Howdy everyone,

This week I got to do a lot more ellipsometry and another brief round of flow coating. This time when I used the flow coater I did a much better job. It feels good to accomplish a goal! Improvement–check! You have to have a steady hand when pippetting out the polymer solution to be cast across the silica wafer uniformly. Otherwise you get these very pretty rainbow colors everywhere–which means your coat did not come out uniformly at all. Again the color on these wafers is a general indication of the thickness, so if the colors are all over the spectrum, it is going to be difficult to get an accurate read on the thickness.

During this experience I have also had the opportunity to go to a few lab meetings which is always cool. Different lab members present on what they have been working on. I enjoy getting to see the research that other people are doing. Seeing what ingenious things people are thinking about and working on really just gets me excited. I think that’s why I lead up the STEM Club at my school and really try and encourage my kiddos to get plugged into as many opportunities as possible. Which reminds me, I can’t wait to see you all at the symposium to learn more about what kind of research you guys have had the opportunity to be involved in this summer. =) Enjoy your weekend!

Getting better at using the flow coater.

Less uniform spots on the left, more uniform spots on the right. Edge effect is okay and happens especially since these are smaller samples (this effect will theoretically be less in much larger samples), but we desire at least a significant spot of uniform color.