Tuesday, October 5, 2021 featured:
Raffaella Buonsanti from École Politechnique Feědeěrale de Lausanne (EPFL)
"Colloidal chemistry for controlled and tunable electrocatalysts"
Abstract:
Affordable clean energy and climate action are two of the sustainable development goals set by the United Nations to be achieved by 2030. The vast majority of energy technologies relies on nanomaterials and their progress is strongly connected to the ability of materials chemists to tune their property and function-dictating features.
In this talk, I will present our group efforts towards the synthesis of atomically defined nanocrystals with properties of interest for energy conversion applications. In particular, I will discuss our studies on the synthesis development and formation mechanism of Cu nanocrystals. I will illustrate how these NCs with precisely tunable shapes, sizes and interfaces serve as ideal platforms to advance our current knowledge towards improved selectivity in the electrochemical CO2 reduction reaction. Finally, I will share our results evidencing that these NCs can sustain their catalytic activity and selectivity at technologically relevant conditions, therefore might also offer practical solutions.
Bio:
Raffaella Buonsanti received her master degree in Chemistry from the University of Bari. After been awarded her PhD in Nanochemistry from the University of Salento, she spent almost six years at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, first as a postdoctoral researcher at the Molecular Foundry, after as a staff scientist at the Joint Center of Artificial Photosynthesis. Since November 2015, she is a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at EPFL. Professor Raffaella Buonsanti has co-authored a total of 97 peer-review publications in international journals. These publications have received over 6000 literature citations and an h-index of 40. She has received an ERC Starting Grant in 2016 and numerous awards, including the Swiss Chemical Society Werner Price in 2021 and the European Chemical Society Lecture Award and the Royal Chemical Society ChemComm Emerging Investigator Lectureship in 2019. She is also the chair-elect of the Nanoscience Subdivision of the ACS Division of Inorganic Chemistry and is an Associate Editor of ACS Catalysis.
Host: Prof. Sen Zhang, University of Virginia