Professor Michael Zuerch and Bailey Raine Nebgen in the lab. Photo courtesy of Michael Zuerch.
Bailey Raine Nebgen, a chemistry graduate student at the College of Chemistry, has been recognized nationally for her innovative research, earning one of the 2025 ACS Physical Chemistry Graduate Awards in Experimental Chemistry. Announced in late October, the award celebrates her work in developing a new method to study the critical components of next-generation electronics. She will be recognized on the ACS PHYS Division website and receive a $500 prize.
Bailey’s research addresses a major challenge in developing advanced electronics—materials often behave differently in a finished device than they do in a perfect laboratory setting.
Conventional electronic materials that are currently used in devices (like personal computers) reached fundamental limits in their performance during the last decade. Quantum materials offer new possibilities using emerging quantum degrees of freedom for computation and memory tasks in future computers. Despite its promise, the practical integration of novel quantum materials into everyday devices remains limited to date. This slow progress comes in part from the fact that scientists typically test and optimize these materials in ideal, isolated conditions, often under vacuum. However, when these materials are built into a complex electronic device, their function can shift, creating a major obstacle to using exciting new properties of quantum materials in everyday technology.
To solve this problem, Bailey focused on developing a new type of measurement technique that can examine a material while it is already inside the complex device.
She perfected a method called solid-state high harmonic generation. In this method she sends in a very short mid-infrared laser pulse into the device. When the laser interacts with the material's electronic charge carriers, the material generates "harmonics"—like echoes or musical overtones of the original laser pulse.
These generated harmonics act as an electronic fingerprint of the material properties. By analyzing this unique fingerprint, scientists can detect even small changes in the material's properties caused by the surrounding device architecture
She successfully demonstrated this powerful technique on a material held inside an extreme pressure device—a setting used to create highly sensitive materials like superconductors. Her work shows that this new spectroscopy can successfully measure the material's critical electronic properties, even in complex, non-ideal environments.
“I’ve had the privilege of watching Bailey grow into an exceptional scientist,” said Michael Zuerch, professor of chemistry and Bailey’s advisor. “Her curiosity and commitment to discovery makes her a model for what’s possible.”
This breakthrough will help scientists and engineers better predict how new electronic materials will perform in real-world technology, accelerating the development of everything from faster computer chips to more efficient power grids.