Profile picture of Cathy Wong

Cathy Wong

Associate Professor
Chemistry and Biochemistry, Materials Science Institute, OMQ
cwong3@uoregon.edu
Phone: 541-346-7323
Office: 143 Klamath Hall
Website: https://blogs.uoregon.edu/wonglab/

Education

B.Sc. McMaster University, Biological Chemistry (2004, Johan Terlouw)
Ph.D. University of Toronto, Physical Chemistry (2011, Greg Scholes)
Postdoc UC Berkeley (2015, Naomi Ginsberg)

 

Research

Photovoltaic and optoelectronic materials are often assembled from nanoscale building blocks, such as small organic molecules, quantum dots, or polymers. Different methods can be used to put these building blocks together, but one of the most common and cost-effective methods is deposition from a solution. As solvent evaporates, the individual building blocks get closer together, start to interact, and end up in particular physical arrangements. As components of a system couple together, these physical arrangements can result in disorder and defects, and the group of particles can exhibit collective phenomena that alter the behavior of excitons and carriers in unexpected ways.
Research in our lab seeks to adapt time-resolved exciton spectroscopies to the measurement of nanoscale building blocks during their self-assembly. We will measure electronic structure and exciton dynamics in situ and in real-time as irreversible processes occur, such as crystallization, self-assembly, and chemical bond formation. By measuring and comparing how exciton behavior changes during self-assembly using various solution deposition techniques, we develop strategies to control self-assembly to create materials with designer excitonic properties.
 
We have developed a single-shot transient absorption spectrometer that allows us to measure exciton dynamics in situ during materials formation and other non-equilibrium processes. Transient absorption uses an ultrafast laser pulse to ‘pump’ the sample, creating excited states, then a second laser pulse after a controlled delay time to ‘probe’ the sample. By changing the delay time, we can measure the dynamics of the excited states. We use tilted beams to spatially encode the time delay in our sample, allowing us to measure the dynamics in a single shot, dramatically decreasing the time needed to complete a measurement. This allows us to measure systems that are changing in time, like aggregating organic molecules, or crystallizing perovskites. Our technique can provide insight into the complex processes involved in materials formation, and will show us how we can steer materials to have particular excited state dynamics by changing environmental conditions while the material is being made. We are continually developing and improving the design of our instruments and building new reaction chambers and film deposition stages so we can measure materials formation in our laser lab, and provide valuable feedback for rational materials design.

Publications

^ undergraduate researcher; * equal contributors; † corresponding author

  1. Z.S. Walbrun, C.Y. Wong† (2022) In situ measurement of evolving excited state dynamics during deposition and processing of organic films using single-shot transient absorption. Annual Review of Physical Chemistry 74: 267-86. (Invited review)
  2. Z.S. Walbrun, L.C. Leibfried^, A.R. Hoban^, B.C. Rasmussen^, T.J. Wiegand, C.J. Collison, C.Y. Wong† (2021) Effect of thermal annealing on aggregation of a squaraine thin film. MRS Adv. 7: 239-244. 
  3. J.C. Sadighian, C.Y. Wong† (2021) Just scratching the surface: In situ and surface-specific characterization of perovskite nanocrystal growth. J. Phys. Chem. 125: 20772-20782. (Invited perspective, selected as ACS Editors’ Choice)
  4. Y. Hassan*†, J. H. Park*, M.L. Crawford, A. Sadhanala, J.C. Sadighian, E. Mosconi, R. Shivanna, M. Jeong, C. Yang, J. Lee, H. Choi, S.H. Park, M.H. Song, F. De Angelis, C.Y. Wong†, R.H. Friend, B.R. Lee†, H.J. Snaith† (2021) Ligand engineered bandgap stability in mixed-halide perovskite nanocrystals for efficient and colour-stable light emitting diodes. Nature 591: 72-77.
  5. K.S. Wilson, Z.S. Walbrun, C.Y. Wong† (2021) Single-shot transient absorption spectroscopy techniques and design principles. Spectrochim Acta A 253: 119557.
  6. M.L. Sosa, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Revealing the evolving mixture of molecular aggregates during organic film formation using simulations of in situ absorbance. J. Chem. Phys. 153: 214902.
  7. J.C. Sadighian, K.S. Wilson, M.L. Crawford, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Single-Shot Transient Absorption of Nascent Perovskite Nanocrystals. Ultrafast Phenomena XXII: Tu3A.6.
  8. J.C. Sadighian, K.S. Wilson, M.L. Crawford, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Evolving Stark Effect During Growth of Perovskite Nanocrystals Measured Using Transient Absorption. Front. Chem. 8: 585853.
  9. J.C. Sadighian, K.S. Wilson, M.L. Crawford, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Understanding Perovskite Nanocrystal Growth Using In Situ Transient Absorption Spectroscopy. Proc. SPIE 11464: 114640K.
  10. L. Huang, C.Y. Wong, E. Grumstrup (2020) Time-Resolved Microscopy: A New Frontier in Physical Chemistry. J. Phys. Chem. A 124: 5997-5998.
  11. M.L. Crawford, J.C. Sadighian, Y. Hassan, H.J. Snaith, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Spectral shifts upon halide segregation in perovskite nanocrystals observed via transient absorption spectroscopy. MRS Adv. 5(51): 2613-2621.
  12. J.C. Sadighian, M.L. Crawford, T.W. Suder^, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Surface ligation stage revealed through polarity-dependent fluorescence during perovskite nanocrystal growth. J. Mater. Chem. C 8: 7041-7050.
  13. K.S. Wilson, A.N. Mapile, C.Y. Wong† (2020) Broadband single-shot transient absorption spectroscopy. Opt. Exp. 28: 11339-11355.
  14. J.C. Sadighian, M.L. Crawford, C.Y. Wong† (2019) In situ transient absorption spectroscopy of organometal halide perovskite nanoparticles. Proc. Mat. Sci. Tech. 960-963.
  15. K.S. Wilson, M.L. Sosa, M.N. Scott^, C.Y. Wong† (2019) In Situ Measurement of the Excited State Dynamics of Evolving Materials Systems in OSA Advanced Photonics Congress (AP) 2019, OSA Technical Digest (Optical Society of America, 2019), paper NoT1B.4.
  16. J.C. Sadighian, M.L. Crawford, C.Y. Wong† (2019) Rapid sampling during synthesis of lead halide perovskite nanocrystals for spectroscopic measurement. MRS Adv. 4(36): 1957-1964.
  17. K.S. Wilson, M.N. Scott^, C.Y. Wong† (2019) Excited state dynamics of organic semiconductors measured with shot-to-shot correction of scatter and photoluminescence. Synth. Met. 250: 115-120. (Early Career Leaders Special Issue)
  18. M.L. Sosa, R.B. Pandit^, K.S. Wilson, C.Y. Wong† (2018) Composition of molecular aggregates during film formation revealed using simulated absorption spectra. Proc. SPIE, Physical Chemistry of Semiconductor Materials and Interfaces XVII 10724: 1072403.
  19. K.S. Wilson, C.Y. Wong† (2018) In Situ Measurement of Exciton Dynamics During Thin-Film Formation Using Single-Shot Transient Absorption. J. Phys. Chem. A 122: 6438-6444
  20. K.S. Wilson, M.N. Scott^, C.Y. Wong† (2018) Single-shot transient absorption spectroscopy of an organic film. MRS. Adv. 3: 3453-3457
  21. K.S. Wilson, C.Y. Wong† (2018) Single-shot transient absorption spectroscopy with a 45 ps pump-probe time delay range. Opt. Lett. 43: 371-374.
  22. K.S. Wilson, C.Y. Wong† (2017) Calibrating a spatially encoded time delay for transient absorption spectroscopy. Proc. SPIE, Physical Chemistry of Semiconductor Materials and Interfaces XVI 10348: 1034805.