Nature has developed composite materials (e.g. plant cell walls and Arthropod exoskeleton) with complex and hierarchical organization from the nano- to the macro-scale via molecular assembly. Such materials often possess remarkable optical and/or mechanical properties by simply assembling hard and soft elements. The outstanding properties of these materials have prompted the fabrication of bio-inspired composites.
Among all methods available for the preparation of multifunctional nanostructured composite materials, Layerby-Layer (LbL) assembly, is currently one of the most simple and versatile nanofabrication method. Recently, we have assembled isotropic and anisotropic transparent wood-inspired nano-composite materials with mechanical properties challenging even medium quality steel (. The combination of LbL assembly with grazing incidence spraying (GIS)has permitted us to extend our approach toward the preparation of complex (e.g. helical) multilayer films in which the composition and orientation of anisotropic nano-objects like nanocelluloses can be controlled independently in each layer.
The goal of this internship is to study the preparation of nanocellulose-based composite materials using different deposition methods (dipping, spray-assisted, GIS, …) and various surface analysis techniques (ellipsometry, UVvis spectroscopy, …) and their optical and mechanical properties. The performance of these materials will be determined by advanced mechanical and optical characterization tools as a function of their composition and structure, the orientation of reinforcing agents, and the experimental conditions. This work will involve the PECMAT and MIM teams at Institut Charles Sadron (Strasbourg, France) and a collaboration with the CERMAV (Grenoble, France) and LCP-A2MC (Metz, France).