Research

Mingliang Tian’s webpage

Penn State University

Template-assembly is an important approach in controllable growth of metallic and semiconducting nanowires. In Penn State, we have developed a new technique for making high quality freestanding AAO membranes and AAO on Si wafers. The pore size of these “home-made” AAO membranes can reach about 5-8 nm and their thickness can be controlled …. ( more )

Superconductivity of nanometer scale materials was found closely dependent on their environment. In Penn State, we found evidences that 1D Zn nanowires (ZNWs) can be either superconducting or non-superconducting completely controlled by the state of two nearby bulk superconducting electrodes, exhibiting antiproximity effect …. ( more )

Transport properties were measured on single-crystal Sn nanowires of various diameters. When the diameter of Sn wires is below 60 nm, a finite resistive tail due to the size confinement effect can be seen clearly. Above 60nm, the superconducting transition is sharp and the wires show bulk property. Our data provide evidence of quantum fluctuation in one-dimensional superconducting wires…. ( more )

Fabrication of porous anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) membranes

Growth mechanisms and characterization of metallic nanowires

Superconductivity in 1D single-crystal Sn nanowires

Antiproximity effect in Zn nanowires sandwiched between bulk superconductors

The mechanisms of the huge positive magnetoresistance in low-dimensional charge-density wave conductors at temperatures below the Peierls transition temperature was debated for long. We comparatively investigated the magnetoresistance in a series of CDW purple bronzes. Our data suggested the huge positive magnetoresistance resulted from field-induced enhancement of 1D Fermi surface “nesting” …. ( more )

Magnetoresistance in quasi-2D charge-density waves compounds

Various metallic nanowires were fabricated by electrodepositing metals into porous membrane. Single-crystal growth of low-melting point metal wires, such as Au, Ag, Cu, Sn, Pb, Bi, were achieved by carefully controlling deposition parameters. Polycrystalline wires of high-melting point, such as , Ni, Co and Rh, were fabricated. The growth mechanisms …. ( more )