The Centre for Functional Molecular Materials has nodes at the Australian National and Monash Univerities in Australia, and Jiangsu, Nanjing and Zhenzhou Universities, and the Harbin Institute of Technology, in China. Researchers are looking at the magnetic, optical, and electronic properties of metal-rich materials. The controlled preparation of functionalized materials is of great interest due to their potential application as active components in advanced materials. Metal-containing materials are particularly interesting because the metal can introduce useful optical, electronic, and/or magnetic behaviour. Clusters have been identified as one of the most promising materials as optical limiters, and they have also attracted significant interest as molecular magnets, particularly those of the single molecule magnet type, with applications in data storage, quantum computing, and nanotechnology.
The Centre brings together complementary expertise Australia and China in the fields of metal cluster and coordination polymer synthesis, and theoretical, spectroscopic, electrochemical, structural, magnetic, and nonlinear optical characterisation of molecular materials. The potential of several important classes of cluster-based metal-containing material is being assayed, which is defining their utility as advanced functional materials.
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| Australian National University | Monash University | Jiangsu University | Nanjing University | Harbin Institute of Technology | Zhengzhou University |