Hosted by: Chuck Black

Nanostructured templates created by self-assembly of block copolymer thin films are ideally suited to the challenge of fabricating high density regular nanometer-scale features across large substrates areas. I will present a new fabrication scheme based on block copolymer self-assembly for fabricating ordered sub-wavelength nanostructures to significantly reduce light reflection from silicon surfaces over a broad wavelength range and large range of incident sunlight angles. Through the precise control over the size and shape of the nanostructures, the reflectance from the top surface of the solar cells can be reduced bellow 1% and the efficiency increases significantly. I will also discuss about using block copolymer self assembled nanostructures to fabricate arrays of very high density plasmonic nanoparticles with tunable size and separation. By optimizing the size and interparticle gap of these nanoparticles, we can design highly sensitive surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) and localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) based sensors.