News
CPI group seminar winter schedule
These are the CPI group seminars for the winter semester 2015/2016. We invite everyone who is interested to learn more about the latest and greatest of CPI research. This schedule may change at any time. So please check back frequently.
CPI group seminar sommer schedule
These are the CPI group seminars for the summer of 2015. We invite everyone who is interested to learn more about the latest and greatest of CPI research. This schedule may change at any time. So please check back frequently.
Postdoc position on surfaces for mechanostimulation
We are currently seeking applications for a postdoc position within a project on the mechanostimulation of stem cells.
CPI Spring School 2015
It was a bit optimistic to name a School in early March a Spring School but taking the risk actually payed off: The weather was largely marvellous and we could even enjoy some meals out on the balcony.
PhD fellowship available
We are seeking a PhD student for a project on the template-assisted moudling of polymers to generate unusual surface topologies for wetting studies.
Ke Li wrapped up PhD
Ke Li recently defended his PhD thesis on two different lubrication systems that both reached a ultralow friction coefficient following rather different mechanisms.
CPI group seminar schedule - fall 2014
It is time to announce the fall schedule of our CPI group seminar presentations. We invite everyone who is interested to learn more about the latest and greatest of CPI research. This schedule may change at any time. So please check back frequently.
Husemann Cup 2014 - CPI came in on second place
Two CPI teams participated at this year's Husemann Cup - a tournament founded by Prof. Dr. Elfriede Husemann, a former director of the Macromolecular Institute in Freiburg.
Macro 2014 - World Polymer Congress
The biennial IUPAC World Polymer Congress just took place in Chiang Mai, Thailand and brought together more than 1000 polymer scientists from around the world. Dr. Prucker gave a presentation on artificial cilia and Prof. Rühe delivered one of the six keynote lectures.
Thin hydrogel coatings are platelet repellent
Four groups have contributed to a project on hydrogel coatings as platelet repellent surfaces. This work has now been published by the ASAIO Journal.
Prof. Christopher K. Ober visiting CPI
From now until the end of May Prof. Christopher K. Ober is our guest at CPI. We work on a project co-sponsored by the NSF and the DFG which deals with nanostructured polymer brushes.
Grafting through: Mostly grafting to with a little extra spin
Polymers are made from monomers. If some of the monomers are attached to a surface these monomers may be incorporated during chain growth. This will tether this chain to the surface. The strategy is known for decades but the mechanism and the influence of selected reaction parameters remained less well understood. We found that the reaction has some rather interesting features. One of them can be summarized with five words: You know what you get.
CPI group seminar schedule - summer 2014
It is time to start the next round of CPI group seminar presentations. We invite everyone who is interested to learn more about the latest and greatest of CPI research. This schedule may change at any time. So please check back frequently.
Updates on our research projects
Research brings new results every day and new projects are started on a regular basis. The description of this progress on our webpage naturally lags behind a bit. Now it was time to catch up.
Surface attached polymer networks are hard to access
A new paper that was just published on the Macromolecules webpage describes Mónica Pérez-Perrino's and Rodrigo Navarro's work on the accessibility of surface attached polymer networks for other macromolecules.
Mechanically stable superhydrophobic surfaces
Langmuir just published an important aspect of Vitaliy Kondrashov's work on superhydrophobic surfaces. He combined two variants of the dry reactive ion etching (DRIE) process to generate surfaces with roughness features at two length scales. These features together with a fluoropolymer coating provide superhydrophobic surfaces that can take quite some shear load and still retain their wetting properties.
Jonas Groten defended thesis
It has already been a little while ago since Jonas Groten successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled "Light induced switching of wetting properties and mechanical stability of superhydrophobic surfaces".
Andreas Mader finished his PhD work
Recently, Andreas Mader wrapped his PhD work by defending his thesis on a biochip topic.
Artificial cilia and 2 Photon Crosslinking