DIFFER researchers have constructed an ingenious plasma-activated electrolysis device that effectively breaks nitrogen gas and splits water into the energy-rich products hydrogen and nitric oxide. Water reduction and nitrogen fixation are key processes in providing fuels and chemical feedstock for wide variety of societal purposes. The sustainable challenge lies in designing all-electric sustainable pathways to replace the conventional, high-temperature industrial processes needed to produce these molecules. The DIFFER device integrates both in an elegant way and recently published their results in ACS Energy Letters!
News
August 14th 2019
August 8th 2019
DIFFER researchers Murat Sorkun, Abhishek Khetan and Süleyman Er have used advanced algorithms to compose a large and reliable database that contains the solubility information of chemicals in water. “Strange as it may seem with respect to the huge importance of employing water as a chemical solvent”, says Süleyman Er, “a reliable, sufficiently large and machine-readable dataset for the development of efficient data-driven models was not available. Until now!” The results are published in Nature Scientific Data.
July 1st 2019
Results published in Nature Communications pave the way to programmable electronic inks.
Conjugated polymers are important materials because of their special electronic and optical properties and low cost, making them very promising for a wide range of applications. An international research team led by Professor René Janssen developed a method to create two subtypes of one polymer, with different semiconductor characteristics, simply by changing the solvent from which the polymer film is created. This opens the door to the development of a programmable electronic inks. The results are published on June 28th in Nature Communications.
June 21st 2019
Vandaag gaf David Pappie, directeur Topsectoren en Industriebeleid bij het ministerie van Economische Zaken & Klimaat (EZK), tijdens de conferentie voor Elektrochemische Conversie & Materialen (ECCM), het startsein voor in totaal 25,7 miljoen euro aan initiatieven op het gebied van duurzame energieopslag en -conversie. Onder coördinatie van een nationale ECCM-commissie is een viertal programma’s bij elkaar gebracht en geïnitieerd. Pappie: “Dankzij ECCM wordt de komende jaren vanuit verschillende sectoren door wetenschap en bedrijfsleven over de hele kenis- en innovatieketen samengewerkt. Dit is nodig om de transitie naar een duurzame energiehuishouding te realiseren.”
May 23rd 2019
DIFFER group leader Thomas Morgan has won a prestigious Vidi grant to investigate the concept of liquid metal layers to protect the walls of future fusion power plants. Liquid metals are exciting as a wall design because they can repair and even shield themselves from the harsh conditions in such an artificial star. Developing robust reactor walls is one of the main challenges in the international quest for clean, safe and abundant fusion energy.
