TY - CONF A1 - Witt, Julia T1 - Exploring innovative Materials and in situ techniques N2 - Presentation of some projects conducted in recent years related to corrosion studies and research on electrocatalysis. The talk was part of a seminar at the University of Toronto and took place within the framework of a scientific exchange stay. T2 - Seminar at the University of Toronto CY - Toronto, Canada DA - 11.10.2023 KW - Multi-principal element alloys (MPEAs) KW - Electrocatalysis KW - Corrosion KW - Materials acceleration platforms (MAPs) PY - 2023 AN - OPUS4-59029 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Abed, Jehad A1 - Bai, Yanh A1 - Persaud, Daniel A1 - Kim, Jiheon A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Hattrick.Simpers, Jason A1 - Sargent, Edward T1 - AMPERE: automated modular platform for expedited and reproducible electrochemical testing N2 - Rapid and reliable electrochemical screening is critical to accelerate the development of catalysts for sustainable energy generation and storage. This paper introduces an automated and modular platform for expedited and reproducible electrochemical testing (AMPERE), designed to enhance the efficiency and reliability of multivariate optimization. The platform integrates a liquid-handling robot with custommade modular array reactors, offering sample preparation and electrochemical testing in the same platform. Additionally, we use offline inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICPOES) to measure metal concentrations in the electrolyte after the reaction, which serves as a proxy for assessing the electrochemical stability. We use the platform to conduct 168 experiments continuously in less than 40 hours to examine the influence of catalyst ink formulation on the performance of Ir, Ru, IrO2, and RuO2 for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) in acid. We specifically investigate the role of solvent type and concentration, catalyst concentration, and binder content on the performance. We find that Ru/RuO2 catalysts show improvements in activity that are not directly linked to improvements in the electrochemical surface area or inversely correlated to Ru dissolution. This suggests a complex interplay between the catalytic performance of the drop-casted catalyst film and ink formulation. AMPERE simplifies catalyst preparation and testing at large scale, making it faster, more reliable, and accessible for widespread use. KW - Electrochemical screening KW - Automated platform KW - Catalysis KW - Energy generation and storage KW - Oxygen evolution reaction (OER) KW - MAPz@BAM PY - 2024 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-614724 DO - https://doi.org/10.1039/d4dd00203b SP - 1 EP - 10 PB - Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) AN - OPUS4-61472 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Witt, Julia T1 - In situ Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) studies of corrosion processes on thin film coated AA2024-T3 aluminium alloy surfaces N2 - The performance of functional coatings relies strongly on the stability of the polymer-metal interface. The increasing utilization of multi-material structures in the automotive and aerospace industry necessitates a fundamental understanding of the processes leading to interface degradation for the development of novel strategies to increase corrosion and delamination resistance. The aim of this project is to investigate the corrosion processes at the buried interface of thin film coated aluminium alloy AA2024-T3 under corrosive and coupled corrosive-mechanical load. A spin coating procedure was developed to synthesize epoxy-like coatings and their nanofiller loaded composites with controlled thickness by layer-by-layer deposition of poly[(o-cresyl glycidyl ether)-co-formaldehyde] and poly-(ethylenimine) bi-layers. Our results indicate that the incorporation of graphene into the epoxy-based coatings leads to the improvement of mechanical and barrier properties. Furthermore, the functional groups play important roles in the interfacial bonding between polymer matrix and the nanofillers. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) results indicate very homogeneous and dense films with a thickness of ~25 nm per bi-layer and the successful integration of the nanofillers into the composite coatings. Ellipsometry measurements of film thickness verified a proportional film growth with the number of deposited layers. The degradation and delamination behavior of the coating systems was characterized by means of in situ AFM corrosion experiments. Complementary energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) analysis was used to correlate the corrosion and delamination behavior with the different intermetallic particle chemistries and distributions. The presentation will summarize our results on the effect of coating composition and build-up on the local corrosion processes on thin film covered AA2024-T3 aluminium alloys. T2 - Eurocorr 2021 CY - Online meeting DA - 20.09.2021 KW - In situ AFM KW - Corrosion KW - Thin epoxy-based films PY - 2021 AN - OPUS4-54053 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Esmann, M. A1 - Chimeh, A. A1 - Korte, A. A1 - Zhong, J. A1 - Stephan, S. A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Wittstock, G. A1 - Talebi, N. A1 - Lienau, C. T1 - Plasmonic nanofocusing spectral interferometry N2 - We describe and demonstrate a novel experimental approach to measure broadband, amplitude- and phase-resolved scattering spectra of single nanoparticles with 10-nm spatial resolution. Nanofocusing of Surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) propagating along the shaft of a conical gold taper is used to create a spatially isolated, spectrally broad nanoscale light source at ist very apex. The interference between these incident SPPs and SPPs that are backpropagating from the apex leads to the formation of an inherently phase-stable interferogram, which we detect in the far field by partially scattering SPPs off a small protrusion on the taper shaft. We show that these interferograms allow the reconstruction of both the amplitude and phase of the local optical near fields around individual nanoparticles optically coupled to the taper apex. We extract local light scattering spectra of particles and quantify line broadenings and spectral shifts induced by tip-sample coupling. Our experimental findings are supported by corresponding finite-difference time-domain and coupled dipole simulations and Show that, in the limit of weak tip-sample coupling, the measurements directly probe the projected local density of optical states of the plasmonic system. The combination of a highly stable inline interferometer with the inherent optical background suppression through nanofocusing makes it a promising tool for the locally resolved study of the spectral and temporal optical response of coupled hybrid nanosystems. KW - Plasmonic nanofocusing KW - Near-field spectroscopy PY - 2020 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-504985 DO - https://doi.org/10.1515/nanoph-2019-0397 VL - 9 IS - 2 SP - 491 EP - 508 PB - De Gruyter AN - OPUS4-50498 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Zhang, Runze A1 - Sur, Debashish A1 - Li, Kangming A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Black, Robert A1 - Whittingham, Alexander A1 - Scully, John R. A1 - Hattrick-Simpers, Jason T1 - Bayesian assessment of commonly used equivalent circuit models for corrosion analysis in electrochemical impedance spectroscopy N2 - Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) is a crucial technique for assessing corrosion of metallic materials. The analysis of EIS hinges on the selection of an appropriate equivalent circuit model (ECM) that accurately characterizes the system under study. In this work, we systematically examined the applicability of three commonly used ECMs across several typical material degradation scenarios. By applying Bayesian Inference to simulated corrosion EIS data, we assessed the suitability of these ECMs under different corrosion conditions and identified regions where the EIS data lacks sufficient information to statistically substantiate the ECM structure. Additionally, we posit that the traditional approach to EIS analysis, which often requires measurements to very low frequencies, might not be always necessary to correctly model the appropriate ECM. Our study assesses the impact of omitting data from low to medium-frequency ranges on inference results and reveals that a significant portion of low-frequency measurements can be excluded without substantially compromising the accuracy of extracting system parameters. Further, we propose simple checks to the posterior distributions of the ECM components and posterior predictions, which can be used to quantitatively evaluate the suitability of a particular ECM and the minimum frequency required to be measured. This framework points to a pathway for expediting EIS acquisition by intelligently reducing low-frequency data collection and permitting on-the-fly EIS measurements. KW - Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) KW - MAPz@BAM KW - Bayesian Inference KW - Corrosion PY - 2024 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-623392 DO - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41529-024-00537-8 VL - 8 SP - 120 PB - Springer Materials AN - OPUS4-62339 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Wetzel, Annica A1 - Hans, Ann-Kathrin A1 - von der Au, Marcus A1 - Brand, Izabella A1 - Wittstock, Gunther A1 - Özcan Sandikcioglu, Özlem A1 - Witt, Julia T1 - Long-term corrosion studies of CrCoNi and CrMnFeCoNi in sulfuric acid N2 - This study investigates the long-term corrosion behavior of CrCoNi and CrMnFeCoNi MPEAs over 28 d in 1 M H2SO4. Corrosion progression and passive film evolution were analyzed using open circuit potential measurements, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy. Unlike short-term polarization tests, where CrCoNi exhibited intergranular corrosion, long-term immersion resulted in a stable, Cr-rich passive oxide layer. In contrast, CrMnFeCoNi formed a porous mixed oxide layer, increasing its susceptibility to degradation and revealing a distinct corrosion mechanism. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy tracking at weekly intervals showed that prolonged immersion led to the transformation of sulfide/sulfite species into a sulfate-containing surface film. This effect was only detectable in long-term corrosion studies. These findings provide new insights into the time-dependent degradation mechanisms of MPEAs and demonstrate that corrosion mechanisms differ significantly from short-term polarization tests. This highlights the need for long-term studies to properly assess material stability in practical applications. KW - Long-term corrosion KW - Multi-principal element alloys (MPEAs) KW - X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) PY - 2025 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-636895 DO - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41529-025-00637-z SN - 2397-2106 VL - 9 IS - 1 SP - 1 EP - 13 PB - Springer Science and Business Media LLC AN - OPUS4-63689 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Sobetkii, Arcadii A1 - Mosinoiu, Laurentiu-Florin A1 - Caramarin, Stefania A1 - Mitrica, Dumitru A1 - Cursaru, Laura-Madalina A1 - Matei, Alexandru-Cristian A1 - Tudor, Ioan-Albert A1 - Serban, Beatrice-Adriana A1 - Ghita, Mihai A1 - Vitan, Nicoleta A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Özcan Sandikcioglu, Özlem A1 - Postolnyi, Bogdan A1 - Pogrebnjak, Alexander T1 - Deposition and Characterization of Cu-Enhanced High-Entropy Alloy Coatings via DC Magnetron Sputtering N2 - Protection against microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC) is critical for materials used in aquatic environments, as MIC accelerates material degradation and leads to faster structural failure. Copper (Cu) has the potential to substantially improve the MIC resistance in alloys. In this study, high-entropy alloy (HEA) coatings containing Cu were deposited using DC (Direct Current) magnetron sputtering to enhance the corrosion resistance and mechanical properties of various substrates. Two CuCrFeMnNi HEA compositions in the form of bulk alloys and PVD (Physical Vapor Deposition) coatings, with 5% and 10% Cu, were analyzed for their microstructural, mechanical, and anticorrosive characteristics. Deposition parameters were varied to select the optimal values. Microstructural evaluations using SEM-EDS (scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy), XRD (X-ray diffraction), and AFM (atomic force microscopy) revealed uniform, dense coatings with good adhesion composed of dendritic and interdendritic BCC (body-centered cubic) and FCC (face centered cubic) structures, respectively. Microhardness tests indicated improved mechanical properties for the samples coated with developed HEAs. The coatings exhibited improved corrosion resistance in NaCl solution, the 10% Cu composition displaying the highest polarization resistance and lowest corrosion rate. These findings suggest that Cu-containing HEA coatings are promising candidates for applications requiring enhanced corrosion protection. KW - High-entropy alloys (HEAs) KW - DC magnetron sputtering KW - Cu-enhanced coatings KW - Corrosion resistance KW - Microstructural characterization PY - 2025 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-625561 DO - https://doi.org/10.3390/app15041917 SN - 2076-3417 VL - 15 IS - 4 SP - 1 EP - 14 PB - MDPI AN - OPUS4-62556 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Czerski, Jakub A1 - Mitoraj-Krolikowska, Marzena A1 - Godlewska, Elzbieta A1 - Wetzel, Annica A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Özcan Sandikcioglu, Özlem A1 - Marzec, Mateusz A1 - Goly, Marcin T1 - Corrosion and passivation of AlCrFe2Ni2Mox high-entropy alloys in sulphuric acid N2 - Corrosion behaviour of AlCrFe2Ni2Mox (x = 0.0, 0.1, 0.15, 0.3 and 0.6) high-entropy alloys was investigated in a 0.1 M H2SO4 solution. Passive films formed upon anodic polarisation, built of Al-based inner layer and (Cr, Fe, Mo)-based outer layer, had good protective properties. In particular, they prevented corrosion of the (Al, Ni)-rich BCC-B2 phase, which was observed under open-circuit conditions. Moderate amounts of Mo, up to x = 0.3, positively affected the passivation ability of AlCrFe2Ni2. Significant changes in microstructure and phase composition of the alloy at higher Mo concentrations (x = 0.6) resulted in deterioration of its corrosion resistance. KW - EIS KW - Alloy KW - Sulphuric acid KW - AFM KW - Acid corrosion KW - Passive films PY - 2024 DO - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2024.111855 SN - 0010-938X VL - 229 SP - 1 EP - 17 PB - Elsevier Ltd. AN - OPUS4-59703 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hattrick-Simpers, J. A1 - Li, K. A1 - Greenwood, M. A1 - Black, R. A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Kozdras, M. A1 - Pang, X. A1 - Özcan Sandikcioglu, Özlem T1 - Designing durable, sustainable, high-performance materials for clean energy infrastructure N2 - Civilization and modern societies would not be possible without manmade materials. Considering their production volumes, their supporting role in nearly all industrial processes, and the impact of their sourcing and production on the environment, metals and alloys are and will be of prominent importance for the clean energy transition. The focus of materials discovery must move to more specialized, application-tailored green alloys that outperform the legacy materials not only in performance but also in sustainability and resource efficiency. This white paper summarizes a joint Canadian-German initiative aimed at developing a materials acceleration platform (MAP) focusing on the discovery of new alloy families that will address this challenge. We call our initiative the “Build to Last Materials Acceleration Platform” (B2L-MAP) and present in this perspective our concept of a three-tiered self-driving laboratory that is composed of a simulation-aided pre-selection module (B2L-select), an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven experimental lead generator (B2L-explore), and an upscaling module for durability assessment (B2L-assess). The resulting tool will be used to identify and subsequently demonstrate novel corrosion-resistant alloys at scale for three key applications of critical importance to an offshore, wind-driven hydrogen plant (reusable electrical contacts, offshore infrastructure, and oxygen evolution reaction catalysts). KW - Material Acceleration Platforms (MAPs) KW - Self-driving-labs (SDLs) KW - Automation KW - Artificial Intelligence (AI) KW - Elektrolyse KW - Structural Materials KW - Corrosion PY - 2022 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-568452 DO - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xcrp.2022.101200 SN - 2666-3864 VL - 4 IS - 1 SP - 1 EP - 11 PB - Cell Press ; Elsevier CY - Maryland Heights, MO AN - OPUS4-56845 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Pomorska Gawel, A. A1 - Dąbkowska, M. A1 - Kosior, D. A1 - Batys, P. A1 - Szatanik, A. A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Özcan Sandikcioglu, Özlem A1 - Michna, A. T1 - Multiscale insights into fibroblast growth factor 23 adsorption on polyelectrolyte layers: From molecular properties to biointerfaces N2 - Fibroblast growth factor 23 (FGF23) is a clinically significant protein hormone regulating phosphate and vitamin D metabolism, with elevated levels linked to chronic kidney disease, cardiovascular disorders, and impaired bone homeostasis. Despite its relevance as both a biomarker and a therapeutic target, its interactions with functional biomaterials remain poorly understood. In this work, we investigate the FGF23 adsorption on polyelectrolyte layers using a combination of theoretical modeling and experimental methods. Theoretical calculations provided insights into the protein's charge distribution and diffusion properties, while experimental measurements quantified its hydrodynamic diameter, electrophoretic mobility, and electrokinetic charge over a broad range of pH values. Microscale thermophoresis revealed quantitative binding affinities of FGF23 to hyaluronic acid, chitosan, and poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride). Adsorption studies on mica, silica, and polyelectrolyte mono- and bilayers showed that FGF23 binds to both negatively and positively charged substrates, with binding affinities following: hyaluronic acid < poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) < chitosan. Desorption occurred more readily from negatively charged surfaces (mica, silica and hyaluronic acid), indicating weaker interactions compared to positively charged layers. These results reveal fundamental aspects of protein –polyelectrolyte interactions and highlight the reversible binding capacity of FGF23 to negatively charged surfaces. Such adsorption behavior provides a physicochemical framework for considering FGF23-polyelectrolyte systems in the design of therapeutic carriers and bioactive materials. However, any direct relevance to wound healing, chronic kidney disease, or cardiovascular disorders remains prospective and requires dedicated biological validation. KW - Molecular dynamics KW - Streaming potential measurements KW - Adsorption KW - Stability KW - Binding affinity PY - 2026 DO - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2026.150221 SN - 0141-8130 VL - 341 IS - Part 1 SP - 1 EP - 14 PB - Elsevier B.V. AN - OPUS4-65415 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -