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Neil Alford

Staff photograph
  • PLD films for ferroelectrics, piezoelectrics and multiferroics
  • Superconducting receive coils for magnetic resonance imaging
  • Core-less transformers
  • Microwave dielectric loss and development of low loss dielectrics.
 Contact details:
Office: Department of Materials
Tel: +44 (0)20 7594 6724
Ext: 46724
Email: n.alfordimperial.ac.uk
Web: Imperial Department of Materials

Research Interests
Principal current research interests are in functional materials.  These include microwave dielectric materials with low loss, ferroelectric materials such as BaSrTiO for tuneable microwave devices. Pulsed laser deposition  is now being used to deposit  multiferroic films.  New transformer designs that do not require ferrite cores have been developed and are in the process of being transferred to industry.

Recent Publications

  • Pullar, RC, Farrah, S, Alford, NM, MgWO4, ZnWO4, NiWO4 and CoWO4 microwave dielectric ceramics, J EUR CERAM SOC, 2007, Vol: 27, Pages: 1059 - 1063, ISSN: 0955-2219
  • Valant, M, Suvorov, D, Pullar, RC, et al , A mechanism for low-temperature sintering, J EUR CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 26, Pages: 2777 - 2783, ISSN: 0955-2219
  • Pullar, RC, Lai, C, Alford, NM, V2O5-doped M2+Cu2Nb2O8 compounds (M2+ = Zn, Co, Ni, Mg & Ca) for microwave dielectric LTCCs, MATER SCI FORUM, 2006, Vol: 514-516, Pages: 264 - 268, ISSN: 0255-5476
  • Kamba, S, Noujni, D, Pashkin, A, et al , Low-temperature microwave and THz dielectric response in novel microwave ceramics, J EUR CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 26, Pages: 1845 - 1851, ISSN: 0955-2219
  • Axelsson, AK, Alford, NM, Bismuth titanates candidates for high permittivity LTCC, J EUR CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 26, Pages: 1933 - 1936, ISSN: 0955-2219
  • Pullar, RC, Lai, C, Azough, F, et al , Novel microwave dielectric LTCCs based upon V2O5 doped M2+Cu2Nb2O8 compounds (M2+ = Zn, Co, Ni, Mg and Ca), J EUR CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 26, Pages: 1943 - 1946, ISSN: 0955-2219
  • Dunne, LJ, Axelsson, AK, Alford, NM, et al , Quasi-classical fluctuation-dissipation description of dielectric loss in oxides with implications for quantum information processing, INT J QUANTUM CHEM, 2006, Vol: 106, Pages: 986 - 993, ISSN: 0020-7608
  • Rawal, R, Feteira, A, Hyatt, NC, et al , Microwave dielectric properties of hexagonal 12R-Ba3LaNb3O12 ceramics, J AM CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 89, Pages: 332 - 335, ISSN: 0002-7820
  • Rawal, R, Feteira, A, Flores, AA, et al , Dielectric properties of the "twinned" 8H-hexagonal perovskite Ba8Nb4Ti3O24, J AM CERAM SOC, 2006, Vol: 89, Pages: 336 - 339, ISSN: 0002-7820
  • Krupka, J, Breeze, J, Centeno, A, et al , Measurements of permittivity, dieletric loss tangent, and resistivity of float-zone silicon at microwave frequencies, IEEE T MICROW THEORY, 2006, Vol: 54, Pages: 3995 - 4001, ISSN: 0018-9480
  • Alford, N, Petrov, P, Salinas, E, et al , Transforming electronics, MATER WORLD, 2006, Vol: 14, Pages: 18 - 19, ISSN: 0967-8638

For a complete list of publications and patents please visit http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/people/n.alford/publications

Biographical Details

  • 2007 - elected to to the Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Engineering
  • 2006 – present - Professor of Physical Electronics and thin Film Materials, Department of Materials, Imperial College London
  • 2000 – present - Adviser on Technical Programmes, Gatsby Charitable Foundation
  • 1994 -2006 - Professor and Pro-Dean of Faculty, London South Bank University
  • 1992 – 2000 - Visiting Professor, Aberdeen University
  • 1981-1994 - Division Research Associate, ICI
  • 1979-1981 - ICI Fellow, Dept Materials, Oxford University
  • 1976-1979 - PhD study at Queen Mary College
  • 1973-1976 - Petroleum Engineer,– division of Baker Oil Tools (Brown and Root)

Committees

  • Member of and Chair of EPSRC grant awarding panels.
  • Advisory Board of Cambridge Massachusetts Institute Ltd http://www.cmi.cam.ac.uk/
  • Advisory Board, Antenova Ltd, Cambridge ANTENOVA - Home/Company
  • Member of the DTI Working Group for the Quantum Metrology Programme at NPL DTI - department of trade and industry - national measurement system
  • Joint Chair of the Electronic Applications Divisional Board, Institute of Materials.
  • Member of the Technical Opportunities Panel of EPSRC 2001-2005 EPSRC Web Site

Research

The figure below was taken by Dr Dave McComb of the Department of Materials at Imperial and Co-Director of the LCN.  Figure is a high resolution TEM image of a BaSrTiO film grown in our laboratory by Dr Peter Petrov.  We can see a superlattice of STO (SrTiO3) and BTO (BaTiO3) layers and we also see on the image the good separation between the STO (dark part, thickness ~1nm) and BTO (bright part, thickness ~4nm).  This was confirmed by elemental analysis (Fig b): The maxima of Sr contain correspond with the minima of Ba.


High resolution TEM Image of a BaSrTiO filmElemental Analysis of BaSrTiO film