Projects at a Glance

  • HYTEM - Organic-inorganic hybrid thermoelectric materials through a new concept of simultaneous vapor phase coating and infiltration (VPI/SCIP)

    Polymers and inorganics come together to support novel waste heat harvesting.

    Organic-inorganic hybrid materials can significantly enhance the design space for novel functionalities, integrating the best properties of the individual components and even resulting in new ones. Polymers and functional inorganic compounds are the top players in the world of materials science. With the support of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the HYTEM project will bring them together literally, generating inorganic structures simultaneously in the subsurface of a bulk polymer and on its top surface. The expected result: novel hybrid thermoelectric materials able to scavenge waste heat and turn it into electricity with unparalleled efficiency.

  • SPECTER - Spin-charge conversion in highly resistive spin-orbit materials

    With the current technology of transistors reaching characteristic sizes of a few nanometers, and heating effects becoming more severe, the regular functionality of processors is at stake. In the next few years, new technologies are required to sustain the increasingly high demands imposed by the consumer electronics industry worldwide. Among the wide range of proposed options, spintronics is considered to be one of the leading candidates to fill this gap, backed by recent proposals for spin-based computation using magnetoelectric spin-orbit devices. In these devices, the magnetic state of a ferromagnetic material is read through the conversion of spin currents in charge currents, where two resistance levels can be unambiguously detected depending on the magnetization direction of the ferromagnet, i.e. a “1” and a ”0” state.

     

  • SPIR - Spasers in the infrared range

    One of the important directions of modern medicine is noninvasive diagnostics. The urgency of the problem is determined by the search of safe methods of examination and sparing techniques of collection of material for medical analysis when the patient does not feel pain, physical and emotional discomfort.

  • ENSEMBLES3 Phase II - Centre of ExcelleNce for nanophotonicS, advancEd Materials and novel crystal growth-Based technoLogiEs

    The grand objective of the project is to create the Centre of Excellence ENSEMBLE3, which will focus on research excellence and innovation performance in the area of crystal growth-based technologies, novel functional materials with innovative electromagnetic properties, and applications in nanophotonics, optoelectronics and medicine.
  • LICONAMCO - Light-controlled nanomagnetic computation schemes

    Computation using nanomagnets could serve as a low-power alternative to existing CMOS technologies. Here, binary information is encoded into two stable magnetic configurations of single-domain nanomagnets.
  • 2DSTOP - Spin transport and spin-orbit phenomena in 2D materials

    We live in a technological world where usage of electronic devices for information technology is an integral part of everyday life. Present and future technological progress requires miniaturization of such devices, continuous improvement of their performances and decreasing of energy consumption.

  • SPRING - SPin Research IN Graphene

    The EU-funded H2020 project SPRING (project ID 863098) is focused on the development of new graphene-based magnetic components that contribute to the creation of faster and environmentally friendly electronic devices. This international research project is coordinated by CIC nanoGUNE (ES) in partnership with IBM (CH), University of Santiago de Compostela (ES), Technical University of Delft (NL) and University of Oxford (UK), and Donostia International Physics Center (ES).

  • ARTEMIS- Graphene Molecule Interfaces for Spintronics

    The future of our society is intimately bounded to the development of smaller, faster and cheaper technologies, which can promote the ability to read, store and manipulate data.
  • ANTHEM - AdvaNced THErmoelectric Materials through Vapor Phase Infiltration

    Waste heat—the rejected by-product of all energy conversion processes—remains a huge and unexplored reservoir of green energy. It is estimated that two-thirds of the 160 TWh required for global power consumption is lost to the environment each year. Converting even a fraction of this wasted energy into electricity at the cost of 10 cents per kWh would generate a new EUR 1.0 trillion industry—creating jobs, boosting the economy, and increasing energy efficiency.