The University of Iowa has won nearly $1.5 million to expand its materials science center and to explore new ways to leverage materials for quantum technologies.

The award from the U.S. Department of Defense will unite researchers in chemistry, engineering, and physics to investigate which materials can be combined to build light- or electronic-based quantum systems. 

Potential applications range from improved remote sensors that detect toxins in drinking water to faster, higher-resolution maps of battle spaces.

Central to that goal is the purchase of equipment that can create patterns and etch materials, and a printing system that enables the materials to be stacked or layered — akin to making a nano-sandwich — to optimize their optical and electronic properties.

“We want to utilize the quantum mechanical properties of new materials,” says Ravitej Uppu, assistant professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy and a principal investigator on the award. “If we can harness these new materials, functionalize them, then we could make sensors that can achieve better image quality and better sensing performance.”

The locus of the research will be at the Materials Analysis, Testing, and Fabrication (MATFab) Facility, which was created in 2019 by the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR) to centralize the university’s advanced micro-nanofabrication research. The facility, housed in 1,500 square feet of clean room space at the Iowa Advanced Technology Laboratories, has deposition and etching tools for building structures at the micro and nanoscale.

“This award represents a transformative investment in Iowa’s capacity for advanced materials research and nanofabrication,” says Aliasger Salem, associate vice president for research in OVPR. “It enables MATFab to expand into emerging areas such as heterogeneous material integration and quantum device fabrication — fields critical to national competitiveness in defense and energy-efficient technologies.”

The new equipment covered through the award will replace infrastructure that had become dated, says Tori Forbes, professor in the Department of Chemistry and MATFab’s director since 2022.

“It’s been challenging to keep this aging equipment functional and enable faculty and students to conduct research in this area. This award will ensure that students can receive training on state-of-the-art equipment and faculty can continue to innovate,” Forbes says.

There is great promise to advancing quantum technologies by leveraging the attributes of materials at the micron and nanoscale. But each material operates differently at these sub-microscopic levels, so learning about a material’s advantages — individually and collectively — can be a challenge. Iowa researchers now will have equipment funded through the award to study each material in detail and pinpoint what each can bring to the table.

One purchase afforded by the award is a maskless grayscale lithography system, which will allow researchers to essentially use a laser pen to draw shapes in three dimensions, such as a dome.

“It has a resolution down to 300 nanometers, so it can make really fine points and make a pattern that can change in height from the surface,” Uppu says.

Complementary pieces will allow researchers to etch on the patterned surfaces and then stack materials as they build and test compact devices. 

“It could help us move our conceptual structures into working devices,” Uppu says. “That flexibility lets us fabricate everything from light-routing devices to tiny transistors relevant for quantum technologies in a university research setting.”

The opportunities will be open to students and faculty from colleges and universities in Iowa, as MATFab positions itself as a regional innovation center. 

“We will train University of Iowa students to use the facilities, and we plan to host a summer school for students from regional colleges where they would learn to use the new materials fabrication tools," Uppu says. 

“That way, we create a new bridge between the universities to start thinking about potential collaborative projects. And naturally, MATFab becomes the central hub for that, because it hosts all the required facilities,” he adds.

The other co-principal investigators are John Prineas and Thomas Folland in the Department of Physics and Astronomy.