Characterization of biosensing with integrated photonic microchips for wearable photonics in health monitoring

Photonics biosensors convert biomolecular interactions into quantifiable optical signals for biomedical analysis, which enable continuous monitoring of health indicators. Among them the microring resonator has a good sensing performance and a very broad application prospect. This thesis studies sensing with microfluidic integrated microring...

Imaging the SAW Field on Suspended 2D Membrane

Surface acoustic wave (SAW) is widely used in biological research and sensor applications, acomprehensive understanding of SAW propagation and visualization on suspended 2D membranes is crucial for the manipulation of nanoparticles in biological research and sensitivity improvement of SAW sensors based on 2D material. The initial step of this...

Dynamic Performance Evaluation of Two-axis Lathes

With the increasing demand for extended service life and increased precision and accuracy of precision mechanics across various industries, machine tool manufacturers face the challenge of increasing the performance of their machines. To achieve this goal, the performance of the machines must be evaluated, points of improvement must be...

Exploring Silicon Photonics to Sense Two-Dimensional Membrane Mechanics

Silicon photonics have received more attention in recent years due to further development in CMOS manufacturing methods. The development allows silicon photonics to be smaller than ever before. This leads to smaller silicon photonic devices that can transceive light, which is typically done at a wavelength of 1550nm for silicon photonics. A...

Design of an Integrated Photonic Distributed Force Sensor

From the research in the field of mechanobiology, it is evident that cells exert different force magnitudes while growing based on the biomaterial these are in contact with. The magnitude of the exerted force determines certain behaviors and mechansims of the cells, such as differentiation. For this reason, it is proposed to develop a...

Visualisation of ultrasound waves in air to support acoustic levitation

Acoustic levitation is an novel method that could lend itself very useful to fast and precise transportation of small objects. To verify the acoustic field and the modelling assumptions, the acoustic field must be visualised and quantified. Different methods to visualise a pressure gradient are investigated and rated against design requirements....

Tuning graphene dynamics by mechanical strain

Two-dimensional (membrane) materials have been receiving much scientific attention due to their unique material properties that can be used to study the smallest physical phenomena. One such material is graphene, perceived as the holy grail in material physics, due to its unique material properties. Its aspect ratio diminishes the bending...

Designing a suspended silicon nitride GHz acoustic beam splitter

Research has shown concepts of phononic integrated circuits (PnICs) consisting of multiple acoustic waveguides and beam splitters. Traveling acoustic waves experience energy loss when moving. Minimizing these losses is critical for large and complex PnICs. By fabricating on-chip PnICs, it is possible to operate under vacuum and at low...

A proof-of-concept on Adaptive Control for High-Speed Atomic Force Microscopy

High-Speed Atomic Force Microscopy is widely used for investigating biological architectures and the semiconductor industry. The main limitation comes from parachuting or the Wile E. Coyote effect. Parachuting is the phenomenon where the cantilever taps on the sample towards a steep decrease in height, but does not get adjusted for this decrease...

Numerical and experimental trapping analysis of simple and cost-effective acoustic tweezers

Acoustic Force Spectroscopy (AFS) is a versatile tool that uses sound waves to manipulate tiny particles such as cells, bacteria, and even zebrafish embryos in microfluidic systems. This kind of acoustic tweezer is gaining increasing attention due to its high throughput capability and non-invasiveness. In addition, this device allows for...

The Effects of Dehydration, Microclimate and Growth on the Acoustic Emission Characteristics of Plants In-Vivo

Measurement platform to characterize integrated photonic chips for fluid-based bio-sensing

Micro-ring resonators based on silicon-on-insulator (SOI) waveguide are widely used as sensors due to their small size and high sensitivities. After being fabricated on an integrated photonic technology, it can be applied in bio-chemical analyses crucial for human health monitoring, disease diagnoses, etc.<br/>In this project, we develop and...

Studying the effect of strain on the mechanical properties of wrinkled graphene

Surface corrugations in graphene negatively effect the unique and useful properties of graphene. In order to exploit the special properties of graphene, it is therefore important to understand the phenomenon of wrinkling. In this study, strain engineering was applied to study the flattening of wrinkles in a suspended graphene membrane. Initially...

Probing the Mechanics of Crumpled Graphene Membranes under Tensile Loading: An Experimental Study

Graphene is considered a promising material due to its unique electrical characteristics and excellent mechanical properties. These extraordinary properties make graphene a suitable material for applications like mechanical reinforcements, protective coatings, supercapacitors, sensors, etc. However, when trying to extract these properties...

Studies on the evaporation induced acoustic emissions from 3D-printed bio-inspired microfluidic vessels

Evaporation can induce acoustic emissions in microfluidic devices. The origin of these emissions and their damping remains elusive. This thesis studies acoustic emissions from 3D printed microfluidic tubes mimicking xylem vessels in plants. We show the time and frequency domain signature of these emissions. From these signatures, we identify...

Dynamics of microfluidic cantilevers in a photothermal AFM

Any resonance based sensing method such as AFM or mass sensing using microfluidic cantilevers require high frequency stability. For mass measurement, a stable frequency allows for a lower mass resolution. One of the most commonly used methods to actuate these resonators is using piezoacoustics. A major downside of this method is the presence of...

Dynamics of a machine tool cross-slide

Within a great variety in high tech industry there is an increasing demand for complex shaped turning workpieces with diameters up to a meter and accuracy within microns. Examples are bearings in offshore wind energy and high precision applications. For the production of these parts CNC controlled turning machines are used. A motorized spindle...

Hamaker constant and tip radius determination in dynamic atomic force microscopy

Dynamic Atomic Force Microscopy (dAFM) is an extremely powerful tool for exploring surface topology and nanoscale manipulation and characterization. A feature of dAFM is the existence of highly nonlinear forces between a cantilever tip and sample. One of these forces that plays a large role in operation of AFM is the van der Waals (vdW) force....