Prof. David Grosso obtained his PhD in sol-gel coatings in 1998 in UK (Atomic Weapons Establishment). He then worked 2 years on materials for microelectronics for Philips in Netherland, before being appointed associate professor in 2002, and full-professor in 2007, at the University of Paris in the LCMCP laboratory. In 2015, he received a "Chair of Excellence" grant from A*MIDEX at the university Aix Marseille to develop nanofabrication methods at the interface between top-down and bottom-up approaches. From 2017 he started to lead the NOVA team at the Institute of Microelectronic, Materials and Nanosciences of Provence (IM2NP). His work was awarded by the International Sol-gel Society (ISGS) in 2005 and by the French Society of Chemistry (SFC) in 2009, and he has been a junior member of the French Institute of University from 2009 to 2014. Most of his achievements concern the controlled elaboration of nanostructured thin films through liquid deposition and the development of environmental ellipsometry analyses. His track record: 188 publications (H-index 58), 25 patents, 45 invited conferences, 25 invited seminars, 23 supervisions of PhD students, 2 start-ups. 

Sol-gel chemistry is based on hydrolysis and condensation of molecular metal oxide precursors in solution. The product of these chemical reactions is a polycondensed oxo, hydroxo intermediate that can be a polymeric network (gel) or a colloidal suspension depending on the nature of the metal centre and the conditions.

Processing sol-gel materials consists in shaping the initial sol-gel solution in the desired morphology (droplet, layer, monolith, fibre, etc.) and dimensions and in the elimination of the volatile species. The spatial gathering of the oxo, hydroxo intermediates triggers the percolation into a xerogel that becomes the solid oxide material after thermal curing.

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