Maarten de Boer

About

Maarten de Boer has been a faculty member at Carnegie Mellon University since 2010, serving in the Department of Mechanical Engineering with a courtesy appointment in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. His background includes employment as an integrated circuit process engineer at Hewlett-Packard from 1983 to 1991 and as a principal member of technical staff at Sandia National Labs from 1996 to 2010. He earned his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Minnesota in 1996. His research group explores the processing and nanomechanical behavior of new materials, focusing on the design, fabrication, testing, and characterization of micromachined test platforms to study the interplay between processing, environment, and properties such as strength, fracture, fatigue, creep, residual stress, adhesion, and friction. His work is funded by agencies including the Department of Energy, NSF, NASA, and the Army Research Laboratory. De Boer has published extensively, with over 90 peer-reviewed journal articles, an h-index above 30, and holds seven US patents. His teaching spans courses in mechanical behavior, solid mechanics, materials selection, microelectromechanical systems, thermodynamics, dynamics, and electronics.

Research topics

• Materials science
• Composite material
• Metallurgy
• Optoelectronics
• Nanotechnology
• Electrical engineering

Selected publications

• Demonstration of tantalum as a structural material for MEMS thermal actuators

  Microsystems & Nanoengineering · 2021 · 25 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  -Ta reported in the technical literature. Residual stress sensitivities to sputter parameters and to hydrogen incorporation are investigated and controlled. Subsequently, a V-shaped TA is fabricated and tested in air. Both conventional actuation by Joule heating and passive self-actuation are as predicted by models.

  DOI

• Experimental insights into adhesion and friction between nominally dry rough surfaces

  MRS Bulletin · 2022-12-01 · 17 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Adhesion and friction between solids in ambient air control applications such as precision positioning and traction of tires. For all practical surfaces, the interfaces between solids are rough. Contact occurs at nano- or micro-contact junctions and the contact area of these junctions changes upon normal or shear loading and during sliding. The multiscale roughness, material parameters such as interfacial bonding, mechanical properties, sliding velocity, and normal load all contribute t…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Self-Actuating Isothermal Nanomechanical Test Platform for Tensile Creep Measurement of Freestanding Thin Films

  Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems · 2021-12-06 · 15 citations

  articleSenior author

  Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) enable potent methods for nanomechanical testing. In many MEMS-based test platforms, high force polycrystalline silicon chevron-type thermal actuators are used as on chip actuators. Here, we implement thermal actuators using the refractory metal tantalum (Ta) as a new micromachined structural material in such a way that it can be integrated to test mechanical properties of a wide variety of metals. Because Ta’s coefficient of thermal expansion is more…

  PublisherDOI

• Phase Change Nanoelectromechanical Relay for Nonvolatile Low Leakage Switching

  Advanced Electronic Materials · 2022 · 12 citations

  Abstract The design, modeling, and experimental validation of a highly scalable phase change electromechanical relay are present. The Phase Change NEMS Relay (PCNR) is a nonvolatile mechanical relay actuated by the volumetric expansion of phase change material. GeTe is used as the active phase change material, and nonvolatile relay states are changed by converting it between amorphous and crystalline phases, which differ in volume by 10%. Phase conversion is induced by Joule heating an adjacent…

  PublisherDOI

• Creep of a thermally stable nanocrystalline nickel tungsten alloy as measured by high temperature nanoindentation

  Materials Science and Engineering A · 2020 · 12 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  The creep behavior of pure nanocrystalline (nc) fcc metals has not been studied above 200 °C because the nanoscale grains tend to grow at temperatures moderately above ambient. In this work, we study the creep of nanocrystalline Ni–W (nc Ni–W) up to 450 °C, near its thermal stability limit. A nanoindenter with the capability to heat both the specimen and the indenter tip addresses the issue of heat flow and provides more accurate test temperatures when compared to heating only the specimen. Cree…

  DOI

Recent grants

• Achieving Theoretical Property Limits in Polymer Nanofibers: Stiffness, Strength and Thermal Conductivity

  NSF · $411k · 2013–2017

• LEAP-HI: Ultra-Low Power Computing: A Disruptive Approach Through a New Integrated Nanomechanics Framework

  NSF · $2.0M · 2019–2024

• Collaborative Research: Stick-slip Dynamics of Micromachined Interfaces

  NSF · $381k · 2010–2014

Frequent coauthors

• Soichiro Tsuda

  252 shared

• Ryan M. Pocratsky

  Carnegie Mellon University

  140 shared

• Murat Okandan

  134 shared

• Tad S. Whiteside

  Savannah River National Laboratory

  133 shared

• Luigi Preziosi

  133 shared

• Masayoshi Esashi

  133 shared

• Paolo Allia

  Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca Metrologica

  133 shared

• Jit Muthuswamy

  Arizona State University

  133 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Materials Science and Engineering

  University of Minnesota

  1996

• M.S., Electrical Engineering

  University of Colorado, Boulder

  1982

• B.S., Electrical Engineering

  Cornell University

  1981

Awards & honors

• Manufacturing Futures Initiative (MFI) award

Similar researchers at Carnegie Mellon University

• Alan McGaugheyh-53
• Philip LeDuch-50
• Jack Beuthh-41