Thin films dance with substrates that are no longer inert

Many of today’s electronic devices — from the semiconductors in your cell phone to the photovoltaic cells in your solar panels — are built on thin-film substrates. The thin film is an electronically conductive material while the substrate is an inert material. Or is it? Physicists and materials scientists have long assumed substrates do not react to electrical stimulus, but new research from the University of California San Diego and a team of collaborators has shown that substrates are not inert after all. The discovery has the potential to help engineers build the dense, three-dimensional, brain-inspired…