IMG Seminar Series: "Designing Hybrid Microstructures for Wicking Applications" and "Magnetic Assembly and Cross Linking of Nanoparticles for Releasable Magnetic Microstructures"

Event category: 
Event date: 
Friday, October 30, 2015 - 3:45pm to 5:00pm
Event location: 
NRF 115

Saitej Ravi and Camilo Velez will present on topics related to their research, "Designing hybrid microstructures for wicking applications" and "Magnetic Assemblies and Cross-Linking of Nanoparticles for Releasable Magnetic Microstructures." Food will be provided for $3 to those that sign up on the IMG wiki.

Mr. Ravi will give a talk entitled "Designing hybrid microstructures for wicking applications" wherein he will discuss the dependence of the thermal performance of a heat pipe or a vapor chamber on the liquid transport capacity of its wick structure. The two major properties of a wick that determine this capacity are the capillary pressure generated within the wick and its permeability. His talk will cover fabrication techniques (and their inherent challenges) to create hybrid microstructures that decouple the inverse relation between the capillary pressure and permeability. Three designs, a silicon-copper, a silicon-silicon nitride and a monolithic silicon hybrid microstructure will be discussed.

Mr. Velez will also present his work on "Magnetic Assemblies and Cross-Linking of Nanoparticles for Releasable Magnetic Microstructures." This is a versatile method to fabricate magnetic microstructures with complex two-dimensional geometric shapes using magnetically assembled nanoparticles. Magnetic pole patterns are imprinted into magnetizable media, onto which magnetic nanoparticles are assembled from a colloidal suspension into defined shapes via the shaped magnetic field gradients. After assembly, the nanoparticles are cross-linked in situ and subsequently released by dissolving a sacrificial layer. The free-floating magnetic structures are shown to retain their patterned shape during manipulation with external magnetic fields.