Search

Collective spin excitations in magnetically ordered crystals, called magnons or spin waves, can serve as carriers in novel spintronic devices with ultralow energy consumption. The generation of well-detectable spin flows requires long lifetimes of high-frequency magnons. In general, the lifetime of spin waves in a metal is substantially reduced due to a strong coupling of magnons to the Stoner continuum. This makes metals unattractive for use as components for magnonic devices. Here, we present the metallic antiferromagnet CeCo2P2, which exhibits long-living magnons even in the terahertz (THz) regime. For CeCo2P2, our first-principle calculations predict a suppression of low-energy spin-flip Stoner excitations, which is verified by resonant inelastic X-ray scattering measurements. By comparison to the isostructural compound LaCo2P2, we show how small structural changes can dramatically alter the electronic structure around the Fermi level leading to the classical picture of the strongly damped magnons intrinsic to metallic systems. Our results not only demonstrate that long-lived magnons in the THz regime can exist in bulk metallic systems, but they also open a path for an efficient search for metallic magnetic systems in which undamped THz magnons can be excited.

The f-driven temperature scales at the surfaces of strongly correlated materials have increasingly come into the focus of research efforts. Here, we unveil the emergence of a two-dimensional Ce Kondo lattice, which couples ferromagnetically to the ordered Co lattice below the P-terminated surface of the antiferromagnet CeCo2P2. In its bulk, Ce is passive and behaves tetravalently. However, because of symmetry breaking and an effective magnetic field caused by an uncompensated ferromagnetic Co layer, the Ce 4f states become partially occupied and spin-polarized near the surface. The momentum-resolved photoemission measurements indicate a strong admixture of the Ce 4f states to the itinerant bands near the Fermi level including surface states that are split by exchange interaction with Co. The temperature-dependent measurements reveal strong changes of the 4f intensity at the Fermi level in accordance with the Kondo scenario. Our findings show how rich and diverse the f-driven properties can be at the surface of materials without f-physics in the bulk.

Scanning- and colloidal-probe atomic force microscopy were used to study the mechanical properties of poly(L-lysine)/hyaluronan (PLL/HA)n films as a function of indentation velocity and the number of polymer deposition steps n. The film thickness was determined by two independent AFM-based methods: scratch-and-scan and newly developed full-indentation. The advantages and disadvantages of both methods are highlighted, and error minimization techniques in elasticity measurements are addressed. It was found that the film thickness increases linearly with the bilayer number n, ranging between 400 and 7500 nm for n = 12 and 96, respectively. The apparent Young’s modulus E ranges between 15 and 40 kPa and does not depend on the indenter size or the film bilayer number n. Stress relaxation measurements show that PLL/HA films have a viscoelastic behaviour, regardless of their thickness. If indentation is performed several times at the same lateral position on the film, a viscous/plastic deformation takes place.

In the design of macroporous biomaterial scaffolds, attention is payed predominantly to the readily accessible macroscopic mechanical properties rather than to the mechanical properties experienced by the cells adhering to the material. However, the direct cell mechanical environment has been shown to be of special relevance for biological processes such as proliferation, differentiation and extracellular matrix formation both in vitro and in vivo. In this study we investigated how individual architectural features of highly aligned macroporous collagen scaffolds contribute to its mechanical properties on the macroscopic vs. the microscopic scale. Scaffolds were produced by controlled freezing and freeze-drying, a method frequently used for manufacturing of macroporous biomaterials. The individual architectural features of the biomaterial were carefully characterized to develop a finite element model (FE-model) that finally provided insights in the relation between the biomaterial's mechanical properties on the macro-scale and the properties on the micro-scale, as experienced by adhering cells. FE-models were validated by experimental characterization of the scaffolds, both on the macroscopic and the microscopic level, using mechanical compression testing and atomic force microscopy. As a result, a so-called cell-effective stiffness of these non-trivial scaffold architectures could be predicted for the first time. A linear dependency between the macroscopic scaffold stiffness and the cell-effective stiffness was found, with the latter being consistently higher by a factor of 6.4 +/- 0.6. The relevance of the cell-effective stiffness in controlling progenitor cell differentiation was confirmed in vitro. The obtained information about the cell-effective stiffness is of particular relevance for the early stages of tissue regeneration, when the cells first populate and interact with the biomaterial. Beyond the specific biomaterial investigated here, the introduced metho, QC 20190913

The single crystal growth of 19 different intermetallic compounds within the LnT2X2 family (with Ln = lanthanides, T = Co, Ru, Rh, Ir, and X = Si, P) is presented, by employing a high-temperature metal-flux technique. The habitus of the obtained crystals is platelet-like with the crystallographic c direction perpendicular to the surface and with individual masses between 1 and 100 mg. The magnetic properties of these crystals are characterized by magnetization, heat-capacity, and resistivity measurements. These crystals form the materials basis for a thorough study of exciting surface properties by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy.

In the present work, we have partially modified fibrils chemically to eate a shell of derivatized cellulose that surrounds the crystalline re of native cellulose. Through the different modifications, we aimed creating a toolbox to enable the properties of CNF materials and terials containing CNFs to be tuned to meet specific material demands. total, nine different chemical modifications using different ueous-based procedures were used as chemical pretreatments before CNF oduction through homogenization. Eight of these modifications included riodate oxidation with an average of 27% of the anhydroglucose units the cellulose chain being cleaved into dialdehydes. The presence of dehydes then facilitated a conversion to other functional groups., QC 20190426

The mechanical properties of different pulp fibres in liquid were measured using an atomic force microscope. Specifically a custom-made sample holder was used to indent the fibre surface, without causing any motion, and the Young's modulus was calculated from the indentation using a linearized Hertz model., QC 20180914

The mechanical properties of wet cellulose are investigated using an atomic force microscope AFM and calculated using a linearized DMT model. Measurements were performed using a model system of gel beads made of cellulose with different charge densities, which show a high impact on the mechanical properties of the cellulose in wet state., QC 20171013

QC 20180711