Rate My Professor Yves Chabal

Yves Chabal serves as the Texas Instruments Distinguished University Chair in Nanoelectronics and Professor Emeritus in Materials Science and Engineering at The University of Texas at Dallas. A physicist by training, he received his B.A. in Physics from Princeton University in 1974 and Ph.D. in Physics from Cornell University in 1980. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Surface Physics at Bell Laboratories from 1980 to 1981. Chabal's distinguished career includes two decades at Bell Laboratories, where he advanced semiconductor surface science, followed by his role as director of the Laboratory for Surface Modification at Rutgers University. In 2007, he joined UT Dallas to lead the Materials Science and Engineering Department within the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science.

Chabal's research utilizes infrared absorption spectroscopy and other optical techniques to elucidate elementary processes at surfaces and interfaces relevant to microelectronics, optoelectronics, organic electronics, nanoelectronics, hydrogen storage, biosensors, and graphene. His investigations cover semiconductor surface cleaning and passivation (Si, Ge, III-V, SiC), atomic layer deposition of high-k dielectrics (Al2O3, HfO2) and metals (TaN, Cu, Ru), hydrogen interactions in metal hydrides and MOFs, self-assembled monolayers on metals and semiconductors, DNA bonding for nanolithography, and biological molecule detection. He has authored numerous influential publications, including "Diffusion of Small Molecules in Metal Organic Framework Materials" (Physical Review Letters, 2013), "Selective Adsorption of SO2 into Microporous Paddlewheel Frameworks" (2013), "Recovery of Nonwetting Characteristics by Surface Modification of Gallium-Based Liquid Metal Droplets Using Hydrochloric Acid Vapor" (ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2013), and "Vanadium Oxide Nanowire-Graphene Binder Free Nanocomposite Paper Electrodes for Supercapacitors" (Journal of Power Sources, 2013). Chabal's contributions have earned him the American Physical Society's Davisson-Germer Prize in Atomic or Surface Physics (2009), the American Chemical Society's Award for Encouraging Women into Careers in Chemical Sciences (2012), the AVS Medard W. Welch Award (2012), the IBM Faculty Award (2003), Fellowship in the American Physical Society (1996), and Fellowship in the American Vacuum Society (1995). His pioneering work on silicon surface atomic processes has profoundly influenced semiconductor manufacturing and beyond.