Ilan Goldfarb, Ph.D.

Professor, Department of Materials Science and Engineering

Tel Aviv University

Speech Title:

Hysteretic switching in nanomagnets and memristors from a Materials Science perspective

Abstract:

A reversible switching phenomenon is usually based on some sort of hysteretic behavior, e.g., electronic, ionic, magnetic, mechanical, etc. While physics and chemistry govern the process, contemporary materials science is vital for understanding the corresponding synthesis-structure- properties triangle. In this context, I will survey our recent work on magnetic transition-metal silicide nanostructures and transition-metal oxide memristors. In the former, synthesis of the nanostructures will be shown to have the highest impact on the observed magnetic properties, even in the phases that are not magnetic in their bulk form, by means of controlling the nanostructure size, shape, and position. In the latter, it will be demonstrated how detailed characterization of the oxide chemistry and electronic structure using photoemission spectroscopy and analytical transmission electron microscopy helped us to identify the crucial role of oxygen ions and vacancies in the switching mechanism.

Bio:

Ilan Goldfarb is a Full Professor at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Tel Aviv University. After obtaining his doctorate in growth and transmission electron microscopy of thin multilayered films with Prof. Shechtman at Technion’s Department of Materials Engineering in 1994, he joined the Department of Materials at Oxford University (UK) as a British Council Post-Doctoral Scholar, where he spent the next five years specializing in surface science, epitaxial growth, and scanning tunneling microscopy. He joined Tel Aviv University in 1999, and spent his 2010-2011 sabbatical year at the Nanoelectronics Research Group at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Palo Alto (Ca, USA) exploring electronic structure and conduction mechanisms in amorphous materials for memristor applications. Since his return he has been heading the TAU Wolfson Applied Materials Research Centre (WAMRC).
Prof. Goldfarb’s current research focuses on self-organization of magnetic epitaxial nanostructures by scanning tunneling microscopy, electron diffraction and photoemission methods, and on electronic structure of amorphous oxide films. Until recently he was on the Editorial Board of Applied Physics A.