P03 - Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule Aachen (RWTH) | Germany
Key contact person: Prof. Jochen M. Schneider
RWTH Aachen University, established in 1870, is divided into 9 faculties, including the medical faculty. Currently, around 40375 students are enrolled in over 130 academic programmes. The number of foreign students (6395) substantiates the university's international orientation. Every year, more than 5800 graduates and 750 doctoral graduates leave the university. Approximately 512 professors as well as 4675 academic and 2443 non-academic colleagues work at RWTH Aachen University. The University budget amounts to 884 M€, of which third parties fund 445 M€. Moreover, special field research, 27 graduate colleges, among them 15 founded by the German Research Foundation, and 16 affiliated institutes with strong industrial alignment illustrate the University ́s considerable research potential.
Research at Materials Chemistry (MCh) (http://www.mch.rwth-aachen.de) of RWTH is driven by the vision of quantum-mechanically-guided materials design. The underlying goal is to contribute towards the basic understanding required to realize the synthesis and application of tailor-made multifunctional materials with chemical and mechanical wear resistance. Computational tools based on ab initio methods provide a description of phase stability and elastic properties. Through combination of theory and experiment we seek to understand the chemistry of material-plasma-interactions and to contribute towards the scientific basis that will allow for designing materials with respect to phase stability and elastic properties. Thin film combinatorics is employed to address the challenges posed above: by co-deposition from multiple plasma sources, we produce thin films with concentration gradients that are then spatially resolved with respect to their composition, structure, elastic properties, and phase stability. This approach can be viewed as "targeted materials screening".
The MCh/RWTH activities in IL TROVATORE involve: WP2 – MAX phase coating deposition on commercial clads; WP4 – advanced characterisation of MAX phase coatings by FIB/APT; and WP9 – predictive modelling activities.