The Department for Nanostructured Materials at the Jozef Stefan Institute (Slovenia)

The Department for Nanostructured Materials’ had its origin in the year 1964, when the Ceramics Department was established at the Jozef Stefan Institute.

During the following 30 years, its persistent high quality research allowed the Ceramics Department to grow and be recognized among the top ceramic research facilities in the world. The Department’s 50 researchers, including a permanent research staff, graduate students and visiting engineers/scientists, were involved in the study of all aspects of powder synthesis, powder processing, and the shaping and sintering of ceramic materials with a particular emphasis given to the characterization of ceramic products – from structures to functional properties.

As a response to the rapidly expanding fields of nanotechnology and nanomaterials the Department for Nanostructured Materials was formed in 2001, being one of the five new units – successors to the Ceramics Department. The Centre for Electro Microscopy with its world-class highly specialized micro-analytical equipment represents the departments’ joint analytical facility.

The Department for Nanostructured Materials brings together scientists, experts and young researchers from various complementary fields of science: chemistry, technology, physics, materials science and mineralogy. The basic and applied research in the department includes ceramic materials, intermetallic alloys and minerals. The Department’s research encompasses conventional processing as well as the development of new technologies and methods for preparing new materials with novel properties.

This includes experimental and theoretical investigations of structures, analyses of chemical compositions at the atomic level, and measurements and calculations of physical properties, all of which help the group to improve the properties of micro- and nanostructured materials. The research group offers research support to partners from industry and it is also involved in two Centers of Excellence as well as the European Research Program.

The department investigates intermetallic magnetic materials, quasicrystals, natural and synthetic materials (amorphous and crystalline nanoparticles), ceramic sensors, the consequences of mechanical wear, neutron radiation, etc. (amorphous and crystalline precipitates), SiC, Si3N4, ZnO varistors (nano-amorphous layers in polycrystalline ceramics), thin films, hetero-layered structures – spintronics, polytypic sequences (grain boundaries between various phases), perovskites, functionally gradient materials like the ceramic partsfor hip-joint prostheses, thick coatings (gradients of the structure and chemical composition). Various approaches are used for processing, including powder metallurgy, high-energy milling, HDDR processing, pulsed-laser deposition, processing in aqueous and non-aqueous suspensions, forming from suspensions, building layered structures on different substrates, and layers with various thicknesses (electrophoresis, electrodeposition).

The final goal of the department’s research is to gain the knowledge for tailoring the properties of various ceramic and metallic materials. This includes improving the final properties of functional materials that they have studied and developed until now, as well as the research and development of new materials with new processing methods.

More information:

Sanja Fidler

Department for Nanostructured Materials

Jozef Stefan Institute

Slovenia