CNSM Research Snapshots

Learn about our faculty research and keep up with the newest information on our laboratories.

New CNSM laboratories are featured monthly! If you would like your lab to be featured, please reach out to the CNSM Associate Dean for Research.

Dr. Thomas Gredig

April 2025 Snapshot

Thomas Gredig and his student researchers — Gredig Molecular Thin Film Group (Fall 2024) - back row: Dr. Thomas Gredig (PI), Nestor Plascencia, Holland Karaghiaulleian; front row: Erin Henkhaus, Sophealena Chhom, Fernanda Razo

Dr. Thomas Gredig, professor in the Physics and Astronomy Department, heads the Gredig Molecular Thin Film Lab. Student researchers in this lab are interested in solving problems related to thin films made from small molecules.

Material properties change completely when you make a thin film, since the surface can become more important than the inside. Thin film thickness is measured in units of nanometers; i.e., these films are tens of atoms or molecules thick.

Thin Film Group students deposit these thin films, layer-by-layer in a controlled environment to create reproducible samples and use atomic force microscopy and x-ray diffraction to measure the structural surface properties. If their samples were as long as the Eiffel tower, then the thickness of this Eiffel tower would be half a hair's width!

Data from student projects in the Thin Film Group help to create solutions for real-world issues such as energy consumption by artificial intelligence (AI) and other data centers.

Erin Henkhaus in the lab — Graduate student Erin Henkhaus loading bare substrates into the thermal evaporator to sublime phthalocyanine thin films for optimizing pin hole reduction in flexible organic-based solar cells.

Fernanda Razo in the lab — Graduate student Fernanda Razo loading a silicon substrate for sputtering gold that will be used to explore the growth of small molecules on different surfaces with applications towards gas sensors.

Holland Karaghiaulleian in the lab — Undergraduate student Holland Karaghiaulleian using the Park XE7 atomic force microscope to study kinetoplast DNA in collaboration with Dr. Alex Klotz's lab.

Holland and Nestor in the lab — Undergraduate students Holland Karaghiaulleian and Nestor Plascencia using the Park XE7 atomic force microscope to study kinetoplast DNA in collaboration with Dr. Alex Klotz's lab. The force microscope can resolve individual DNA strands at the nanometer scale.

Nestor in the lab — Undergraduate student Nestor Plascencia loading a sample with zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 nanocrystals on mica substrates from a collaboration with Dr. Fangyuan Tian (Chemistry and Biochemistry Department) into the Park XE7 atomic force microscope. The microscope can resolve the shape and size of these nanocrystals by probing the surface with an atomically sharp tip mounted onto a cantilever in resonance.

Sophealena in the lab — Graduate student Sophealena Chhom tightening the vacuum tubes to an oven that can purify iron phthalocyanine molecules.

Dr. Gredig and Sophealena in the lab — Dr. Thomas Gredig and graduate student Sophealena Chhom storing molecular thin film samples in desiccators to keep oxygen and moisture away from the samples. The thin films are only tens of molecular layers in thickness, which means that their properties are surface dominated. Applications include organic light-emitting diodes, gas sensors, and controlled drug delivery systems.

Previous Snapshots

Here are the most recently featured snapshots.

Julie Wahlman and her student researcher

Dr. Julie Wahlman

March 2025 Snapshot

Dr. Julie Wahlman's lab research group focuses on improving and broadening the scope of one type of chemical reaction called cross-coupling, which allows scientists to easily and reliably create complex molecules by stitching carbon atoms together.

Amy Ricketts teaching students in a classroom

Dr. Amy Ricketts

February 2025 Snapshot

Dr. Amy Ricketts's research aims to impact the ways that science is taught at the elementary school level. Her method uses sensemaking as a guide to aid children in creating a deeper understanding of what they are experiencing in class, as well as the world around them.

Dr. Claudia Ojeda-Aristizabal

January 2025 Snapshot

Dr. Claudia Ojeda-Aristizabal and her student researchers study how electrons travel through materials with exotic properties in her lab, the Nanoelectronics Group. Understanding how electrons respond to different materials has the potential to make major impacts on current and future technology, such as quantum computing and low-energy-consumption microdevices.

See all previous CNSM Research Snapshots.

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