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"As a designer in the AFM field, I truly appreciate the ingenious design of this bench top platform..."
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Newsletter Sep 2026 | Menu of Newsletters

VOx-Vanadium Oxide Thin Films Critical for Microbolometric Device Performance

The Nanomaterials Lab at the University of North Texas – a research group which strives to better understand the unique properties of nanoscale materials – has been experimenting with annealing driven phase changes in vanadium oxide thin films and their impact on bolometric characteristics. The lab’s recent research, assisted by Negative-Stiffness vibration isolation, demonstrate that stress relaxation, crystallite formation, changes in resistivity and noise, which influence the film’s electrical properties, are governed by specific annealing conditions. Vanadium oxide thin films are critical nanomaterials necessary for uncooled microbolometers used in applications including military, aerospace, gas analysis, security systems and medical imaging.

Bolometric sensors are widely used in devices that detect heat or electromagnetic radiation by measuring temperature-induced changes in electrical resistance. Bolometers are primarily categorized by their sensing materials, operating temperatures, and the physical mechanisms they use to detect thermal energy, with two categories being prevalent in use:

a) Cooled bolometers which operate at cryogenic temperatures (e.g. liquid helium ~4.2 K or liquid nitrogen ~77 K), to achieve high sensitivity and low noise. They are essential for astronomical observations and high-end scientific experiments.

b) Uncooled (room temperature) bolometers usually designed as microbolometers, operate without cryogenic cooling, and are widely used in commercial thermal imaging, security, and automotive safety.

This paper focuses on recent research developments regarding structural and electrical changes within microbolometers.


Microbolometers
A microbolometer is a highly sensitive instrument that detects radiant energy by measuring the change in electrical resistance of a conductor as its temperature changes. Leveraging MEMS (Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems) technology for mass production and uncooled operation, they work by absorbing infrared energy, which heats a thermistor element, changing its electrical resistance, and mapping this change into a visible thermal image.

A thermistor element is a semiconductor device made from metallic oxide thin films, such as vanadium oxide (VOx), that changes its electrical resistance dramatically with temperature, allowing it to function as a highly accurate temperature sensor or controller in electronics.

The important figures of merit for a thermal sensing membrane are the material's temperature coefficient of resistivity (TCR), and electrical noise. TCR quantifies how much a material's electrical resistance changes per degree of temperature change, crucial for electronics design.

Highly resistive films typically exhibit high TCR values and high signal-to noise ratios, factors that influence their performance in bolometer applications.

VOx Thin Films
VOx constitutes a class of materials characterized by significant physical and chemical properties. They exhibit intriguing solid-state physics, centered around phase transitions, in particular metal/insulator transitions as a function of temperature, which display peculiar structural, electronic, and magnetic behavior.

VOx thin films are the materials of choice for uncooled infrared microbolometers used in thermal radiation sensing. Ranging from a single atom to a few micrometers thick, thin films are used to modify surfaces for various technology applications, such as solar cells and integrated circuits, created by depositing material to control electrical or optical functions, or provide protective properties.

VOx thin films are the materials of choice for uncooled infrared microbolometers used in thermal radiation sensing. Ranging from a single atom to a few micrometers thick, thin films are used to modify surfaces for various technology applications, such as solar cells and integrated circuits, created by depositing material to control electrical or optical functions, or provide protective properties...

Need for Vibration Isolation:


Full article...

Announcing Launch of the 2026-27
$25,000 Minus K Technology Educational Giveaway to
U.S. Colleges and Universities

Giving away $25,000* worth of patented vibration isolators to colleges within the United States.

Your college could receive one of our superior performing negative-stiffness low-frequency vibration isolators, which DO NOT USE air, electricity, computers, magnets or fluids and are currently being used for biology, neuroscience, chemistry, crystal growing, physics, audio reproduction and many other fields.

If you have an Atomic Force Microscope (AFM), Electron Microscope, Interferometer, Laser Optical System, Micro Hardness Tester, or any other special equipment that would be assisted by our vibration isolation, simply complete the giveaway submission form (word.doc) or submission form (pdf) and send it back to edgiveaway@minusk.com. If you're one of the top applicants, we'll send you one of these free vibration isolators to assist you with your research.

Submission deadline for applications is February 28, 2027...


Minus K WS-4 Vibration Isolation Workstation Minus K BM-1 Vibration Isolator Minus K BM-4 Vibration Isolator
Minus K BM-8 Vibration Isolator Minus K BM-10 Vibration Isolator Minus K WS-4 Vibration Isolation Workstation

*$25,000 of retail products will consist of at least one each of the following models of Negative-Stiffness vibration isolators: WS-4, BM-1, BM-4, BM-8, BM-10 and CM-1. Based on the information provided within grant forms Minus K may substitute different models to best accommodate the application and payload needs.


Last Year's 2025-2026 Winners:

University of North Texas - Physics Department
The vibration isolator will be used to stabilize their AFM to achieve high resolution images of grain sizes in thin films. They will modify these films through different thermal processes.

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology - Physics and Optical Engineering Department
The vibration isolator will be used for experiments in ultra-sensitive optical measurements and characterization of magneto-optic nanoparticles for cancer hyperthermia therapy.

Wellesley College – Chemistry Department
The isolator will for research studies of pathological changes to excitable cells using fluorescent reporters. They will use microinjection and electrophysiology on intact worms in vivo and culture cells using their Nikon Ti-U microscope which currently has too much vibration movement.

Cornell University – Applied and Engineering Physics Department
The isolator will used fabricating novel two-dimensional (2D) material heterostructures by combining atomically thin 2D materials, such as graphene, hBN, transition metal dichalcogenides, to explore new electronic and quantum phenomena inside an MBraun glovebox under an inert argon atmosphere.

Rutgers University – Physics Department
The isolator will be for a scalable atomic gravimeter to measure the absolute gravity, the vertical gravity gradient, and the third-order vertical derivative by dropping three spatially separated cold-atom cloud and forming atom interferometry, to a retroreflector under a vacuum chamber.

Sam Houston State University – Biological Sciences
The isolator will assist in fluorescent and phase contrast imaging using an ECHO Revolve upright/inverted microscope, allowing publication-quality fluorescence, phase, and darkfield imaging to graduate and undergraduates in research or doing live-cell video.


Check out previous Educational Giveaway winners:

2025 Winners

2018 Winners

2024 Winners

2017 Winners

2023 Winners

2016 Winners

2022 Winners

2015 Winners

2019 Winners

2014 Winners



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