AIP Publishing Announces Winners of the 2022 APL Materials Excellence in Research Award

Newswise — WASHINGTON, Dec. 5, 2022 – AIP Publishing is pleased to announce the winners of the 2022 APL Materials Excellence in Research Award, a distinction for young researchers who publish exceptional research in the journal.

First place and a $5,000 prize are awarded to Xuanyi Zhang of North Carolina State University for his publication, "Thickness and temperature dependence of the atomic-scale structure of SrRuO₃ thin films."

Zhang and his team used a combination of high-resolution X-ray diffraction and scanning transmission electron microscopy to explore the atomic-scale structure in ultrathin SrRuO₃ films. The researchers found that rotations of the oxygen octahedra – molecules that govern the magnetic properties of the film – change with thickness and temperature. They provided a precise picture of the evolution of structural properties with these two parameters. This will have implications for novel spintronic devices.

Jin Hong Lee of CNRS/Thales won second place and $2,500 for his article, "Strain tuning of Néel temperature in YCrO₃ epitaxial thin film."

Lee and his colleagues explored how compressing and stretching antiferromagnets can control their transition temperature, above which magnetism is lost. In antiferromagnetic YCrO₃, the transition temperature increased when the group compressed it, and they were surprised to find the strain sensitivity was much larger than values estimated for similar materials. This knowledge could be applied to noncollinear antiferromagnets and piezomagnetic sensors.

Berit Goodge, a Minerva Group Leader and Schmidt Science Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids and a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow in Physics and Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, captured third place for her paper, "Disentangling types of lattice disorder impacting superconductivity in Sr₂RuO₄ by quantitative local probes."

Goodge and fellow researchers wanted to understand how subtly different growth conditions could impact the lattice structure and superconducting transition in Sr₂RuO₄ films. They leveraged a suite of high-resolution structural and spectroscopic tools in a scanning transmission electron microscope to reveal surprising forms and degrees of disorder in their samples. The article illustrates an effective strategy for stabilizing desired materials properties outside of perfect conditions.

The winners will receive waived charges for a 2023 article in APL Materials, and their research will be highlighted on the APL Materials webpage and shared with the materials science community via email and social media.

APL Materials and AIP Publishing are proud to support early-career researchers with the APL Materials Excellence in Research Award. Entries for the 2023 award are now being accepted. Eligibility and other details are available on the APL Materials website.

###

The article, "Thickness and temperature dependence of the atomic-scale structure of SrRuO₃ thin films," is authored by Xuanyi Zhang, Aubrey N. Penn, Lena Wysocki, Zhan Zhang, Paul H. M. van Loosdrecht, Lior Kornblum, James M. LeBeau, Ionela Lindfors-Vrejoiu, and Divine P. Kumah. The article was published in APL Materials on May 11, 2022 (DOI: 10.1063/5.0087791) and can be accessed at https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0087791.

The article, "Strain tuning of Néel temperature in YCrO₃ epitaxial thin film," is authored by Jin Hong Lee, Lourdes Marcano, Raphaël Aeschlimann, Mohamad-Assaad Mawass, Chen Luo, Alexandre Gloter, Julien Varignon, Florin Radu, Sergio Valencia, and Manuel Bibes. The article was published in APL Materials on Aug. 2, 2022 (DOI: 10.1063/5.0095742) and can be accessed at https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0095742.

The article, "Disentangling types of lattice disorder impacting superconductivity in Sr₂RuO₄ by quantitative local probes," is authored by Berit H. Goodge, Hari P. Nair, David J. Baek, Nathaniel J. Schreiber, Ludi Miao, Jacob P. Ruf, Emily N. Waite, Philip M. Carubia, Kyle M. Shen, Darrell G. Schlom, and Lena F. Kourkoutis. The article was published in APL Materials on April 29, 2022 (DOI: 10.1063/5.0085279) and can be accessed at https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0085279.

###

About APL Materials

APL Materials is an open access journal that features original research on significant topical issues within all areas of materials science.

About AIP Publishing 

AIP Publishing's mission is to advance, promote, and serve the physical sciences for the benefit of humanity by breaking barriers to open, equitable research communication and empowering researchers to accelerate global progress. AIP Publishing is a wholly owned not-for-profit subsidiary of the American Institute of Physics (AIP) and supports the charitable, scientific, and educational purposes of AIP through scholarly publishing activities on its behalf and on behalf of our publishing partners. 

###