Dr. Delia Milliron is recognized with the Norman Hackerman Award in Chemical Research.
She is working to open new windows into understanding nanomaterials, including the new area of plasmonic oxide nanocrystals. Her goal is to develop a robust chemical knowledge of how things work with a goal of ultimately providing solutions to real world needs.
http://che.utexas.edu/2017/03/01/delia-milliron-to-receive-2017-norman-hackerman-award/
A recent article in the New York Times describes Professor Goodenough's story and states, the "new kind of battery that, if it works as promised, would be so cheap, lightweight and safe that it would revolutionize electric cars and kill off petroleum-fueled vehicles".
Link to New York Times: To Be a Genius, Think Like a 94-Year-Old
The Center for Electrochemistry will host its annual workshop over the weekend of February 11-12 in Austin, Texas. Click here for information on the 2017 CEC Annual Workshop on Electrochemistry.
Session topics include nitrogen electrochemistry, platinum dissolution during reduction, and electrochemical energy conversion and storage. Registration is open to all at http://electrochemistry2017.eventbrite.com. UT Austin employees can also register at http://cec.cm.utexas.edu/electrochemistry-workshop-2017.
A recent publication in the journal Nature Materials describes a new flexible composite material and how it can be successfully integrated into high-performance flexible electrochromic devices, such as smart windows.
CEC faculty members Prof. Delia Milliron and Prof. Graeme Henkelman are co-authors on the publication. When incorporated into windows, sunroofs, or even curved glass surfaces, the material should have the ability to control transmission of both heat and light from the sun to improve the energy efficiency of buildings.
The material is based on tin-doped indium oxide (ITO) nanocrystals embedded in a niobium oxide (NbOx) glass, which can be fabricated into electrochromic films using a room-temperature solution process (rather than more conventional processes, which are energy-intensive). The authors discuss that, with this new process, the structure of the NbOx is one-dimensional and chain-like, compared to a typical three-dimensional network obtained from conventional high-temperature thermal processing.
Link: A summary of the paper by the College of Natural Sciences.
Professor Arumugam Manthiram will serve as chief scientist for Battery500, a national consortium to advance battery technology for electric vehicles.
The effort is led by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and funded by the Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. DOE has awarded the consortium this five-year, $50 million project to make smaller, lighter and less expensive batteries that can be adopted by electric vehicle manufacturers. Prof. John Goodenough, inventor of the lithium-ion battery cathode materials, also will contribute his knowledge and expertise to the consortium. Both Prof. Goodenough and Prof. Manthiram are CEC faculty members and professors in UT Austin's Cockrell School of Engineering. Click through for more information.
A special focus issue of the Journal of the Electrochemical Society (JES) honoring Allen Bard has been published, including an introductory commentary co-authored by Shelley Minteer and Henry White of the University of Utah.
White received his Ph.D. from UT Austin in 1983 with Bard as his adviser, and was also the first recipient of the ECS Allen J. Bard Award, given in May 2015 at the ECS meeting in Chicago. This focus issue has been published in recognition of the establishment of this new endowed award.
The focus issue has 24 research articles that demonstrate many of the areas of research that Bard has advanced during his career. The authors of these articles include many former students and postdoctoral researchers. The issue citation is J. Electrochem. Soc. 2016 163(4), and many of the articles are available as open access.
In honor of his recent induction as the 78th Honorary Member of the Electrochemical Society (ECS), the Department of Chemical Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin is hosting a special lecture by Research Professor Adam Heller.
Honorary Membership is one of the oldest Society awards, and is granted for outstanding contributions to ECS. Of the only 20 living ECS Honorary Members, Heller is now the fourth UT Austin electrochemist on the list, joining Larry Faulkner (2003), Allen Bard (2013), and John Goodenough (2013).
Dr. Heller will present his talk “Wealth, Global Warming and Geoengineering,” which he previously delivered as a plenary lecture at the 228th ECS Meeting in Phoenix last October. The event is open-invitation and seats will be available on first-come, first-served basis. Refreshments will be served after the lecture. The event will be held Tuesday, March 22, 2016 at 3:30 pm in CPE 2.218.
ABSTRACT:
The press has done well in telling the public that CO2 emissions and global warming are associated. Many political leaders are committed to reducing CO2 emissions to mitigate global warming through policies and subsidies encouraging energy efficiency and use of renewable energy. What neither the press nor the political leaders publicize is that the underlying cause of the rapid rise in CO2 emissions is the increase of global energy consumption with global wealth, i.e. with the product of the per capita GDP and the world’s population. Global wealth has increased in the past century about 250-fold and its growth is accelerating. A major part of the world’s population has emerged in the recent past from poverty and the world’s fraction of poor people continues to shrink.
About Adam Heller:
Adam Heller’s work in electrochemical engineering has touched the lives of people across the globe. As the inventor of the painless diabetes blood monitor, his developments in healthcare have had enormous societal and economic impact. Heller’s work spans a range of technologies, touching areas related to batteries and energy.
The day following our annual Workshop, the CEC will welcome Metrohm USA for an afternoon session on electrochemical instrumentation and measurements on Monday, February 15, 2016, 1 to 4 pm in Welch Hall.
This workshop is designed to provide the participants with an in-depth understanding of fundamentals and new applications of various electrochemical techniques used in research. This workshop is material based on Metrohm USA's well appreciated customer training materials. Attending this workshop will not only give you a chance to learn about different electrochemical techniques but also a chance to interact with a specialist to find out the best solutions.
Topics:
• Advanced electrochemistry and applications
• Advantages of NOVA 2.0 in various electrochemistry fields
• Spectro-echem applications in the modern world
• Spectro-electrochemistry with SPELEC
Who Should Attend?
Students and researchers in every area of electrochemistry such as solar cells, Spectro-electrochemistry, corrosion, sensors, batteries, capacitors, electro-analytical chemistry, interfacial electrochemistry, thin-films, and so on. Registration is required. Please visit www.regonline.com/MetrohmUTAustin.
The first edition of a new technical journal, ACS Sensors, was published this week featuring a publication from Prof. Crooks's group and cover art by graduate student Josephine Cunningham.
The cover image features a blueprint of a paper-based sensor for detection of proteins using a detection strategy based on galvanic exchange, based on the publication in that issue "Paper-Based Sensor for Electrochemical Detection of Silver Nanoparticle Labels by Galvanic Exchange" (DOI: 10.1021/acssensors.5b00051). The platform and know-how for these types of paper-fluidic sensors have been the subject of intensive research and development in the Crooks lab over the past several years, which has generated a growing portfolio of patents and publications, as well as applications to sensing of a huge variety of targets such as disease markers, biological/chemical weapons, and hormones.
The new journal, ACS Sensors, promises to be an American Chemical Society journal dedicated to all aspects of chemical and biological sensors. The editors intend to publish peer-reviewed research articles, reviews, and opinion pieces regarding conceptual and applied advances in sensing and to represent both academic and commercial sectors.
The full citation for the research paper is:
Cunningham, J. C.; Kogan, M. R.; Tsai, Y. J.; Luo, L.; Richards, I.; Crooks, R. M. "Paper-Based Sensor for Electrochemical Detection of Silver Nanoparticle Labels by Galvanic Exchange" ACS Sens. 2016, 1 (1) 40–47 (DOI: 10.1021/acssensors.5b00051).
The Center for Electrochemistry will host its annual workshop over the weekend of February 13-14 in Austin, Texas. Click here for information on the 2016 CEC Annual Workshop on Electrochemistry.
Session topics include lithium-ion batteries, electron transfer through films, and advanced electrolytes with applications. Registration is open at http://electrochemistry2016.eventbrite.com.