Behind the lens: Stephen Boona

Every person filters life through a different lens. And Stephen Boona, a research associate at Ohio State’s Center for Electron Microscopy and Analysis (CEMAS), is no different.

Boona brings more than a decade of solid-state physics and materials science experience to his role at CEMAS. His more than 18 publications have been cited nearly 700 times by other scientists across research fields ranging from mechanical engineering to high energy physics. His breadth of knowledge creates a distinct perspective, allowing him to connect the dots for users within one of the most advanced microscopy facilities in the world.

“If you talk to a doctor, they’d probably tell you that you should wash your hands more often than you do,” Boona said. “If you talk to different types of engineers, they’ll tell you a building was built the way it was for a particular reason. 

“Everyone filters their take on the world through what they know. For materials engineers, everything is made from something. At CEMAS, I now have the chance to see a lot of those things up close.”

Although his expertise didn’t originate in advanced microscopy, it’s easy to see a connection when bringing his overall academic and professional journey into focus. 

“A physics class in high school changed the way I look at the world,” Boona said. “It was fascinating to me that equations can describe so many different things you see in everyday life. It’s not as random as it seems once you start to learn more about how it all works.”

That early interest guided his studies at the collegiate level. 

Boona earned a Bachelor of Science degree in physics from Northern Illinois University in 2008, followed by a Master of Science degree in applied physics from NIU in 2010. As his expertise developed, so did his interest in materials science. That sparked a desire to focus his Ph.D. in materials science and engineering at Michigan State University. 

“My advisor at Michigan State was someone who I specifically sought out because of the work he was doing,” Boona said. “My arc ended up being more applied physics, and I realized I was very interested in materials. I dove even deeper in my postdoctoral research.”

 

Boona spent four years at Ohio State as a postdoctoral researcher. Initially, he worked with Joseph P. Heremans in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Boona then briefly joined Fengyuan Yang at Ohio State’s Center for Emergent Materials before joining CEMAS. 

“In my case, I didn’t cut my teeth as a microscopist through school,” Boona said. “I come in with a different perspective. I’m not using the skills I gained studying high energy physics every day, but I do have familiarity with a broader range of things.”

That broad perspective is an asset. It helps him when discussing samples, specifically with students. And also helps him relate to individuals and organizations across disciplines interested in leveraging CEMAS. 

“Techniques progress so quickly that a lot of people, who are even familiar with characterization techniques from when they were in school, don’t realize how much things have changed,” Boona said. 

At CEMAS, Boona primarily works with a pair of the center’s most heavily used instruments — the two nearly identical Thermo Scientific Apreo LoVac SEMs. One is modified slightly for advanced analytical research, while the other for high-resolution imaging. His work has an emphasis on characterization.

Looking at his daily schedule, you’ll see a reflection of the breadth of scientific disciplines CEMAS serves. 

“I get to work with researchers from pretty much every department on campus —  whether its people from food science developing new types of bread or individuals observing fungal spores from the International Space Station,” Boona said. “I may be helping someone with a microstructural analysis of 3D printed metals and then 10 minutes later assist someone looking at collagen scaffolds.”

He also has the opportunity to collaborate on industry projects. 

“It can be difficult as an individual researcher to reach a point where your work has a huge impact,” Boona said. “With industry collaborations, they often come to us with some of their biggest or most challenging research questions, and they want us to help them find answers.

“You’re working on something you know is going to have an impact. It’s not just about helping a company make money. It may involve coming together to solve a problem no one else has tried to solve before.”

Boona has contributed to one of CEMAS’s biggest industry collaborations, which includes work on seven different Procter & Gamble brands, such as Pampers®, Pantene®, and Gillette®. CEMAS received one of P&G’s 2018 North America Connect+Develop Awards as a result of the combined effort.

 

And when he needs an extra set of hands, Boona is surrounded by an exceptional team.

“At CEMAS, I’m surrounded by people who know a lot about what they’re doing, and we have such good relationships with the vendors that make the instruments,” Boona said. “If I were in a place with fewer resources and fewer experts, I would’ve had a harder time getting to the point I’m at now within the same period of time.”

Boona became acquainted with CEMAS’s world-class environment for the teaching and practice of advanced microscopy well before joining the staff. He relied on CEMAS for characterization of his own materials while performing cutting-edge research as a postdoc. 

“I started my postdoctoral research in a fairly young and emerging field, so everyone was essentially studying slightly different versions of the same thing — fragile, rigid, thin-film structures,” Boona said. “I had an idea right away for studying the same phenomena in a totally different way. I spent time working on it on the side for the next two to three years trying to figure out how to make it work.”

That idea culminated in a paper published in Nature Communications. The paper describes how Boona and a team of researchers at Ohio State utilized magnetism within a nanocomposite of nickel and platinum to improve the materials’ thermoelectric properties by over a factor of 10. The result was achieved not with a thin film, as had been done previously, but in a thicker piece of metal that more closely resembled components for future electronic devices. Ohio State also highlighted the paper. 

Work was completed at CEMAS to confirm particles in the material were positioned and configured the way the team expected. CEMAS Director David McComb contributed to the piece. 

Another person who played a role in that study was Boona’s wife, Isabel Boona, who worked at CEMAS while he was a postdoc. The pair met at Michigan State before both migrating to Columbus to pursue their professional aspirations. Isabel Boona is currently the microscopy laboratory leader at Owens Corning. 

Although both are microscopy and materials science enthusiasts, away from the lab, they enjoy collaborating on another project — their home. 

“My wife and I spend a lot of time working on our house,” Boona shared. “I’m also pretty consistently watching a lot of college sports. Right now, I’m busy with both basketball and football.”

And as for whether he views college sports through the lens of a Buckeye or Spartan fan… 

“My favorite teams are OSU, MSU, and whoever is playing Michigan,” Boona stated.

 

by Ashley Albertson, ERA Communications Specialist, albertson.29@osu.edu