Hello, fellow NEWT and RET interns!
We have been really busy over here in the Material Science Labs. In my last post, I told you all a little bit about the samples we are working with, which is Cubic Boron Nitride (c-BN). I also told you all that the main goal is to dope this material with the highly electronegative element, Fluorine. We have made several samples, all of which with different concentrations of our fluorinating material.
Our mission now is to run a series of tests on our newly created Fluorinated Cubic Boron Nitride (F c-BN) and attempt to understand the new structure and its properties.
One test we’ve run is an X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. This machine tells us what elements are within our compound. Based on the results of this machine, being the peaks given via X-ray absorption, my mentor was able to determine that our newly formed compound does, in fact, have fluorine. This means that the process designed by my mentor is an effective procedure for doping c-BN.
Other tests we have run are Raman Spectroscopy as well as IR spectroscopy. Both of these machines give us insight into the bonding structure of the compound. We have also put our samples through an X-ray diffractor, this is a machine only utilized to examine 3D crystal structures. This machine will give us insight into how the compound is structured within 3D space. These three machines are highly complex and the data we have must be carefully analyzed. My mentor and I plan to spend time next week analyzing the data from these three devices and trying to put together a working theory for how the structure is bonded together and possibly a working theory as to the compound’s overall structure.
On Monday of next week, we plan to run a hardness test as well as a thermal conductivity test. This will give us insight to how the properties of c-BN change upon fluorination. The hardness test is especially exciting for c-BN is the second hardest compound in existence, second only to diamond. The hope is that by fluorinating the material, the hardness will increase, possibly making this new material even harder than diamond.
Below are a few pictures of the devices we have been using to conduct our tests. I hope you are all having a great time in the lab with your research!
