Dr. Matej Fekete's new project aims to identify the impact of deposition parameters on plasma properties and correlate them with the properties of prepared TiAlON protective thin films that could withstand higher loads than current protective thin films. In the next thirty months, he will deal with their development from deposition and process diagnostics to thin film analysis and implementation in the industry.
Dr. Matej Fekete at the Department of Plasma Physics and Technology deals with diagnostics of the magnetron sputtering process, preparation and analysis of thin films. He worked as a postdoc researcher at RWTH Aachen University in Germany for approximately two and half years after his PhD studies. There, he began to tackle the topic of oxynitride thin films which may be employed as protective thin films for cutting tools in machining applications. In 2023, he joined the research group Deposition of Thin Films and Nanostructures, section PVDLab at the Department of Physics and Technologyand is now continuing his research on oxynitride thin films with TiAlON.
His new project "Plasma Diagnostics Guided Synthesis of Oxynitride Protective Coating with Enhanced Oxidation Stability" is funded by the Programme Johannes Amos Comenius, MSCAFELLOW7_MUNI, reg. no. CZ.02.01.01/00/22_010/0008854. This project is only accessible to applicants who have submitted a successful project proposal to the EU Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme (MSCA). However, did not receive the funding. Due to a massive interest in EU MSCA projects from young scientists and the limited MSCA budget, only some excellent projects are funded. The Ministry of Education of the Czech Republic decided to support Czech projects that have been awarded the "Seal of Excellence."
As part of the project, Dr. Fekete will do a five-month internship at RWTH Aachen University as well as a six-month internship with industrial partner PLATIT a.s. Improving the properties of the thin films will require fine-tuning of the deposition parameters and detailed deposition process diagnostics for optimal growth and properties of thin films. "Good mechanical properties and thermal stability are essential for industrial applications as such coatings are more durable and can withstand higher loads and higher temperatures. Such oxynitride thin films are not yet highly used on an industrial scale," adds Dr. Fekete.
In the near future, Dr. Matej Fekete will focus on optical emission spectroscopy within the deposition process diagnosis and the first depositions of samples using multi-pulse high power impulse magnetron sputtering and subsequent analysis of the composition, crystal structure, mechanical properties and thermal stability of prepared thin films. Dr. Fekete will deal with the development of TiAlON thin films from October 1, 2024, to March 31, 2027.
At the Department of Plasma Physics and Technology, Dr. Pavel Ondračka is also working on a MSCAfellow5_MUNI project. We have written about his project "Material design of moderately ductile hard coatings" in the article here. Dr. Oleksandr Galmiz has successfully received and solved the EU MSCA project "A Step Towards New Plasma Processing Technology for Medical Purposes" and we wrote about his project "A Step Towards New Plasma Processing Technology for Medical Purposes" in the article here.
Leila Zahedi and Pedram Ghourchi Beigi, Ph.D. candidates at the Plasma Nanotechnology and Bioapplication group, Department of Plasma Physics and Technology, stayed four months at the University of Ghent for their Erasmus+ traineeship. They investigated the potential of plasma-liquid interaction for practical applications within the scope of their respective Ph.D. topics.
In mid-February 2025, Dr. Richard Krumpolec and Pedram Ghourchi Beigi hosted Kingsley Iwu, the CTO of Nanize AS. New insights into plasma application in the PFAS-free industry were discussed at the beginning of the sixth year of this collaboration with this Norwegian company. Experiments were carried out based on the use of plasma technologies for the activation of various substrates for applications in the coating industry.
