Center of Excellence

Materials science is a top research priority at Linköping University (LiU) (see LiU's page, in Swedish), spanning every level from docents to Professors to Vice Chancellors. This leads to a vibrant atmosphere for carrying out exciting world-class fundamental research in areas carefully selected to have a high probability for significant societal payoff. Research at LiU is undertaken in an environment that is highly collaborative, and vertically and horizontally integrated. The core activities of the Thin Film Division are within the largest and most rapidly developing areas of materials research worldwide and provide unsurpassed opportunities for the design of advanced and multifunctional materials that are enabling for the industry contributing to Sweden’s wealth in the sectors metal, energy, and microelectronics/IT/communications. Specifically, we set out from fields where we are best in class and use the unique holistic approach to research at LiU to define future directions in the studies of i) thin film processing for multi-functional surfaces and ii) growth of wide band gap semiconductors.

We have been awarded highly competitive Centers of Excellence Grants (from VR, VINNOVA, SSF), the Government Strategic Faculty Grant in Materials Science, and Individual Grants: Hultman (ERC Advanced
Grant), Rosén (ERC Starting Grant and SSF-Ingvar Carlsson Award 2), and Eklund (SSF-Ingvar Carlsson Award 3). Our work has been evaluated as excellent-to-outstanding by the VR-Swedish Condensed Matter
Physics, VINNEX Center, VR-Linnaeus, and SSF-Strategic Research Center. We integrate theory, simulations, and experiments in state-of-the-art materials-research laboratory settings.