The Material Discovery Funnel: A Six-Step Process for Advanced Material Development

The forward march of technology relies on continuous improvement of critical components such as semiconductors, batteries, fuel cells, and the like. In time, every component runs up against performance constraints established by fundamental physics and chemistry. Overcoming those restrictions requires the development of unique advanced materials that circumvent such limitations. Discovering and optimizing these types of new materials is difficult because the range of variables creates an enormous design space that is difficult to explore efficiently. Combinatorial deposition refers to a process of creating many advanced material candidates on a single substrate without removing that substrate from the chamber during the deposition process. The technique is not new in concept, but the remarkable advancements in deposition chamber capabilities and controls are making combinatorial deposition easier to implement. We refer to the process of developing advanced materials using combinatorial deposition as the "material discovery funnel."

 

The material discovery funnel - PVD Products

 

As described by PVD Products this is a six step process. You can visit their Blog and get the download link to the excellent white paper!

Source: PVD Products Blog LINK

Capillary flow layer-by-layer (CF-LbL) employed by MIT researchers for fast screening of films

Capillary flow layer-by-layer (CF-LbL) - An very interesting publication (ACS Nano, 2014, 8 (7), pp 6580–6589) from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on liquid Layer-by Layer growth in a combinatorial approach for fast screening of thin films.

Capillary Flow Layer-by-Layer: A Microfluidic Platform for the High-Throughput Assembly and Screening of Nanolayered Film Libraries
Steven A. Castleberry, Wei Li, Di Deng, Sarah Mayner, and Paula T. Hammond

 

ACS Nano, 2014, 8 (7), pp 6580–6589, DOI: 10.1021/nn501963q

 

 

 

Abstract: Layer-by-layer (LbL) assembly is a powerful tool with increasing real world applications in energy, biomaterials, active surfaces, and membranes; however, the current state of the art requires individual sample construction using large quantities of material. Here we describe a technique using capillary flow within a microfluidic device to drive high-throughput assembly of LbL film libraries. This capillary flow layer-by-layer (CF-LbL) method significantly reduces material waste, improves quality control, and expands the potential applications of LbL into new research spaces. The method can be operated as a simple lab benchtop apparatus or combined with liquid-handling robotics to extend the library size. Here we describe and demonstrate the technique and establish its ability to recreate and expand on the known literature for film growth and morphology. We use the same platform to assay biological properties such as cell adhesion and proliferation and ultimately provide an example of the use of this approach to identify LbL films for surface-based DNA transfection of commonly used cell types.