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This PhD project will demonstrate the outstanding potential of novel organic light-emitting materials for high-efficiency thermally-activated delayed fluorescent (TADF) OLEDs and low threshold organic semiconductor lasers emitting in the near infrared (NIR) spectral region.

OLEDs emitting in the visible spectral range are now widely commercially used in the displays of smartphones and televisions. While strong efforts are still devoted to the improvement of blue organic electroluminescence (EL), recent research has also focused on the development of high-performance NIR OLEDs due to their potential for various applications in the biological/medical field and for new technologies in the areas of facial recognition, eye tracking and sensing.[1] An important breakthrough was reported in 2018 by Dr Ribierre and Dr D'Aleo with the first demonstration of NIR TADF OLEDs based on a borondifluoride curcuminoid derivative.[2] Their other collaborative studies provided important information on the influence of the molecular structure on the photophysical properties of this family of dyes.[3,4] 

This PhD project aims to develop novel NIR emitters for high-efficiency OLEDs and organic lasers. The light-emitting molecules will be synthesized by the group of Dr D'Aleo (in Strasbourg, France) and the recruited PhD student at St Andrews will focus on the photophysical studies, fabrication of novel organic EL device architectures and their characterization. The measurements will be carried out using the world-class research facilities of the Organic Semiconductor Centre (OSC) at St Andrews. The successful outcome of this project will tackle some key challenges currently met by NIR OLED materials and will lead to a next generation of near infrared organic EL technologies with improved performance. The student will learn and apply a broad range of organic light-emitting device fabrication and characterization techniques as well as various optical spectroscopic tools to investigate TADF properties and excitonic processes. Overall, the student will gain strong scientific expertise in the active and interdisciplinary field of organic electronics that will allow him/her to follow a successful scientific career in either academia or industry.   

Informal enquiries are very welcome and should be made by email to Dr Jean-Charles Ribierre (jr43@st-andrews.ac.uk). 

[1] A. Minotto et al., Light Sci. Appl. 10, 18 (2021).
[2] D. H. Kim, A. D?Aleo, X. K. Chen, A. S. D. Sandanayaka, D. Yao, L. Zhao, T. Komino, E. Zaborova, G. Canard, Y. Tsuchiya, E. Y. Choi, J. W. Wu, F. Fages, J. L. Bredas, J. C. Ribierre, C. Adachi, Nature Photon. 12, 98 (2018).
[3] H. Ye, D. H. Kim, X. K. Chen, A. S. D. Sandanayaka, J. U. Kim, E. Zaborova, G. Canard, Y. Tsuchiya, E. Y. Choi, J. W. Wu, F. Fages, J. L. Bredas, A. D?Aleo, J. C. Ribierre, C. Adachi, Chem. Mater. 30, 6702 (2018).
[4] A. D'Aleo, M. H. Sazzad, D. H. Kim, E. Y. Choi, J. W. Wu, G. Canard, F. Fages, J. C. Ribierre, C. Adachi, Chem. Comm. 53, 7003 (2017).

• The Organic Semiconductor Centre

This project is to develop models of resolved star formation on galactic scales. This will involve modelling a full galactic potential and how it drives the formation of molecular clouds and the onset of gravitational collapse and star formation. feedback from ionisation and supernova will be included to assess molecular cloud lifetimes and star formation efficiencies.

Extensive layers of diffuse ionized gas are observed in the Milky Way and other galaxies. This project will study the structure, ionization, heating, and dynamics of diffuse ionized gas using our newly developed radiation hydrodynamics codes that incorporate feedback processes including photoionisation, stellar outflows, and supernovae. Output from our 3D rad-hydro simulations will be compared with emission line observations of the diffuse ionised gas.

Evaporative cooling is an essential stage in the creation of Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) in atomic gases. Recently we suggested [1] that holographic optical traps can be used to increase the evaporation efficiency, leading to larger BECs. In this PhD project you will implement this scheme, which will result in a simplified apparatus for the productions and subsequent manipulation of BECs.

[1] http://pra.aps.org/abstract/PRA/v84/i5/e053410

This project will use (and futher develop) our new radiation hydrodynamics codes to syudy the effects of stellar feedback on the structure, dynamics, and star formation rates in star forming regions (parsec sizescales) and the interstellar medium (kiloparsec sizescales). Feedback processes that are readily incorporated into our codes include photoionisation, radiation pressure, dust heating, stellar outflows, and supernovae. In addition to studying these processes in star forming regions, the new numerical codes are also applicble to numerical studies of galactic outflows and the impact of feedback processes and leakage of ionising radiation into the intergalactic medium.

Many gravitational microlensing events involve binary (or multiple) systems, which can be any combination of stars, stellar remnants, brown dwarfs, and planets. Yet, there is quite a lack of systematic studies on what microlensing observations can tell us about the demographics of such systems. This now becomes an even more promising topic as not only photometric but also astrometric microlensing signatures are observed.

This project can take different directions in line with the main interests of the student, where specific questions could include a) the overlapping mass regime between planets and brown dwarfs, b) close binaries, or c) the yet unresolved question why so few binary-source events have been identified (with potential implications on the derivation of planet population statistics).

Most stars form in clusters, where energetic feedback from massive (proto)stars – including outflows, ionization, heating, and winds – shapes the environment and impacts accretion. The relative importance of different feedback processes is a key outstanding issue in our understanding of massive star formation.

The aim of this project is to conduct a large-scale observational study of the role and physics of feedback in young massive (proto)clusters, using ALMA and Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) observations of "Extended Green Objects (EGOs)". The PhD project will focus on imaging and analyzing ALMA observations of the EGO-10, a sample of typical young, massive star-forming regions that exist in a specific evolutionary state where active outflows dominate their infrared appearance.

Determining the demographics of cool planets by means of microlensing is one of the key science goals of NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope mission. Already the much smaller data rate of the most advanced ground-based surveys poses a key challenge for the modelling of the detected gravitational microlensing events. The major bottleneck to be overcome is the reliance on human judgement in the data analysis process. Any scalable solution not only needs to be fully-automated ("data-in-model-out"), but also needs to take into account the specific statistics of time-series observations, with their correlated noise and non-Gaussian distribution of measurements. This results in a complex Bayesian interference problem involving an intricate high-dimensional parameter space.

Our knowledge of exoplanet atmospheres is undergoing a paradigm change following the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). High-quality spectroscopic observations of exoplanet atmospheres necessitate a careful reassessment of model assumptions that were sufficient in the pre-JWST era, in order to ensure the reliable inference of atmospheric properties (e.g. the chemical composition, temperature profile, and aerosol properties).
In this MSc (res) project, you will investigate new ways to improve state-of-the-art models of exoplanet spectra. You will also have the opportunity to apply these models to JWST observations of giant exoplanets, which will allow you to measure the atmospheric properties of worlds around other stars.

• The Centre for Exoplanet Science

Transition metal oxides host a wide range of physical properties and functionalities, making them an ideal platform for implementing potential future devices. The aim of this project is to establish novel ways to manipulate the local properties of transition metal oxides by using a scanning tunneling microscope to enable writing device structures at the atomic scale into the surface of the material. To establish the properties of these written device structure, you will first use scanning tunneling spectroscopy, but later also explore possibilities to contact the written structures macroscopically to study transport through these and enable actual device operation. While initial studies will be performed on bulk material, at later stages of the project, thin-film samples grown by reactive oxide molecular beam epitaxy will be used.