Combinatorial thin film methods for the search of new lightweight metal hydrides

Abstract

The search for new lightweight metal hydride storage materials is essentially like looking for a needle in a haystack. Over the years, a number of combinatorial methods have been developed to scan the properties of materials in an efficient way. We demonstrate that combinatorial techniques are also applicable for the search of suitable hydrogen storage materials. This applies especially to hydrogenography, a novel optical screening method that measures simultaneously the enthalpy of hydride formation of thousands of materials on a single thin film wafer.