Albert P. Pisano (Advisor)

Crystalline nickel titanium (NiTi) films are known to possess superelastic properties offering superior advantages in engineering applications where resilient mechanical response is essential. One such application of increasing importance in the biomedical field is the fabrication of micro-needles for transdermal or subdermal fluid transport, including the integration of micro-needles with silicon structures such as bio-MEMS assemblies. Unfortunately, the direct deposition of Ni-Ti alloys onto silicon is sometimes compromised by grossly mismatched thermal expansion coefficients...