Day 2 of the Annual User Meeting began with the User Town Hall led by User Executive Committee Chair, Boyce Chang. The Town Hall gave users, postdocs, and prospective users the chance to candidly speak about their experiences with the Foundry.
The morning continued with a look at new Foundry capabilities. Staff scientists Aeron Tynes Hammack, Ed Barnard, and Sinéad Griffin all spoke about state-of-the-art upgrades, ranging from data infrastructure to nano-fluidic circuits, which will let Foundry users engage in more cutting-edge science.
Next was a User Highlight where the Lab’s Jianfang Liu spoke about the Ren Group’s research into RNA origami. He detailed their recent study’s insight into RNA folding pathways and how it paves the way for future studies of the energy landscape of molecular machines and self-assembly processes.
The Foundry then recognized the Student Paper Award Winner, Paul Corbae, who gave a short presentation about his work on the observation of spin-momentum locked surface states in amorphous bismuth selenide.
The day’s keynote speaker, Carolyn Bertozzi, Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor at Stanford University and Nobel Laureate delivered a talk about the advancement of bioorthogonal chemistry. She began with an historical account of the field’s development and then discussed current directions in the area of clinical translation.
The Foundry also hosted the awarding of the Bertozzi street sign. Berkeley Lab Director Mike Witherell presented Bertozzi with a ceremonial sign in honor of the new Bertozzi Road at the Lab, recognizing her previous work at Berkeley Lab in addition to her Nobel Prize.
Before lunch, the Foundry announced the three winners of the poster competition: Alexander Herman, Colum O’Leary, Febrice Roncoroni, as well as this year’s Outstanding Staff Award winner, Carolin Sutter-Fella.
After lunch, a career development networking session took place, and then the second round of breakout symposia were held. The four symposia covered advances in bio-materials, innovation in molecular crystalline materials, intentional defects in 2D and 3D materials, and 4-D STEM analysis.
Summaries of the symposia are below:
Advances in the field of Bio/Bio-inspired materials: Design Strategies, Challenges and Applications
Recent studies on biomaterials and bio-inspired materials have shown their exceptional potential towards diverse technological applications such as therapeutics, catalysis, energy storage, regenerative medicine, imaging, protein purification, threat mitigation and many more. Novel synthetic biomaterials on a nanoscale range can lead to the opening of new frontiers in the field of medicine and sustainability. The molecular science and engineering of these nanomaterials and their derivatives and mimics are not only fascinating but also challenging. This symposium aims to showcase multi-disciplinary research on the design strategies, challenges and applications of a wide range of biomaterials and to foster new collaborations in this field.
Innovation in Molecular Crystalline Materials: Synthesis, Characterization, and Applications
Bottom-up approach from small molecular building blocks is widely employed for the design and synthesis of functional solid-state structures. This field involves the study of intermolecular interactions and the use of these interactions in the design strategy as well as fine-tuning of crystal structure for property optimization. The purpose of this symposium is to bring together a wide range of experts with a diverse background and will consist of topics including materials via topological polymerization, crystalline framework materials, crystals through self assembly, and emerging EM techniques for structural determination, etc.
Defects by Design in 2D and 3D Materials: Theoretical and Experimental Investigations
This symposium will provide a forum for researchers from both theory and experiment to discuss the tuning of material properties (optoelectronic, magnetic, chemical, porosity, etc.) through the introduction of defects at the atomic level to provide new functionalities for applications ranging from quantum sensing and computation to biosensing and nanofiltration. The defect types of interest include single vacancy, interstitial, and substitutional defects, as well as composite defects such as clusters and complexes. Topics to be covered will span recent developments in methods to deterministically place atomic-scale defects (ion and electron irradiation, annealing, plasma and chemical treatments, tip-induced manipulation, etc), characterization methods (transmission electron microscopy, scanning probe microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, photoluminescence, cathodoluminescence), new insights from modeling and theory (high-throughput calculations, machine learning, structure-property relations), device integration (optical cavities, electronics, sensors), and the latest results demonstrating defect-engineered properties in bulk, thin-film, and 2D materials.
4D-STEM analysis with py4DSTEM
In this workshop, attendees will learn how to install and use Python codes and Jupyter Lab. They will work through 4D-STEM data analysis and visualization tutorials built into py4DSTEM. Planned tutorials are virtual imaging, orientation and strain mapping, diffraction pattern simulations, and ptychographic phase contrast reconstruction.
Many thanks to Cindy Lee for her contributions to this article and to the symposium organizers and the User Executive Committee for their efforts in putting the meeting together.
