UNIPA

The practical application of conventional lasers is often hampered by inherent difficulties related to their bulky, expensive and highly coherent nature. Some of these issues can be overcome by so-called Random Lasers (RL), devices in which laser emission stems from the random walk of photons in a disordered medium. However, achieving efficient, tunable, and stable RL remains difficult to date. A large variety of nanostructured metals and semiconductors, organic dyes and quantum dots (QDs) were proposed as passive or active scatterers to fabricate RLs. However, organic dyes usually suffer from rapid photo-bleaching, while semiconductor QDs are affected by fluorescence blinking and their toxicity can be a serious pitfall in biomedical RL applications. CARLITO proposes the use of carbon nanostructured materials (CNMs) to design an entirely new class of RLs for a wide range of photonic applications, where a stable and low-threshold RL is obtained by the combined use of different CNMs as active and passive light scatterers. The ambitious goal of CARLITO is designing the first all-carbon-based RL (ACRL), capable to yield high-quality RL from hybrid CNMs, by taking advantage of the peculiar electronic properties of different zero-, one- and two-dimensional nanocarbons. ACRLs will be a new family of low-cost, non-toxic and fully biocompatible RL devices, which can be easily tuned to emit photons within the entire visible spectral region. Achieving these targets will advance RLs well beyond the current state-of-the-art, favouring their transition into real-world technology, such as in live cell microscopy, speckle free imaging and sensing. In particular, the application of ACRLs in speckle free imaging will be directly tested within the scope of CARLITO.

A step change in the methods of inspection and measurement data, collected through robotic systems, is required to enable the next generation of intelligent systems to penetrate the manufacturing and construction industries. Dr Carmelo Mineo is an expert in state-of-the-art robotic ultrasonic inspection systems and in advanced software and graphical user interfaces. The project will allow a new generation of integrated robotic approaches for inspection of industrial production. As a member of the Department of Industrial and Digital Innovation (DIID), and through collaboration with supervisor Prof Donatella Cerniglia, Dr Mineo seeks to address a technology gap between research and industrial exploitation. His work will facilitate the migration of fundamental research, developed by the University of Palermo, towards higher technology readiness levels. The aim is to automate promising quality assessment techniques, in which DIID has a strong international reputation, using robotic manipulators. Although there are some examples of robotic inspection systems, developed by others, it is necessary to improve sensor integration, data fusion and enable real-time data processing, in order to fulfil the real meaning of autonomy and decision making in manufacturing. The proposed research is aligned with the requirements set by the nascent Industry 4.0. A two-month secondment phase, at a growing company (RECENDT, Austria), will increase the researcher’s cross-sectorial experience. The project includes vibrant opportunities of knowledge transfer and training for the development of the researcher and the hosts as well as clear plans to disseminate the project outcomes to different audiences.