Department of Materials and Interfaces

Leeor Kronik, Head


Activities in the Department span a wide range of topics from soft, composite and hard materials to energy research, nanoscience, and biological systems. A UNIFYING THEME is the STUDY OF MATERIAL FUNCTIONALITY AND ITS RELATION TO FUNDAMENTAL PROPERTIES AT MULTIPLE SCALES. These properties may be mechanical, structural, electronic, magnetic and chemical. Some examples are:
How do shapes and sizes of nm-sized particles affect their spectral properties?
How can we tune the properties of solar cells by manipulating their material interfaces?
How does friction in knee and hip joints depend on polyelectrolytes that lubricate them? How can we design self-assembling, even self-replicating (bio)chemical systems?
THE RESEARCH IS BASED ON AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH, and indeed the scientists bring complementary experience in chemistry, physics, and biophysics, including theory and experiment.

Among the materials under active study we can note:
? nano-particles and nanotubes of carbon and inorganic materials
? composite materials down to the nanoscale, with unique mechanical properties
? crystalline and non-crystalline pyroelectric and piezoelectric materials
? self-assembling supra-molecular architectures, also for nanoscale lithography
? functionalized electronic materials, also for sensing and energy conversion
? ultrathin ceramic or molecular organic films
? polymers and polyelectrolytes, complex fluids
? biomolecular materials: DNA, cytoskeleton
? biological tissues, cells, and matrix elasticity
? materials and processes for alternative, sustainable energy conversion and storage.
? opto-electronic, pyroelectric, superconducting solids with extended bonding
? nano-crystalline ceramics with unique mechanical & electrical property combinations;

Experimental and theoretical approaches include:
? first-principles calculations, density functional theory
? inorganic synthesis, template synthesis, electrochemistry
? optical and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopies, Kelvin probe
? solid state impedance spectroscopy;
? surface force apparatus, atomic force microscopy, optical tweezers
? mechanical testing, elasticity & indentation
? X-ray diffraction & scattering
? micro- & nanofabrication, including new (non-traditional) processes
? microfluidic devices
? advanced optical, electron, and X-ray microscopies
? in vitro reconstitution of functional biosystems, biomimetics
? theory of membranes and gels, charge interactions & elasticity
? application of theory to understanding biological cell & tissue properties.

Many facilities that we use are part of the Chemical Research Support Unit. They include the Electron Microscopy Unit, Surface Science (Scanning Probe Microscopies and Photoelectron Spectroscopy) unit, X-ray diffraction and scattering unit, combined clean rooms / micro-fabrication / biological specimen manipulation ("nano-bio") laboratories. Further facilities in the department or Chemical Support Services include systems for low temperature electrical transport and for optical and magnetic characterization of materials. In addition to new insights in how materials properties can be understood from their atomic, molecular, macro-/supra-molecular and over-all composition and structure, our inter- and multi-disciplinary strategy to the study of the functionality of materials and its relation to fundamental properties of matter at multiple scales, permits exploring new materials and combinations. It has also led to a number of practical applications.


R. Bar-Ziv

Artificial biochemical circuits

  1.  Cell-free gene expression on a chip

  2.  Cell-free expression of protein nano-structures

  3.  Autonomous interrogation of the state of a living cell

The physics of microfluidic crystals


D. Cahen

Bio molecular and molecular (opto)electronics
D. Cahen, M. SHEVES, I.PECHT, L. Kronik,A.Vilan, R.Naaman, C.Sukenik (Bar Ilan), A.Kahn (Princeton), N.Koch (Humboldt), M.Tornow, J.Gooding (UNSW), H.Zuilhof (Wageningen)

  1.  Understanding charge transport across organic molecules; with A. Vilan

  2.  Understanding charge transport across proteins

  3.  Proteins as dopable electronic materials

  4.  Hybrid Organic/Inorganic, Molecular/Non-Molecular materials; fundamentals and impications for devices, e.g. solar cells

Solar Energy: New materials and concepts, and understanding of Photovoltaics
D. Cahen, G. Hodes,D. Oron, S. Cohen, K. Gartsman, A. Kahn (Princeton)

  1.  Molecular electronics for solar cells. The importance of molecules for inversion cells.

  2.  Assessing possibilities and limitations of solar to electrical and chemical energy conversion

  3.  Photovoltaic effect at Inorganic/Organic Hybrid Interfaces

  4.  Extremely Thin Absorber Solar Cells


M. Elbaum

Cellular Biophysics and Molecular Transport Machines

  1.  Single-molecule manipulations using optical tweezers.

  2.  Dynamics of DNA uptake into the cell nucleus.

  3.  Structure and function of the nuclear pore complex (with Z. Reich): application of atomic force microscopy and advanced optical spectroscopies.

  4.  Anomalous diffusion in polymer networks and living cells (with R. Granek).

  5.  Organization of forces driving cell movements (with A. Bershadsky): optical force measurements and particle tracking studies; influence of cell biochemistry on biophysical forces.

  6.  Novel surface-patterning lithographies.


G. Hodes

Semiconductor-sensitized nanoporous solar cells and semiconductor film deposition
G. Hodes, D. Cahen (WIS)

  1.  Electrochemical and chemical bath deposition of semiconductor films.

  2.  Nanocrystalline solar cells; semiconductor-sensitized nanoporous cells

  3.  Charge transfer in nanocrystalline films


E. Joselevich

Nanoscale Materials Chemistry and Biophysics;

Molecular Wires: From Self-Organization to Functional Nanosystems

  1.  Organization of molecular wires and one-dimensional nanostructures

  2.  Integration of molecular wires and one-dimensional nanostructures into functional nanosystems

  3.  Characterization of molecular wires and one-dimensional nanostructures by mechanical and electrical measurements


J. Klein

Polymers, Complex Fluids, and Interfaces - Experimental studies of the behavior of confined simple and polymeric fluids.
J. Klein, Sam Safran

  1.  Nanotribology

  2.  Surface forces between heterogeneous surfaces

  3.  Confinement induced phase transitions

Surface-forces-measurement techniques at angstrom surface separations; polymers as molecular lubricants

  1.  ATRP growth of polymers from surfaces

  2.  Polyelectrolyte brushes

Molecular origins of biological lubrication Hydration lubrication: a new paradigm

  1.  Properties of thin liquid films including aqueous electrolytes and polyelectrolytes.

  2.  Hydrophobic interactions

  3.  Slip at surfaces

  4.  Boundary lubrication under water

  5.  Tissue engineering and regenerative medicine: the role of lubrication

  6.  Hydrogels

  7.  Macro-tribological studies of soft matter


L. Kronik

Quantum Theory of Materials

  1.  Unique properties of organic/inorganic interfaces

  2.  Orbital-dependent functionals in density functional theory

  3.  Real-space computational methodologies


M. Lahav

Solid State Chemistry in 2- and 3-dimensions

  1.  Organization of molecules at surfaces and interfaces; effects of environment on crystal growth

  2.  Chirality, Chemistry and the origin of life


L. Leiserowitz

Crystallography and Chemistry in 2- and 3-dimensions

  1.  Grazing incidence x-ray diffraction

  2.  Malaria


I. Lubomirsky

Dielectric materials

  1.  Properties of Ultra-Thin Self-Supported Crystalline Oxide Films.

  2.  Infrared focal plane array based on freestanding pyroelectric films.

  3.  Oxygen ion transport in thin freestanding films.

  4.  High temperature, electrochemical CO2 reduction


I. Rubinstein

Functional Nanomaterials

  1.  Self-assembled supramolecular nanostructures on surfaces (with A. Vaskevich, H. Leader)

  2.  Nanoparticle organization on surfaces using coordination layer-by-layer assembly (with A. Vaskevich, H. Leader)

  3.  Plasmonic systems based on metal nano-island films prepared by evaporation/annealing (with A. Vaskevich)

  4.  Application of metal nanoisland films in chemical and biological sensing using localized surface plasmon resonance spectroscopy (with A. Vaskevich)


S. Safran

Soft Matter and Biomaterials

  1.  Statistical physics of soft matter and biological physics (theory)

  2.  Single cell physics and cell activity: cell shape, orientation, mechanics & polarization.

  3.  Cooperative physics of cell activity: cell-surface interactions (adhesion), cell-cell elastic interactions.

  4.  Inhomogeneous membranes, physics of inclusions in membranes: connection to lipid rafts.

  5.  Membrane self-assembly of surfactants, lipids, and amphiphilic polymers.

  6.  Electrostatic and fluctuation induced interactions in charged colloidal and membrane systems.

  7.  Coupling of shape and shear elasticity in membranes and in biological cells.


J. Sagiv

Supramolecular Architecture at Interfaces (with R. Maoz)

  1.  Supramolecular Surface Chemistry: Bottom-up Nanofabrication using Planned Self-Assembling Mono- and Multilayer Systems (with R. Maoz)

  2.  Constructive Lithography: Contact Electrochemical Surface Patterning on Lateral Length Scales from Nanometer to Centimeter (with R. Maoz)


R. Tenne

Inorganic nanotubes and inorganic fullerene‐like materials: new materials with cage structure. From basic science to applications.


D. Wagner

Mechanics of Composite Materials and Carbon Nanotubes

  1.  Micro- and nano-mechanics of tubes (C, WS2)

  2.  Electrospun polymer nanofibers

  3.  LBL clay-films, and their composites

  4.  Mechanics of biological composites (bone, dentin, cell adhesion)