This internship option aims to introduce the field of Materials Science research, related to issues of development, remarkable properties, and innovative applications. Addressed from both fundamental and applied perspectives, the proposed topics are aimed at understanding and controlling the properties of materials in relation to their structure at various scales (crystallinity, microstructure, shaping). The nature of the materials involved can be highly diverse, including specialty polymers, glasses, crystals, remarkable oxide properties, semiconductors, catalysts, functional surfaces, biomaterials, and their forms can also vary, such as dispersions, powders, thin films, surfaces, and bulk materials.
The themes covered may include materials chemistry (new fabrication strategies, processes), structural characterization, the study of physical properties in various domains (optics, transport, magnetism). The topics addressed typically lie at the interface between several disciplines: chemistry, electrochemistry, process chemistry, solid-state physics, mechanics, surface science, biology. Often, the research is conducted in connection with targeted potential applications with prospects for developing innovative materials.
Examples of techniques used include:
- Materials chemistry: colloid chemistry, inorganic chemistry, thin-film deposition, CVD, PVD, ceramic processes, electrochemistry.
- Advanced structural characterizations: Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, X-ray scattering, studies using large instruments (synchrotrons), electron microscopy.
- Materials and process modeling, physical or physicochemical property characterization: optical measurements (absorption, luminescence, nonlinear optics), ionic or electronic conduction, superconductivity, piezoelectricity, magnetism.
Types of internships: Internships can take place in France or abroad, in an academic or industrial context. For example:
- In research centers at École Polytechnique: LPMC, LPICM, LSI, LMS, CPHT, LOB.
- In other academic institutions: Université Paris-Saclay, Collège de France, Institut Curie.
- In industrial R&D sites in France: Saint-Gobain, Solvay, Arkema, Michelin, Essilor, Thalès, L'Oréal.
- In foreign universities: MIT, Harvard, UC Santa Barbara, NIMS (Tsukuba).
- In foreign industrial R&D centers: Solvay (USA), Saint-Gobain (USA, India, China).
- In startups or within incubation programs.
- Profesor: Gacoin Thierry
- Profesor: Nay Bastien