Events

Prof Oskar Paris, Synchrotron radiation studies of complex biological and bioinspired materials

Date: Thursday 28 February 2013 11:00 - 12:00

Location: Nanoforce Seminar Room

Synchrotron radiation studies of complex biological and bioinspired materials
Oskar Paris
Institute of Physics, Montanuniversität Leoben, Austria

The hierarchical structure and its relation to the multifunctional properties of biological tissues has become a topic of intense research in recent years. This is because it has been widely recognized that many biological materials may be used either as templates or as inspiration source for novel smart materials for engineering- or biomedical applications.
In the present lecture I will give an overview of recent and ongoing own work in this field. This includes the hierarchical structure characterization of biological tissues (bone, crustacean cuticle) using sophisticated synchrotron radiation based position resolved and in-situ X-ray scattering techniques. I will also report on recent progress in the synthesis and structure characterization of silica from the nanocasting of wood, aiming at hierarchical porous ceramics perfectly replicating the hierarchical architecture of wood. Finally, humidity driven actuation mechanisms in plants are used as inspiration to study adsorption induced deformation in nanoporous model materials. The aim is to explore the potential of simple physical principles - in connection with hierarchical structuring - for novel sensors and actuators.