• Philippe Leclère,
• Emmanuel Gosselin,
• Peter Ladurner and
• Patrick Flammang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 2071–2086, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.196

• microscopy was used to visualize the 3D structure of whole footprints. The roughness average within footprints was around 3 µm, compared to 0.9 µm outside of the footprints, where also small amounts of material were detected (Figure 5A). However, the thickness considerably varied within footprints and areas

• Metrology A/S) was used to determine the roughness parameters from the confocal images. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) Footprints were collected on clean microscope glass slides, rinsed with MilliQ water and air dried. The footprints were then imaged in air and under ambient conditions with a Dimension Icon

Recent highlights in nanoscale and mesoscale friction

• Andrea Vanossi,
• Dirk Dietzel,
• Andre Schirmeisen,
• Ernst Meyer,
• Rémy Pawlak,
• Thilo Glatzel,
• Marcin Kisiel,
• Shigeki Kawai and
• Nicola Manini

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1995–2014, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.190

• the relative lateral motion of bodies in contact, and the related dissipation phenomena are being investigated extensively due to their importance in applications, from everyday life to advanced technology. At the macroscopic scale, friction between sliding bodies depends on their surface roughness

Biomimetic and biodegradable cellulose acetate scaffolds loaded with dexamethasone for bone implants

• Aikaterini-Rafailia Tsiapla,
• Varvara Karagkiozaki,
• Veroniki Bakola,
• Foteini Pappa,
• Panagiota Gkertsiou,
• Eleni Pavlidou and
• Stergios Logothetidis

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1986–1994, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.189

• scaffolds recognized their microenvironment and proliferated. The cells also began to spread, indicating that the scaffolds are cytocompatible. Moreover, on the dexamethasone-loaded scaffolds, the cell population was larger than on the drug-free CA scaffolds. This could be attributed to the higher roughness

Self-assembled quasi-hexagonal arrays of gold nanoparticles with small gaps for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy

• Emre Gürdal,
• Simon Dickreuter,
• Fatima Noureddine,
• Pascal Bieschke,
• Dieter P. Kern and
• Monika Fleischer

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1977–1985, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.188

• diameter distribution, which is indicated by the error bars in Figure 3. Since in reality the particles are irregular and exhibit some surface roughness, the equivalent diameters underestimate the maximum outer diameter, and thus the minimum gap sizes to neighbouring particles may be even smaller than

Defect formation in multiwalled carbon nanotubes under low-energy He and Ne ion irradiation

• Santhana Eswara,
• Jean-Nicolas Audinot,
• Brahime El Adib,
• Maël Guennou,
• Tom Wirtz and
• Patrick Philipp

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1951–1963, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.186

• [11]. Besides modification of the mechanical properties, ion irradiation can also be used to change the shape of CNTs: suspended SWCNTs get straightened under ion irradiation [12]. Similarly, for a sheet of several layers of graphene suspended on a TEM grid, the initial roughness disappears under 30

A differential Hall effect measurement method with sub-nanometre resolution for active dopant concentration profiling in ultrathin doped Si_1−xGe_x and Si layers

• Richard Daubriac,
• Emmanuel Scheid,
• Hiba Rizk,
• Richard Monflier,
• Sylvain Joblot,
• Rémi Beneyton,
• Pablo Acosta Alba,
• Sébastien Kerdilès and
• Filadelfo Cristiano

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1926–1939, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.184

• most challenging process, we show the reliability of the SC1 chemical solution (NH4OH/H2O2/H2O) with its slow etch rate, stoichiometry conservation and low roughness generation. The reliability of a complete DHE procedure, with an etching step as small as 0.5 nm, is demonstrated on a dedicated 20 nm

• good agreement with previous results obtained by our research group [26]. Concerning the surface roughness, tapping mode AFM analysis provided arithmetic averages Ra of about 1.2 Å (Figure S2, Supporting Information File 1). However, in view of its application for DHE experiments, it is necessary to

• conservation and low roughness generation. Etching process for Si The silicon etching process differs from the etching of SiGe insofar as it involves a two-step mechanism: first, oxidation and then oxide stripping. In this case, the etch rate is not defined as a function of the etching time, but is given by

Direct AFM-based nanoscale mapping and tomography of open-circuit voltages for photovoltaics

• Katherine Atamanuk,
• Justin Luria and
• Bryan D. Huey

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1802–1808, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.171

• profile, the RMS roughness is thus improved up to two orders of magnitude. Notably, there are few correlations between this morphology and the photovoltaic performance. Figure 3 displays secondary scanning electron microscopy images of the as-provided thin film (Figure 3a, outer regions) and the surface

• of milled material that were not swept out of the field of view during planarization/tomography. The weaker, heterogeneous contrast within results partially from not quite perfect smoothing of the initially high roughness topography. As already introduced, sequentially repeating ISC* and direct VOC

Uniform cobalt nanoparticles embedded in hexagonal mesoporous nanoplates as a magnetically separable, recyclable adsorbent

• Can Zhao,
• Yuexiao Song,
• Tianyu Xiang,
• Wenxiu Qu,
• Shuo Lou,
• Xiaohong Yin and
• Feng Xin

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1770–1781, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.168

• increasing concentration of DA (Figure S2A–D, Supporting Information File 1). After the heat treatment at 800 °C, Co nanoparticles embedded in the rough and porous carbon layer are observed (Figure S2E–H, Supporting Information File 1). The surface roughness is observed to reduce with decreasing

Preparation of micro/nanopatterned gelatins crosslinked with genipin for biocompatible dental implants

• Reika Makita,
• Tsukasa Akasaka,
• Seiichi Tamagawa,
• Yasuhiro Yoshida,
• Saori Miyata,
• Hirofumi Miyaji and
• Tsutomu Sugaya

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1735–1754, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.165

• , 1 um, or 500 nm, on Saos-2 cell attachment and proliferation. The gelatin patterned surfaces have a high wettability due to the high gelatin content. It is known that Saos-2 cells prefer to attach to rough surfaces [59][74]. Therefore, Saos-2 cell attachment indicates high roughness on our gelatin

Magnetic properties of Fe₃O₄ antidot arrays synthesized by AFIR: atomic layer deposition, focused ion beam and thermal reduction

• Juan L. Palma,
• Alejandro Pereira,
• Raquel Álvaro,
• José Miguel García-Martín and
• Juan Escrig

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1728–1734, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.164

• , which has a pyramidal geometry with 25° slope. Once the thermal reduction is performed, the morphology is preserved and the Fe3O4 antidots are obtained. Only a slight reduction in roughness is produced: In the AFM measurements performed in the thin film regions, the roughness of the initial Fe2O3 film

Toward the use of CVD-grown MoS₂ nanosheets as field-emission source

• Geetanjali Deokar,
• Nitul S. Rajput,
• Junjie Li,
• Francis Leonard Deepak,
• Wei Ou-Yang,
• Nicolas Reckinger,
• Carla Bittencourt,
• Jean-Francois Colomer and
• Mustapha Jouiad

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1686–1694, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.160

• energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) detector) operating at 200 kV for imaging and elemental characterization. Roughness and topography of the as-grown MoS2 NSs (before transfer) were examined by atomic force microscope (AFM). The AFM scans were recorded in resonant mode (AppNanoTM made cantilever with

• crystals. Therefore, unlike in the previous case [20], the growth of micrometer-size crystals (of Mo or MoO3) on the sample surface was not observed. The AFM measurements confirm (Figure S1, Supporting Information File 1) a dense growth of MoS2 NSs. The observed root mean square roughness was 8 nm

Light extraction efficiency enhancement of flip-chip blue light-emitting diodes by anodic aluminum oxide

• Yi-Ru Huang,
• Yao-Ching Chiu,
• Kuan-Chieh Huang,
• Shao-Ying Ting,
• Po-Jui Chiang,
• Chih-Ming Lai,
• Chun-Ping Jen,
• Snow H. Tseng and
• Hsiang-Chen Wang

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2018, 9, 1602–1612, doi:10.3762/bjnano.9.152

• are shown in Figure 2. The results show the surface roughness and surface height distribution of the three samples. Figure 2a, Figure 2d, and Figure 2g show the three-dimensional AFM images of AAO60, AAO70, and AAO80, respectively. Figure 2d shows the overall structure and structural integrity of the

• reflected by the surface roughness of LEDs. RCWA analysis indicated that surface plasmon waves are not involved in LEE enhancement. Experimental To produce a typical LED chip with a single-sided PSS, InGaN/GaN MQW LEDs were grown on c-plane (0001)-oriented PSSs using a metal–organic chemical vapor