Back to the current year Winners
2020, December
Micro Wasp Nest
Pooya Dehghan,Nanolab
Don’t expect honey inside them, because they are made up of CNTs!!! Imagine how hard it must be for bees to make these honeycombs without an access to nano-lithography facility!!
2020, November
Queueing microtubes
Esteban Bermúdez Ureña,Soft Matter Physics, Adolphe Merkle Institute
After a packed morning shift at CMi, these self-rolled SiO2 microtubes patiently await their turn at the cafeteria, following of course current distancing rules. All the sample fabrication was carried out at CMi, involving thin film deposition (SPIDER), substrate patterning (ACS, MLA 150) and etching (AMS & XeF2), while imaging was carried out at the Adolphe Merkle Institute in Fribourg (FEI Scios2).
2020, October
Forest with trees made up of CNT
Pooya Dehghan,Nanolab
CNT forest coated with photoresist makes this beautiful jungle.
2020, September
Wild West
Didem Dede, LMSC
Experience the wild west adventures at Zone 15 with AFM. By using AFM, we examine how the growth proceeds for GaAs nanomembrane formation. In this image, you see the surface topography at the bottom of the slit.
2020, August
Starcell
Saeid Ansaryan, BIOS
Not all stars are found either in the sky or in the sea. If you lose your alignment marks while working with DUV stepper, keep calm, and never ask our starcell for the directions. The gold nanohole array chip was fabricated in CMi. And since we have a cell on the surface of the chip, the SEM was taken at BIOP.
2020, July
Inorganic broccoli
Remco van Erp, Pirouz Sohi, POWERLAB
Like many others during the confinement, we discovered our green fingers and started to grow fresh vegetables in the backyard. After some failed attempts, we discovered that this micro-broccoli grows surprisingly well at 1050 °C! Picture is an SEM image of GaN crystals grown on a patterned silicon substrate using MOVPE.
2020, June
Corona capacitor
Amir Youssefi, LPQM
Corona is everywhere! A clamp tapered high-Q electro-mechanical capacitor fabricated in CMI after CVOID-19 lockdown.
2020, May
Nanodots printer
Ping Che, LMGN
Cobalt nanodots lattice was printed by ebeam writing and lift-off process on membrane. The layer of MMA/PMMA was peeled away in lift-off process in this image. With the cobalt nanodots lattice, spin spiral structure called “skyrmions” will be formed into lattice. Each skyrmion works as storage unit. Would you like to have a nano-printer for data storage?
2020, April
Welcome back to CMi
Georges-André Racine, CMi
To honor the gradual exit out of the Covid-19 lock-down and to celebrate the re-opening of the CMi for users, arrays of nano-pillars were added to a first print of the resolution test of the VPG200 laser writer after its re-start in the last days of April. Direct sunlight diffraction creates nice colored rainbow arcs. Structure was recorded in 600nm thick photo resist on a silicon substrate. The diameter of the rainbow arcs is 19mm.
2020, March
3-Floor Micro Apartment
Niyazi Ulas Dinc, LO
This 3-floor structure, fabricated with two-photon polymerization (Nanoscribe), is not the most welcoming home even though it is coated with gold (to see it better). But, it can do angular multiplexing with light!
2020, February
A sun full of stars
Miguel Solsona, Benoît Desbiolles, Clémentine Lipp, LMIS4
This nanopore etched in SiO2 is an open window to another galaxy. You are met with an insight full of stars when you glance through it.
2020, January
Micreux Jazz Festival
Robin Groth, LPQM
The CMi festival for micro-music hast just announced this year’s headliner: “The SiNs”. The newcomer band will certainly attract a large audience, not least thanks to its exotic instruments including the fractal guitar shown in the picture. When skilfully plucked, the oscillating string creates a psychedelic sound which has impressed crowds across the globe. The peculiar vibrations arise due to the self-similar geometry of the structure, which was made from silicon nitride and measures only 20nm in thickness. Rumour has it that “The SiNs” will use the festival to showcase the world’s first fractal drum.