Stephane Cuenot, Chris Ewels, Bernard Humbert

The atomic force microscopy (AFM) and more generally the near field microscopy are heavily used to characterize the surface of materials. Indeed, these microscopes possible to image very precisely the surface of all kinds of materials from the micrometer scale to the molecular or atomic scale. However, the originality and the important contribution of these microscopes lie in the ability to measure the physical properties at the nanoscale.

The tip of the AFM can measure locally different properties that can not be probed by other techniques: Friction, adhesion, chemical composition, magnetic and electrical properties, mechanical properties.

Chris Ewels, Arezki Mokrani

The structural complexity of nanomaterials at the atomic scale require a range of theoretical approaches from empirical potential modelling (GULP, LAMMPS), semi-empirical (such as DFTB+, …), to full DFT methods (AIMPRO, SIESTA, …). With these we are able to model atomistic, vibrational and electronic structure, the response of nanomaterials to external stimulate (temperature, chemical modification, mechanical distortion, gas absorption, …).

A key signature of our approach is close collaboration with experimentalists in our group and elsewhere, in order to model the most “physically realistic” systems possible.

At the same time we work directly with DFT code developers (SIESTA, AIMPRO, …). Our calculations aim to: