Tailoring electrocatalyst materials at the nano-scale: Enhancing activity, selectivity, and stability for energy conversion reactions
Thomas F. Jaramillo
Department of Chemical Engineering
Stanford University
Tuesday, December 13
4:15 PM
Room 66-110
Abstract
Chemical transformations are ubiquitous in today's global-scale energy economy. The ability to catalyze chemical reactions efficiently will continue to be critically important as we aim to enable a future energy economy based on renewable, sustainable resources. This talk will focus on our efforts to develop catalytic materials for the low-temperature, electron-driven production and consumption of chemical fuels, reactions that could play key roles for future energy technologies. The reactions we seek to catalyze include: (1) H2 generation from water and (2) the synthesis of alcohols and hydrocarbons from CO2, and (3) the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), reducing O2 to H2O. Reactions (1) and (2) are relevant to the synthesis of chemical fuels from renewable resources (e.g. wind and solar), while reaction (3) is a major technical obstacle at the cathode in low-temperature fuel cells. Common catalyst materials for these reactions face challenges in terms of activity, selectivity, stability, and/or cost and earth-abundance. This talk will describe approaches used in our research group to understand the governing principles guiding the reaction chemistry, as well as strategies to tailor the surface chemistry of materials through control of morphology, stoichiometry, and surface structure at the nano- and atomic-scale in order to overcome performance barriers in catalyzing these reactions, particularly for low-cost, earth-abundant materials.
About the speaker
Thomas Francisco Jaramillo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Stanford University. Jaramillo is from San Juan, Puerto Rico, and came to Stanford University to pursue his B.S. in Chemical Engineering. Jaramillo then continued his education at the University of California at Santa Barbara, earning his M.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering. Jaramillo then conducted post-doctoral research at the Technical University of Denmark in the Department of Physics, as a Hans Christian Ørsted Post-doctoral Fellow. Jaramillo returned to Stanford in Fall 2007 to start his independent research career, where he has won a number of awards for his research efforts, including the U.S. Dept. of Energy Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Program Research & Development Award (2011), the National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award (2011), the Mohr-Davidow Ventures (MDV) Innovator Award (2009), the Hellman Faculty Scholar Award (2009), and the NSF BRIGE Award (2008).
