Ramachandra Bangari and associate professor Thomas Folland collaborated with researchers from two universities to investigate a precise way to determine how extremely thin crystals are oriented. 
Thursday, October 22, 2026

Ramachandra Bangari, a graduate research assistant in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences’ Department of Physics and Astronomy, is helping scientists better understand materials that are thousands of times thinner than a human hair.

Image: Ramachandra Bangari
Photo courtesy of Ramachandra Bangari.

Bangari and Thomas Folland, associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, collaborated with researchers from McMaster University and Vanderbilt University to demonstrate a precise way to determine how extremely thin crystals are oriented when stacked on top of one another. 

The findings could help scientists better understand how these materials behave and how they might be used in future electronic and optical technologies.

The research was published in the scientific journal ACS Nanoscience Au in August 2026, and the work was also featured on a supplementary journal cover.

Why the arrangement of crystals matters

The study focuses on what are called van der Waals materials, which can be just one layer of atoms thick.

Scientists can stack these incredibly thin layers just like Legos to create new materials with different properties. But the angle at which the layers are stacked can make a big difference in how those materials behave.

For example, rotating one layer slightly can change how the material conducts electricity or interacts with light. That makes knowing the exact orientation of each layer especially important.

The research team demonstrated a way to measure that orientation accurately, helping scientists better understand the connection between how these materials are arranged and how they function.

“The technique we studied uses a beam of electrons that get scattered back differently based on how atoms are arranged in crystals. This method is typically used to characterize bulk materials,” said Bangari. “In this work, we showed it works well even for ultrathin layered materials. We have already started using it in other research projects going on in our group to study how the physics we observe in these materials depends on their orientation.”

This knowledge could support future research into electronic devices and various technologies that use light.

See the full article in ACS Nanoscience Au.