Waitukaitis Group

Soft Electrified Materials

Scott Waitukaitis leads an experimental soft matter physics lab. The group focuses on complex phenomena that emerge when everyday materials interact with electric fields.

One major focus is contact electrification of insulators, i.e. the exchange of electrical charge between materials when they touch. Although known to occur even in ancient Greece, the underlying mechanism remains poorly understood. In our lab, we have found that contact electrification seems to have different causes depending on the type of material used. For soft organic materials such as plastics, our work points to irreversible nanoscale mechanical deformations as a key ingredient, potentially through the release of charge through mechanochemical and flexoelectric effects. For oxide insulators, i.e., hard inorganic materials like glass or ceramic, we find that surface adsorbates (e.g. nanoscopic layers of water and other molecules) play a critical role.

Other interests of the group include creating emergent activity with electrical energy injection (e.g. Quincke rollers or charged matter in acoustic levitation), the physics of lightning, the development of charge-measurement techniques, and the Leidenfrost effect.