preface - UHasselt

Welcome to the website of IMO-IMOMEC

IMO is the Institute for Materials Research of Hasselt University, located at the university campus in Diepenbeek (Province of Limburg, Flanders, Belgium).

The core competence of IMO is the development and characterization of new material systems with potential use in microelectronics, bioelectronics and nanotechnology. In the core competence field, fundamental as well as applied research programs are carried out.

There is a very close collaboration with IMEC (Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre, Louvain) which local division IMOMEC is housed within the premises of IMO. The largest part of the fundamental research in the core competence field is performed by IMO, while the majority of the applied research programs in collaboration with industrial partners is performed by IMOMEC.

There are about 110 people working at IMO-IMOMEC. About 50 students are preparing their PhD, The team is strongly interdisciplinary (chemists, physicists, engineers, biomedical researchers,...). About 70 % of the research funding at IMO-IMOMEC comes from applied research projects, mainly in collaboration with industrial partners, and 30 % from funding for fundamental research by the Flemish government and the university.

Research activities are focussed on the following main research fields :

• Plastic electronics including synthesis of multifunctional, conjugated polymers (Photovoltaics, LEDS, transistors, biosensors...)
• Molecular electronics and Biosensors (in close collaboration with the biomedical research institute (BIOMED) of Hasselt University and with research groups of the University of Maastricht (UM).
• Wide band gap materials. (CVD diamond, BN, …) for optical, electronic and bioelectronic applications.
• Chemical, water based precursors for nanocrystalline films for electronic applications (SBT, PZT, BLT,...) and for nanopowders (e.g.ZnO)
  Reliability aspects of material systems used in electronics, with emphasis on high temperature electronic materials and III-V materials
• Nanophysics
• Chemical and physical characterisation

More information about our research activities can be found on this website.

Prof. dr. Dirk Vanderzande
Director IMO-IMOMEC