National Institute Of Materials Physics - Romania

Matrix assisted pulsed laser evaporation (MAPLE) was used for growing urease thin films designed for biosensor applications in clinical diagnostics. The targets exposed to laser radiation were made from a frozen composite manufactured by dissolving biomaterials in distilled water. We used a UV KrF* (lambda = 248 nm, tau(FWHM) congruent to 30 ns, nu = 10 Hz) excimer source for multipulse laser irradiation of the frozen targets cooled with Peltier elements. The laser source was operated at an incident fluence of 0.4 J/cm(2). Urease activity and kinetics were assayed by the Worthington method that monitors urea hydrolysis by coupling ammonia production to a glutamate dehydrogenase reaction. A decrease in absorbance was measured at 340 nm and correlated with the enzymatic activity of urease. We show that the urease films obtained by MAPLE techniques remain active up to three months after deposition. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The to study of the total oxide (SiO2+SiOx) thickness, SiO2 and SiOx (e.g. Si2O, SiO, Si2O3) thicknesses on Si(100) crystalline substrate with take-off angles ranging from 30 degrees to 80 degrees has been carried out by spectrometric method. The d(s) X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) thicknesses were compared with d(EL) thicknesses obtained by fitting the Spectroscopic Ellipsometry (SE) spectra. A qualitatively good correlation is revealed. However, from these estimations of film thicknesses it results that ellipsometry analysis cannot be as accurate as in XPS evaluation. This is due to uncertainty of used optical constants as well due to very thin oxide films used in this work.

Electrochemical deposition in nanoporous ion track membranes is used for the preparation of multisegment CdTe-homojunction diode nanowires. Our study is based on the fact that the deposition overpotential strongly influences the composition of the compound semiconductor nanowires. Therefore, the transport behavior of the nanowire devices can be tailored by appropriately choosing a certain sequence of electrodeposition potentials. The wires were characterized using scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive x-ray analysis, optical spectroscopy and x-ray diffraction. The current-voltage characteristics measured prove that, by appropriately choosing the voltage pulse pattern, one can fabricate nanowires with ohmic or rectifying behavior. The semiconducting nanowires are sensitive to light, their spectral sensitivity being characteristic of CdTe. The preparation of functional nanostructures in such a simple approach provides, as a major advantage, an increase in the process reproducibility and opens a wide field of potential optoelectronic applications.

This paper presents a study of some thin monomer films deposited by MAPLE. These monomers have been synthesised from maleic anhydride and aniline derivatives and are characterized by a molecular structure adequate for the generation of optical non-linear phenomena. UV-VIS, FTIR, Raman and Photoluminescence spectroscopy have been used to investigate the influence of the experimental conditions on the properties of the films. X-Ray Diffraction has evidenced a certain degree of disorder in the thin films, which is correlated with the randomly orientated molecules and AFM images have revealed different roughness for different monomer layers and different substrates. Second harmonic measurements have shown a strong signal emitted by the thin film prepared from the monomer with one [-NH-NH-] donor and two [-NO(2)] acceptor groups. This thin film is characterized by good transparency and low photoluminescence emission at excitation with the wavelength of the second harmonic (lambda-400 nm).

Amorphous thin films of SnSe2 and Ge2Sb2Te5 doped by different amount of silver (0.1, 0.2, 0.5 and 1 Ag atoms per formula unit) have been prepared by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) starting from solid polycrystalline targets. The films were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The good gas sensing properties for CO, as well as the sensitivity for CH4 and NO of the Ag; doped SnSe2 films have been demonstrated in the composition SnSe2Ag0.2. The structural effect of silver introduced in Ge2Sb2Te5 matrix has been investigated. The freshly deposited thin films doped by various amount of Ag develop three phases: an amorphous one, and two crystalline phases consisting of a major fcc cubic phase of AgSbTe2 and a minor cubic phase of composition Ag2Te. (C) 2010 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

Au3Zr intermetallic phase was obtained as pure phase by melt spinning technique. The sample with the same composition obtained by powder metallurgy exhibits some Au4Zr impurity. Rietveld refinements of the X-Ray data were done to obtain the unit cell parameters and atom positions inside the unit cell. Geometry optimizations for the atom positions inside the unit cell were performed by using ab-initio band structure calculations. The calculated values agree well with the ones obtained by Rietveld refinements of the diffraction data. The electronic mechanisms are explained on the basis of the projected densities of states to atom sites.