Travelogue Australia
The flight to Melbourne is almost the famous trip to the other side of the world. Only New Zealand would make this statement a bit better for us Germans. Nevertheless such a flight can hardly be done on one and there are accordingly different flight routes. The two most famous tours go either over the Emirates or over India and South East Asia. The flight over India and Southeast Asia has the disadvantage that you have to change planes in Delhi and Singapore. So once again more than over the Emirates. An advantage might be that you can see more of the world if you have a window seat. Because after the Emirates there is only the wonderful blue water of the Indian Ocean until Australia.
My two-month stay in Melbourne was funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and was created by the collaboration of the two research groups of Prof. Dr. Markus Lippitz at the chat Experimental Physic 3 (EP3) of the University Bayreuth and Dr. Daniel Gomez from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO). Even before my departure, I had contact with my new colleagues in Australia, as in the course of joint replacement also a student was sent to Bayreuth.
CSIRO is a public authority in Australia for Scientific and Industrial Research, established inter alia, in Clayton, Melbourne. There I was hired as a visiting student and spent much of my time in the department manufacturing and in the research organization "Melbourne Center for Nanofabrication" (MCN), also in Clayton. Clayton is a suburb of Melbourne and is located southeast of the central business district (CBD). A graduate student of this group, Stuart, previously worked as a guest PhD at the Department EP3 in Bayreuth for less than two months in fall, 2014. I could ask him for advice and help in Melbourne anytime. Together with Daniel, he helped in the planning and organization to teach me the basic skills for the production of nanoscale semiconductor samples on coverslips.
After I decided to write my Master's thesis in the research group of Prof. Lippitz, the preparations for my abroad stay advanced rapidly. At the chair I had to fill in a travel application. The funding was provided in two packages in this case. A package was provided for the airfare, the other package for housing and maintenance costs. The application for the receipt of the funds was provided by Prof. Lippitz because even before my flight to Australia the idea of a collaboration between the Australian Group and Prof. Lippitz. The other preparations existed for me in it to measure the samples together with Stuart, applying for a passport and a visa, and reserving a flight.
I spent the first two nights in a hostel in CBD of Melbourne. I used the time to seek myself a shared apartment near Clayton. Alternatively my host group could have organized a room for me in a student apartment at the Monash University in Clayton. However, I decided for a WG before my departure because I wanted to get to know the Australian mentality. This was not hard and within 24 hours I had already found an accommodation close to Clayton, in Mount Waverley. The four other roommates were always very friendly, frank and helpful. Thus, I have felt very comfortable. Through my roommates, I also got to know many more new people very quickly. Not only from Melbourne and the State of Victoria, but also from the other states of Australia such as Tasmania, Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia and even from New Zealand. The cost of living is very high in Melbourne CBD in comparison to Germany. Fortunately Clayton is slightly away from the CBD. Nevertheless, I had to pay for the room in the shared apartment 1000 A$ (1€ ≈ 1.5 A$) per month. Unlike in Germany, in Australia there are in general no canteen at the universities, but many mini restaurants. Whether a Sandwich, Schnitzel, exotic Asian food or just a tasty coffee, for every taste is catered for. However, you already pay 10 A$. I therefore quickly switched to self supply and brought my own food to work. Even more expensive than the food is the beer in Australia. Also, 10 A$ for a 0.365 l small beer in the pub are quite normal.
The reason for the collaboration between CSIRO and MCN is that the MCN is a user facility in which you have to pay for your stay time. These costs were deducted from my working group on CSIRO. In addition, the work with nanocrystals (NCs) was done at CSIRO. Be it the processing clumped NCs, experiments with different NC concentrations up to drop casting the NC to the 2-step electron beam lithography (EBL) samples. The MCN, however, was not equipped safety-related good enough for handling such materials. On the other hand, the MCN consisted of a lounge, a workstation area for the user, a wet lab and two huge cleanrooms of class 10000 and 100. These two chambers were necessary in order not to contaminate the photosensitive nanostructures with dust or other microparticles. In the new work group I was welcomed friendly and warm from the beginning, which allowed me a very quick entry. The aim of my visit was to learn the most important steps for producing metal-nanocrystal samples. The nanocrystals are composed of semiconductor materials such as e.g. GaAs or CdSe. The NCs that I use in this case consist of a core-shell structure. First, the cover glasses need to be cleaned and then covered with a uniform layer of PMMA in the spincoater. Then the cover slips are vaporized with a 10 nm thick layer of Chrome and the first step of the EBL can begin. First, a certain pattern on the computer is created and passed to the EBL machine. By bombardment with electrons on the chromium layer, the electrons are decelerated to react with the PMMA and increase its solubility.
With the help of chromium etch and developer one removes both the chromium layer and the bombarded PMMA. The metal evaporator steams a noble metal such as gold or silver on to the "holey" PMMA layer. Finally, the remaining PMMA is completely removed by a combination of acetone and isopropanol (liftoff). Excessive metal is also removed and only metal, which had contact with the cover glass, sticks to it. In order to bring the NCs in the vicinity of the metal, the processes of PMMA spin coating and chrome vapor deposition are repeated. The greatest difficulty in the EBL now is to regain the markers created in the first EBL passage and align the sample to it. Thereafter, the next sample can be lithographed. Chromium etch and developers finish the procedure of the two-step EBL. Through techniques such as spin coating and drop casting the NCs are now applied to the coverslip. Excess NCs remain on the PMMA hang and be removed by the renewed liftoff. The computer written models are just a few nanometers in size, and the vapor deposition is precise to at least ± 1 Å occurs exactly or NCs only 8 nm in size in diameter, one obtains very precise nanostructures. Due to the given geometry between ferrous and nanocrystals a surface plasmon resonance is generated upon irradiation with light. According to theory, this means that all NC dipoles align along an axis. Instead of spontaneously emitted light in the process of photoluminescence, photons are now emitted almost simultaneously in a very short time interval, which is known as s "superemitter".
In my time after work I tried to visit as much as possible from Melbourne and it is definitely not going to be boring! Already from Germany I searched for the biggest local attractions such as Eureka Skytower, Melbourne IceBar, Queens Market, Melbourne Jail Ghost Story, Maru Koala Park, Great Ocean Road, Luna Park and much, much more. The city here lives from its diversity and the many cultural influences. While the surfer culture has a strong presence on the beaches, it is in the city center, the hectic activity, punctuated by the little hidden bars, restaurants and pubs. It's worth it just once spontaneously to look into a side street, only perhaps to find the tastiest restaurant for Dumplings throughout Chinatown or the best coffee in town. On weekends one can optimize the personal complexion by sunbathing on the beach in St. Kilda. At night you can celebrate in the numerous pubs, bars, discos and casinos until dawn, from 23 h on unfortunately only indoors, but no less boozy. Especially on Fridays it pulls the Melbourne directly after work in the pub to drink a few beers with colleagues in suits.
An interesting selling point it is to be a German in Australia. Firstly find most Australians the German accent funny - interesting, on the other hand, most Australians have a very positive picture of Germany or they've also stayed here (about 90 % of those who went to Germany have visited the cities of Berlin and Munich). The usual phrase "How's going?" can be heard from colleagues to the cashier at the grocery store, should actually be perceived to start a smalltalk. Now and then, the Aussis (that's how the Australians call themselves; also see the Australia day shout "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi") know a few German words and are looking forward immensely to announce this to the best (also if it's just 50% bad words). Following my two-month research period, I have attached two weeks vacation. From my friends newfound I was unceremoniously invited to Christmas. This takes place traditionally at the beach with a BBQ at 30°C. Another highlight was New Year's Eve in Sydney watching the fireworks at Opera House in Sydney Harbour and greet with my friends and millions more in the New Year.
This stay abroad has exceeded all my expectations and enriched my life! On the part of my research, I was very well looked after with advice, tips and tricks for sample preparation and scientific publications of other research groups to my project. Due to the fact that I had to make myself understood every day with work colleagues, friends or tenants, I could significantly improve my English. Even after my return to Germany I'm in almost every day in contact with my friends in Down Under via email or Skype. For my further work in Bayreuth I brought along some new samples which will be to measured soon. Moreover, new samples with a different geometries will be prepared to discover the secrets of the super emitters.
