Research
Superhard Materials
Our goal is to make metallic superhard materials, in both bulk and thin film conditions, to suit various engineering applications such as cutting tools, forming dies, aerospace components, etc. These materials, mostly transition-metal borides, promise to demonstrate extremely high hardness and other mechanical properties needed for these challenging applications.
Superhydrophobic Materials
The objective of this research is to produce hard, transparent superhydrophobic coatings for practical applications such as satellite dishes, eyeglasses, window panes, etc. We study the wetting of surfaces, made of different polymers, to find the best material that can be used for these applications. Furthermore, our group is focused on the development of inexpensive and robust superhydrophobic materials, which are capable to withstand harsh environmental conditions for potential applications as passive anti-icing systems.
Nanoprobes for Metal Detection and Adsorption
The focus of this research is to design and fabricate nanocomposites with surface engineering for detection, and then removal of heavy metal ions from solutions. With the advent of technology and growing the number of industries, the high concentration of heavy metals in water resources and biological environments has raised concerns. Therefore, our group is developing new sensors, which are able to detect the trace amounts of metal ions in solution by fluorescence turn-off or turn-on mechanism. The fluorescent functionalizing ligands, which mainly graft on iron oxide-silica nanocomposites, possess active sites to coordinate to the metal ions. Depending on the bonding energy of the ligand-metal, selective and sensitive detection of the ion is possible. Moreover, the coordinated ions to the nanocomposite surface could be easily be removed from water by using an external magnet. Therefore, this technique addresses a clean, facile, low cost, sensitive, and selective approach to help solving one of the important environmental concerns.