Thesis Project Form

Graphene is expected to provide considerable advantages with respect to conventional conductive materials in biomedical applications, as it is known to be biocompatible, has favorable electronic and chemical functionalities and is electrochemically stable. It offers the possibility to develop inks for making printed flexible biocompatible electrodes and circuits that can simplify the production of biosensing devices such as brain interfaces, skin sensing devices and wearable electronics.

The student will develop the methodological skills for preparation of graphene ink and other two-dimensional materials.
The student will address the key issue of the use of environmentally friendly and non-toxic solvents, essential for the development of devices compatible for biosensing applications. To this end, he will need to finely tune the rheological properties of the inks for the deposition on flexible substrates optimizing, after testing different deposition techniques, the most successful one.
He will be involved in the production of prototypes of printed electrodes for flexible and wearable applications, and take part in their optical and electrical characterization.
The obtained devices will be evaluated using as benchmark state-of-the art systems used in flexible electronics for wearable and biosensing applications.

The student will learn: organic chemistry methods; ink preparation techniques (sonication, jet-milling); ink deposition methods; optical characterization techniques (absorption spectroscopy and micro-Raman); electrical conductivity methods (4-probes). A theoretical background of experimental methods will be provided. The student will complete a peer-reviewed publication documenting the methodologies and outcomes. The anticipated project duration is 6 months.