Mikhail Krishtab joins the force!

Mikhail Krishtab is a new member joining our group as a postdoc researcher. During his Master and PhD research, Mikhail was exploring various classes of porous materials for their application as low-k dielectrics in on-chip interconnects. His research involved evaluation of mechanical, electrical, chemical, optical and structural properties of thin porous films as well as of their compatibility with integration processes, mainly plasma etching. Supervised by Prof. Mikhail Baklanov and Prof. Stefan De Gendt, Mikhail Krishtab developed a new approach for damage-free integration of self-assembly based mesoporous organosilica coatings. His activities and interests span over wide range of microfabrication processes and thin film characterization techniques among which ellipsometric porosimetry takes the central place. As the class of metal-organic frameworks became an appealing candidate for replacement of silica-based low-k dielectrics, Mikhail's research touched on evaluation of dielectric properties of various MOF films prepared by liquid phase epitaxy (in collaboration with the group of Prof. Woell) and by solvent-free metal/metal oxide conversion (in collaboration with the group of Prof. Ameloot). In our group, Mikhail will investigate the impact of surface pattern and its functionality on nucleation and crystallization of CVD MOFs targeting applications in nanoelectronics devices.