Casting metallic alloys is a primary human activity since the ancient times. Now, by using advanced methods of electron microscopy coupled with the advent of micro-electromechanical devices (MEMS), Diego Coradini and Professor Stefan Pogatscher led a scientific team to a study that demonstrates the feasibility to cast metallic alloys at the nanoscale.
Coradini et al. demonstrated in this new published research at the Lab on a Chip journal (Royal Society of Chemistry) that nanomaterials can be casted in situ within a Transmission Electron Microscope to form metallic alloys. We now propose this lab on a chip approach can be viewed as a nanoscale chemical reactor, thus propelling the ancient art & science of metallurgy into new geometric dimensions!
The parameters underlying the thermodynamic principles, theory and interpretation for casting nanoalloys is also under review in another publication by Coradini et al. Access here!
The publications:
Coradini, Diego SR, et al. “In situ transmission electron microscopy as a toolbox for the emerging science of nanometallurgy.” Lab on a Chip (2023). https://doi.org/10.1039/D3LC00228D (Awarded Journal Back Cover)
Coradini, Diego SR, et al. Unravelling Nanometallurgy with in Situ Electron-Microscopy: A Case Study with Cu Nanowires. Preprint Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4313569 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4313569
Materials at Extremes 