Andrew Gruber

Chemistry B.S., minor in Nano-science and Materials, UTD ‘23. Currently working in the McCall research group at UTD. Here, I’ll post updates on my research!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

@calimoxinger Secret 🤫

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Absolutely wizarding a new method of data collection I figured out today. This plot is so much fun to work with and having it visualized is even better.

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

@calimoxinger These are roughly between 1-5mm, varying thicknesses, with a few longer outliers. This morphology matches that of what I’ve worked on previously

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Hello again. I’m in the middle of drafting my first publication and I’ve been playing around with stuff. I made a translucent purple crystal that follows the structure I’ve been looking for. Very cool, very strange!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

A big thank you to everyone who showed up to SPUR today. It was a phenomenal event and I’d love to do it again next year, but I have bigger plans ahead.

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

In case anyone is interested, I will be presenting my work here at UTDallas on Friday July 28 as part of the SPUR program. You can stop by for free and check out my poster, along with hundreds of other undergraduates’ works.

https://t.co/AYndB5FEOg

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Hello nerds! As of today, I have enough data to prove a hypothesis I’ve been working on for about a year. I’ve proven beyond a reasonable doubt that I’ve been able to induce an optical change without a phase change!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

This is one of the last major steps I have to take before I get a publication out, and it’s right in front of me! I’ve finally been able to induce an optical change within the crystal structure, which could help me prove where the emission center is in a dual-polyhedra system!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

The top is the phase pure sample, the left and middle are the two samples made to fill the gap, and the right is the high percentage dopant sample

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Interesting development in my doping series today. I made two samples to fill a gap between a phase pure sample and a higher percentage of dopant sample. These two were expected to luminesce brighter than the phase pure. Strangely, they did the exact opposite. Here’s a look:

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

@calimoxinger It’s about a centimeter long, maybe more, and 2 mm wide

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Recently, one of my samples went absolutely crazy. Here’s a picture of a piece of it. The rest of the sample was garbage, but this MONSTER of a crystal was found in the wreckage. Not sure what it is yet, but it’s about 5x bigger than what I normally get.

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Hey science nerds! I’ve been away trying to get samples and I finally found one of the most exciting bits yet. I’ve been playing around with a sample and it’s morphology is incredible, as well as a brighter emission under UV. This might be the breakthrough I’ve been looking for!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Hey twitter! I’m not gonna lie, sometimes I forget this is here, but I’ve got some cool stuff I’m gonna look into in the next couple days. Zinc has proven to be quite the stubborn atom, so I need to do some experiments outside of my material. Introducing my new priority:

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

We've done some further refinement of the first Zn sample I made a little while ago and learned that Zn did not selectively replace tetrahedral atoms like we thought it would, which makes refinement that much more of a pain in the ass. Now we have to generate our own reference :/

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

It’s been a little bit, so here’s a brief update:

I have confirmed a repeatable phase pure synthesis method.
Zinc fit very well into the system, the limit is within a few percent of my first experiment.
Luminescence decreases as zinc percentage increases, which is interesting!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

My (informal) proposal for further research got accepted today, which is cool. My PI has given me the go ahead to check how different cations change the overall crystal structure. Basically, I get to put in a bunch of atoms and see how tolerant my crystals are.

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

I have 2 very cool updates for my fellow nerds. First, I have phase pure stuff to work with after nearly 6 months. Very excited about that because it opens up a whole new field for me. Second, my crystals light emissions are actually facet-specific, which is kinda cool!

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

@calimoxinger It was a thread from the labcoat

[Andrew Gruber @AGruber12]

Hello twitter! It’s time play a game called Guess That Impurity! On today’s episode, we have a starkly blue object within a cluster of orange crystals. Who can guess what it is?