Studying Thin-Films: Do I Need Material Science Background?

[ahmedizeldin1981]

Do I need to have a solid background in Material Science if I would like to study thin-films?

 

[BvU]

Hello @ahmedizeldin1981 ,

$\qquad$ !​

Depends on the kind of thin film you are thinking of, and we have to guess at, apparently ...
Nice exercise in telepathy, but I failed

$\$

 

[sophiecentaur]

Do I need to have a solid background in Material Science if I would like to study thin-films?

You would need a pretty solid background in Science before you could be really sure you want to spend your life with Thin Films. Without a fair bit of knowledge of things in general, you could never be able to appreciate what that field would actually involve.
If you have been inside a Thin Films Lab and seen some interesting work going on then I can appreciate it would be an attractive idea. But there are thousands of labs all over the world doing stuff that's just as interesting - once you get down to it. So I think you should avoid getting too set on one direction of study until you have studied the whole field. That would avoid both possible disappointment and missing out on fascinating alternatives.

 

[Astronuc]

Do I need to have a solid background in Material Science if I would like to study thin-films?

Probably, yes, to some extent. One probably needs a good background in physics and chemistry (and math, of course). As sophiecentaur implied, one should have a diversified scientific (materials) background in order to ensure a continuing career (onging employment) in broader or related fields.

Consider what a thin film is and does.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin_film

A thin film is a layer of material ranging from fractions of a nanometer (monolayer) to several micrometers in thickness. The controlled synthesis of materials as thin films (a process referred to as deposition) is a fundamental step in many applications. A familiar example is the household mirror, which typically has a thin metal coating on the back of a sheet of glass to form a reflective interface. The process of silvering was once commonly used to produce mirrors, while more recently the metal layer is deposited using techniques such as sputtering. Advances in thin film deposition techniques during the 20th century have enabled a wide range of technological breakthroughs in areas such as magnetic recording media, electronic semiconductor devices, Integrated passive devices, LEDs, optical coatings (such as antireflective coatings), hard coatings on cutting tools, and for both energy generation (e.g. thin-film solar cells) and storage (thin-film batteries). It is also being applied to pharmaceuticals, via thin-film drug delivery. A stack of thin films is called a multilayer.

Optical or magnetic surfaces are one area of application. Wear/galling resistance is yet another area, and corrosion/chemical resistance, chemical reactivity (catalysis), heat transfer or heat resistance (insulation), and electrical conduction or resistance (electrical insulation) are still other areas of interest.

A thin film will have specific properties for specific uses, and one then applies a film to a substrate, which has its special properties and purpose. One has to tailor the thin film to an environment, so there must be resistance to film degradation. The thin film must be compatible with the underlying substrate.

In one example, an thin film may provide protection to the underlying substrate, and so the film and substrate must be chemically compatible over the range of operating/environmental conditions. One should try to match thermal expansion and mechanical strain capabilities over the range of operating temperatures. The protective film cannot crack, or if it does, it should be self-healing.

In developing a thin-film/substrate system, there are numerous bits of physics one must understand, or one must know someone(s) who understand certain bits of physics and how they are inter-related.

 

[f95toli]

"Thin films" is not really an area as such. There are undergraduate courses that might e.g. deal with how thin films grow when deposited using different methods and also some of the underlying thermodynamics and surface physics. However, once you start looking into the specifics of how they are used for different applications the areas quickly diverge.

Pretty much all modern electronics uses thin films meaning it is a huge area and the specifics are therefore usually "covered" by that specific field. Someone working on depositing anti-reflection coatings for photonics using CVD won';t necessarily have much in common with someone working with high-Tc superconducting devices; they would both the using a clean room and some of the same tools but that is about it.