In january I participate in "Bath Electrochemistry Winter School" at Bath University (UK)

On the training I listened the following lectures:
- “Introduction to Electrochemistry”, Dr Petra Cameron (University of Bath);
- “Mass transport effects in voltammetry”, Dr Toby Jenkins (University of Bath);
- “Electron transfer kinetics”, Dr Jason Riley (Imperial College London);
- “How a potemtiostat works (with demonstration)”, Prof. Laurie Peter (University of Bath);
- “Mechanism of electrochemical reactions”, Dr Frank Marken (University of Bath);
- “Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy”, Dr David Fermin (University of Bristol);
- “Design of electrochemical experiment”, Prof. Laurie Peter (University of Bath);
- “An introduction to electroanalytical methods”, Dr Petra Cameron (University of Bath);
- “Spectroelectrochemistry”, Dr Jason Riley (Imperial College London);
- “Electrochemistry for biosensing”, Dr Toby Jenkins (University of Bath);

and I also attended in the following lab sessions:
-“Getting to know the equipment. an introduction to electrochemical instrumentation & techniques”;
- “Voltammetry at Rotating Disc and Ultramicroelectrodes”;
- “Quantitive analysis of solar cell absorber layer”;
- “The impedance properties of a simple redox reaction: the ferri/ferrocyanide couple”;
- “More complex cyclic voltammetry –the elucidation of reaction mechanisms”;
- “Electrochemical Deposition: Kinetics and Mechanism of Bismuth Electrodeposition onto glassy carbon electrodes”;
- “Protein electrochemistry: cytochrome c reduction and oxidation in a mesoporous membrane system”;
- “Spectroelectrochemical studies of an EC’Reaction”;
- “Gold nanoparticle electrocatalysis: electrophoretic deposition and catalytic reactivity of 5 nm diameter gold nanoparticles”.

It is really good training. I've learned a lot and I would recommend this school to anyone who wants to wirk with electrochemistry.

In January with the help of my prominent supervisors, which I have the privilege to work alongside with, we produced ribbons via a melt spinning technique. This method is based on rapid cooling of molten materials leading to quick solidification. There were four ingots prepared with nominal composition of Ni48Mn39.5Sn12.5, Ni48Mn39.5Sn11.5Al1, Ni48Mn39.5Sn10.5Al2, Ni48Mn39.5Sn9.5Al3 denoted as NMS, NMSA, NMSAA, NMSAAA respectively. The subsequently obtained ribbons were XRD and TEM analysed (only the first NMS sample was studied this month due to time constraints). During this task I had the opportunity to familiarize myself with the method utilized for fabrication of thin foils specific for Transmission Electron Microscopy studies. TEM observation showed very interesting results. Amongst them there were the so called tweed contrasts seen in the examined sample indicative of segregation processes. Also it was noticed that the resulting average elemental chemical composition slightly shifted with respect to the staring one. This is in accordance with literature and was reported in a paper by B. Hernando et al. (Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials V. 321 April 2009), which I came across. Nevertheless this interesting finding requires further studies.
The research goes on…

In Januar,

New Year has started with application the Miedema and de Boer theory for calculation the formation enthalpies of metallic alloys, for example Fe-Ti. Yielded results was compared with DFT calculation. As is well known, Miedema’s group developed a widely used thermodynamic theory for calculating the formation energies of binary transition metal alloy systems. From first principles, one could calculate the formation energy of any alloy system, however, it is usually very complicated and requires approximations and assumptions in the calculation especially for the ternary and higher component alloys.

In December, I took into consideration issues concerning methods of physico-chemical polyelectrolyte multilayer coatings characterization. I devoted time for a review of the literature on the use of radial flow test to determine the kinetics of cell adhesion on solid surfaces. I also made several attempts to analyze the value of shear stress in the system: blood - material with a modified surface. I also prepared a series of samples for preliminary analysis of FTIR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy) and verifying the optimal stiffness of the system for settlement of cells such as smooth muscle and endothelial cells.

Main studies carried out during December:

- analysis of the results obtained so far,
- casting of new quaternary alloy,
- microstructure analysis of prepared ingot using SEM,
- preliminary tensile tests on melt-spun ribbons with molybdenum addition using INSTRON 6025,
- microstructure analysis of melt-spun ribbons with vanadium addition using TEM,
- participation in seminars and lectures