On August 20th, 2019, Jean-Michel Romano successfully defended his PhD thesis, titled “Laser-based manufacturing routes for functionalizing surfaces” and was awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.
The work was carried out at the University of Birmingham (UK) under the supervision of Prof. Stefan Dimov. The now Dr. Jean-Michel Romano, was an Early Stage Researcher (ESR) of the Laser4Fun project. The examination board was composed by Prof. Lin Li, Director of Laser Processing Research Centre at the University of Manchester and Dr. Nan Gao, Lecturer of Bio-medical Engineering at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Birmingham.
We congratulate Jean-Michel with this achievement!
Summary PhD thesis
Robust functional surfaces are of a growing industrial interest for a range of optical, easy-to-clean, anti-icing and non-fouling applications. At the same time, nature is a great source of inspiration for micro/nano-scale surface structures with tailored functional properties. There are a number of competing technologies for producing such structures but ultrashort laser processing is emerging as one of the most promising for fabricating bio-inspired surfaces. However, the technology has limitations and its capabilities have to be augmented to achieve the required high-throughput in manufacturing products that incorporate functional surface topographies. Therefore, this research investigates a promising process chain that combines synergistically the capabilities of laser texturing with complementary surface engineering and replication technologies. Several large-area laser texturing techniques are investigated, namely Direct Laser Writing (DLW), Laser-Induced Periodic Surface Structures (LIPSS) and microlenses-induced Photonic Jet (PJ) texturing. The research advances the knowledge in laser-based surface functionalization and also in factors affecting the functional response and durability of laser structured surfaces.
Link
https://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/9740/1/Romano2019PhD.pdf