For my Ph.D., I was working in the Sansoz group at the University of Vermont. This research group is focused on the mechanics of nanostructured materials at small, atomic scale. The lab is equipped with Dell workstations, an Atomic Force Microscope and an Scanning Electron Microscope. We also have access to the home-built Xi cluster (20 processors) of the College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences and Bluemoon cluster from the Vermont Advanced Computing Center (368 processors).

The title of my dissertation was "Multiscale modeling of contact plasticity and nanoindentation of nanostructured FCC metals". It was divided into three main chapters. The first one dealt with the study of contact plasticity in an Al nanocrystalline thin film. I compared the effects of two interatomic potentials on the plasticity mechanisms. The second chapter focused on the mechanism of grain growth in nanocrystalline Al under nanoindentation. I studied the effects of temperature and of the nature and size of the tip indenting the surface. Finally, in my last chapter, I investigated the plasticity of single crystal Ni thin films and nanowires. The objective was to study the effects of free boundary and of the size of the sample on the plasticity mechanisms.

3D Model of an Al nanocrystalline thin film and a rigid Al indenter.

I am currently continuing my research in the Sansoz group, studying the experimental growth and characterization of Ni nanowires. My goal is to control the nanowires' length depending on the time spent in the electrodeposition bath, to fix the nanowires on a wafer in order to finally indent them radially. This last part would converge with the last part of my PhD research.

SEM pictures of nanowires grown by electrodeposition.