Innovative research at historic location
The Rottweil Research Center was reopened in March 2016. It is located on the premises of the former Rottweil gunpowder factory, a site that was already home to several powder mills during the Thirty Years' War.
It offers space for the innovative plasma coating technologies located in the Faculty of Mechanical and Medical Engineering and a hall for mechanical engineering and Industry 4.0 with state-of-the-art robots, automation technology and simulation.
Practicals, research projects and thesis work
In addition to university research with partly international research projects in the field of coatings for medical technology, internships are held for students on the Micromedical Technology, Advanced Precision Engineering and Technical Physician master's programmes:
- Coating Technologies internship in the field of plasma coating / plasma activation, and bonding technology
- Intelligent implants: Practical course on current research on the retina chip from Retina Implant AG
In addition to the internships, the research center's facilities and equipment are available to students on bachelor's degree programmes for coursework, project internships and bachelor's theses.
Master's students are regularly offered exciting topics for research internships as well as thesis work in the fields of coating technology and mechanical engineering/robotics.
Partnerships with local schools
We also work closely with the local Rottweil schools. As part of this cooperation, internships are offered for pupils at the Rottweil Gymnasien, in which the teaching content in the field of science and technology is supplemented with real application content from research and development:
- Microscopy
- Plasma treatment and coating
- Production of hydrophobic and hydrophilic layers using plasma coatings
- Application of biocompatible layers for the encapsulation of electronic components
- Measurements on the engine test bench
- Retina chip experiments
Coating/surface modification systems
- Atomic layer deposition ALD (Myplas III, Plasma Electronic GmbH)
- Plasma-enhanced vapor deposition PECVD (Plasma Flecto 30, Plasma Technology GmbH)
- Parylene coating system (Labcoater 300, Plasma Parylene Systems GmbH)
- Atmospheric plasma system (Openair Plasma, Plasmatreat GmbH)
- Cold plasma jet kINPen (Control Kin Pen 11, neoplas GmbH)
- Sputter Coater (SC7620 Mini, Quorum Technologies Ltd)
- Plasma deposition system (PECVD) (modified Leybold Z401, Leybold GmbH)
- Sputter Coater (Z590, Leybold GmbH)
- Coating system (Domino, Plasma Electronic GmbH)
- Plasma etching system (RIE) (Oxford Plasmalab)
- Combined Parylene-PECVD system (Plasma Electronic GmbH)
Analysis/measurement technology
- Digital microscope up to 200x (Keyence VHX700F, Keyence Deutschland GmbH)
- Wafer inspection microscope up to 1000x (Ultraplan FS 110, Mitutoyo Deutschland GmbH)
- Surface Profiler (Alpha Step 500, KLA Corporation)
- Scanning force microscope AFM (Core AFM, Nanosurf)
- Scanning electron microscope SEM (XL30 ESEM with EDX, Philips)
- Transmission electron microscope TEM with EDX and EELS (JEM 2000-FX II, Jeol Germany GmbH)
- Mass spectrometer (Prisma Pro & HiCUBE Eco, Pfeiffer Vakuum)
- Tensile testing machine / universal testing machine, 50 N / 500 N (FMT 310, Alluris GmbH)
- Ion etching system (Ion Mill Model 600, Gatan USA)
- UV-VIS spectrometer coating thickness measurement (NanoCalc-XR, Ocean Optics Deutschland GmbH)
- UV-VIS-IR spectrometer FLAME-T-XR1-ES, 200-1025nm (Ocean Insight)
- High-voltage breakdown measurement (ST9201CX AC HIPOT Tester, Sourcetronic GmbH)
- Impedance spectrometer (Solartron EnergyLab XM Potentiostat Galvanostat, Ametek Scientific Instruments)
- Impedance analyzer (SI 12690, Solartron Instruments)
- DC measurements (Keithley 6517B, Electrometer/High Resistance Meter, Tektronix GmbH)
- Contact angle meter with tilting table and picoliter dosing system (OCA 200, DataPhysics Instruments GmbH)
- Mixed-signal oscilloscope (MS070404C, Tektronix GmbH)
- Two-channel arbitrary waveform/function generator (AFG3022C, Tektronix GmbH)
- Digital multimeter with 60 channel multiplexer (Keithley 3706)
- Dynamic differential calorimetry (DSC 204 N1 Netzsch )
- X-ray diffraction (XRD) (FPM XRD7, Seifert)
- 656 Dimple Grinder; Gatan USA
Mechanical engineering / robotics
Other equipment
- 3D printer (i3MK3, Prusa Research s.r.o)
- 3D printer (SL1S Spped , Prusa, Research)
- High-temperature furnace (HAT 64/17, Nabertherm GmbH)
- Corrosion test salt spray system (SSC 450, Weiss Umwelttechnik GmbH)
- Climate chamber (APT.line MKF115 (E3.1), Binder GmbH)
- Glove box with gas purification (PGB 20k, Sylatech GmbH)
- Vacuum leak detector (Ultratest M2, Helium, Leybold Heraeus GmbH)
- Table dosing robot (JR 3303, Janome Industrial Equipment Europe GmbH)
- CO₂ snow jet cleaning system (CO₂ Cleaning, acp GmbH)
- CO₂ dry ice blasting system (DIS Mini, DIS Dry Ice Solution GmbH)
- Micro welding machine (Unitek UB25, Miyachi)
- LAWEMA Laser Welding Machine (AHAP Alfred Hirt Apparatebau GmbH)
- Laboratory autoclave (CentroClav)
Team
- External link opens in a new window:Prof. Dr. Volker Bucher
- External link opens in a new window:Prof. Dr.-Ing. Gunter Ketterer
- External link opens in a new window:Prof. Dr. Jörg Friedrich
- External link opens in a new window:Anja Levermann
- External link opens in a new window:Nicolai Simon
- External link opens in a new window:Wolfram Kintzel
- External link opens in a new window:Professor Thomas Schiepp
- External link opens in a new window:Dr. Christian Bildhauer-Buggle
- External link opens in a new window:Marvin Schmid
- External link opens in a new window:Daniel Sauer
- External link opens in a new window:Sven Schumayer
