Harvey Mackenzie

Topic

π-Conjugated and inorganic materials for bottom-up self-assembly and top-down lithographic fabrication of nanostructures

Department of Chemistry

Date & location

• Thursday, August 14, 2025
• 12:00 P.M.
• Elliott Building, Room 230

Examining Committee

Supervisory Committee

• Dr. Ian Manners (deceased), Department of Chemistry, University of Victoria (Supervisor)
• Dr. Alexandre Brolo, Department of Chemistry, UVic (Supervisor)
• Dr. Etienne LaPierre, Department of Chemistry, UVic (Co-Supervisor)
• Dr. Makhsud Saidaminov, Department of Chemistry, UVic (Member)
• Dr. Rogério de Sousa, Department of Physics and Astronomy, UVic (Outside Member)

External Examiner

• Dr. Michael Wolf, Department of Chemistry, University of British Columbia

Chair of Oral Examination

• Dr. Stephanie Willerth, Department of Mechanical Engineering, UVic

Abstract

Nanostructured materials have emerged as critical components in every day applications ranging from microchips in electronic devices to lipid nanoparticles in the recent COVID-19 mRNA vaccines. A key challenge in nanoscience is the ability to generate low dispersity nanostructures of controlled length, morphology with tunable chemistries and functionalities, since these parameters influence their resulting properties. To address the needs of next-generation technology and applications, accessing nanostructures reproducibly and reliably is of critical importance. This thesis explores the development of new fabrications techniques and materials to address the challenges associated with producing well-controlled nanomaterials of various morphologies and compositions using either bottom-up self-assembly approaches or top-down photolithography.

Chapter 1 provides an introduction into polymer self-assembly, living crystallization-driven self-assembly (CDSA) and its emerging applications as well as an introduction and overview for state-of-the-art photolithographic techniques and current technologies. Chapter 2 describes the development of a new approach to generate π-conjugated non-centrosymmetric 1-dimensional (1D) polymer nanofibers using selective fragmentation and explores their use as chemically-driven nanomotors. Chapter 3 explores the synthesis and self-assembly of complex and hierarchical π-conjugated that combine 1D and 2D morphologies to produce scarf-like micelles with tunable structures that exhibit energy funneling and light harvesting properties. Chapter 4 explores the first use of a bismuth oxide cluster as an EUV photoresist material and represents a new sub-class of inorganic resist material that lays the groundwork for further development of bismuth cluster photoresists. Chapter 6 concludes with potential future directions for each project and provides an overall summary and outlook for this work.