Meet the researchers: The Unite!Energy Doctoral Candidates
Namitha Nair
DC1 – Carbon nanomaterials with encapsulated metal nanoparticles as electrocatalysts for water splitting
Host institution 1
Politechnika Wrocławka (PWR)
Supervisor: Professor Piotr Rutkowski
Host institution 2
Technische Universität Darmstadt (TUDa)
Supervisor: Professor Jan Philipp Hofmann
My project
​To synthesise carbon nanomaterials with encapsulated metal nanoparticles using catalytic chemical vapour deposition (CCVD) for green hydrogen production from electrochemical water splitting reactions and to study their interfaces and associated material property changes during the reactions.
About me
I have been a passionate science student from my school days which led me to join the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Thiruvananthapuram (IISER-TVM) for a BS-MS dual degree program in 2019. The same year, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded for the development of lithium-ion batteries, which piqued my interest in electrochemical research. I learned about battery and fuel cell systems while working in the Nanomaterials and Energy Devices lab at IISER-TVM. Here I completed my master’s thesis on ‘Enhanced Oxygen Evolution Reaction (OER) in Alkaline Media via Electron Spin Polarization’ for which I synthesized, modified and tested various electrocatalysts for OER.​
Credit: Katrin Binner/TU Darmstadt
The DAAD-WISE Scholarship scheme provided an opportunity to intern at the Institute of Material Physics at the University of Stuttgart. I grew more fascinated after studying about current collector modifications in anode-free lithium metal batteries during the internship. My understanding of electrochemical systems and interfacial interactions in the nano regime has grown as a result of all these projects, and I continue to find the subject intriguing. My goal as a Unite! Energy PhD student is to investigate carbon nanomaterials with encapsulated metal nanoparticles, with an emphasis on how surface interactions and material property changes affect electrocatalytic performance.
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