Flexible Tuning of Friction on Atomically Thin Graphene.

The tuning of flexible microscale friction is desirable for the reliability of wearable electronic devices, tactile sensors, and flexible gears. Here, the tuning of friction of atomically thin graphene on a flexible polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) substrate was obtained with the elastic modulus using a 1H,1H,2H,2H-perfluorodecyltrichlorosilane (FDTS) self-assembly monolayers (SAMs)-modified microsphere probe with the diameter of 5 µm at the microscale. The friction can be tuned at a large scale with the difference in the elastic modulus of PDMS and thickness of graphene. The hydrophobic property of the FDTS SAMs-modified probe decreased friction by reducing interfacial adhesion and preventing the effect of capillary interaction; thus, the friction decreased with the increase in the elastic modulus of the PDMS substrate due to decreasing indentation depth and thus the interfacial contact area; and also, the enhanced out-of-plane stiffness effectively decreased the interfacial contact quality with the increase of the thickness of graphene. The flexible tuning of friction on graphene was further verified by the theoretical calculation from the aspects of the friction arising from the normal and lateral deformation around the contacting area. This work is meaningful for promoting the design and reliability of flexible micro-devices.

Role of Interfacial Water in the Tribological Behavior of Graphene in an Electric Field.

Friction properties in the electric field are important for the application of graphene as a solid lubricant in graphene-based micro/nanoelectromechanical systems. The studies based on conductive atomic force microscopy show that interfacial water between graphene and the SiO2/Si substrate affects the friction of graphene in the electric field. Friction without applying voltage remains low because the interfacial water retains a stable ice-like network. However, friction after applying voltage increases because the polar water molecules are attracted by the electric field and gather around the tip. The gathered interfacial water not only increases the deformation of graphene but is also pushed by the tip during frictional sliding, which results in the increased friction. These studies provide beneficial guidelines for the applications of graphene as a solid lubricant in the electric field.

A novel degradation mechanism of the elastic modulus of wet polymer substrates under nanoindentation.

We demonstrated that the formation and solidification of a continuous confined water film played a very important role in changing the elastic modulus of the wet polymer substrate in a nanoindentation process by a coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulation of this process. It was found that as the water content increased, the elastic modulus of the wet polymer substrate showed a non-monotonic change. Relative to the dry polymer substrate, the elastic modulus of the wet polymer first decreased. This is because the appearance of a confined water film caused the force between the polymer substrate and the indenter to change from repulsion to attraction. Subsequently, as the confined water film gradually solidified and then weakened, the elastic modulus of the wet polymer slowly increased and then rapidly increased due to a large number of interstitial water molecules gradually penetrating the polymer substrate. Therefore, it is unreasonable to explain the wet polymer degradation during nanoindentation only from the plasticization and anti-plasticization effects based on the hydrogen bond breaking and formation during stretching. The above-mentioned results will help to more comprehensively understand the degradation mechanism of the polymers' encounter with water, thus promoting further practical applications for polymers.

Preparation of Fe-doped colloidal SiO(2) abrasives and their chemical mechanical polishing behavior on sapphire substrates.

Abrasives are one of key influencing factors on surface quality during chemical mechanical polishing (CMP). Silica sol, a widely used abrasive in CMP slurries for sapphire substrates, often causes lower material removal rate (MRRs). In the present paper, Fe-doped colloidal SiO2 composite abrasives were prepared by a seed-induced growth method in order to improve the MRR of sapphire substrates. The CMP performance of Fe-doped colloidal SiO2 abrasives on sapphire substrates was investigated using UNIPOL-1502 CMP equipment. Experimental results indicate that the Fe-doped colloidal SiO2 composite abrasives exhibit lower surface roughness and higher MRR than pure colloidal SiO2 abrasives for sapphire substrates under the same testing conditions. Furthermore, the acting mechanism of Fe-doped colloidal SiO2 composite abrasives in sapphire CMP was analyzed by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Analytical results show that the Fe in the composite abrasives can react with the sapphire substrates to form aluminum ferrite (AlFeO3) during CMP, which promotes the chemical effect in CMP and leads to improvement of MRR.