Achievement

During the past year, IGERT fellow Van Le has been using self organization to control magnetic properties in nanoscale materials. In her work she has shown that nanoporous silica hosts can be used to force coupling between superparamentic (soft) magnetic nanocrystal and ferromagnetic (hard) nanocrystals. The results have a range of potential applications in spin based computation and communication. Van has also been able to use block copolymer tempating strategies to create nanoporous ferromagnetic and multiferroic materials. The pores space in these materials can be used to exchange couple various magnetic phases. Of particular interest is her work on nanoporous bismuth ferrite, which is a multiferroic material that combines ferroelectricity with antiferromagnetic ordering. Filling the pore space with a ferromagnetic metal such as nickel may provide a low cost route to electrically switchable magnetic materials. In this work, she collaborates closely with groups in engineering.