News

	October 2020 Several NanoChemistry group members attend the Annual Meeting of the Danish Electrochemical Societry, where posters were presented by PhD students Fangyuan Diao and Xiaomei Yan, and Senior Researcher Christian Engelbrekt. October 2020 Christian joins the 2020 edition of the nanoGe Fall Meeting (https://www.nanoge.org/OnlineNFM20/home), where he presents the poster Au-Pt Core-Shell (Au@Pt) Nanocrystals (NCs) and Plasmon-Mediated Energy Funneling to the NC Surface. The high-resolution poster can be downloaded here. September 2020 MSc student Sandra Harfmann Raun starts a special course, where she will develop methods for the synthesis and electrochemical testing of bimetallic nanoporous films. August 2020 Christian participates in ISE Belgrade online conference August 31^st to September 2^nd presenting the posters “Cysteine Self-Assembly on Au(100) Studied by In Situ STM, Voltammetry and DFT” https://annual71.ise-online.org July 2020 Sandra Harfmann Raun successfully defends her bachelor thesis Plasmon-Driven Photoelectrochemistry of Bimetallic Nanoporous Films supervised by Senior Researcher Christian Engelbrekt. The project was evaluated by Senior Specialist Jacob L. Bonde from Danish Technological Institute and received top marks. April 2020 Our paper “Efficient Plasmon-Mediated Energy Funneling to the Surface of Au@Pt Core–Shell Nanocrystals” was highlighted on the April issue of ACS Nano. The work was done during Christian’s time at UC Irvine in collaboration with Assoc. Prof. Matt Law, Distinguished Prof. of Chemistry Ara Apkarian and Dr. Dmitry Fishman. The paper presents an atomistic model of small core-shell nanocrystal and photoexcited carrier dynamics enabled by synchrotron photoelectron spectroscopy and ultrafast transient absorption spectroscopy. These results reveal how hot carriers are efficiently funneled to the catalytic platinum sites at the surface of the nanocrystals.
	February 2020 We warmly welcome BSc student Sandra Harfmann Raun who joins the group for her bachelor thesis project “Plasmon-driven photoelectrochemistry of bimetallic nanoporous films” under the supervision of Senior Researcher Christian Engelbrekt. Sandra will study the exciting plasmonic photocatalytic properties of these newly developed gold-platinum nanoporous films with their prospects for photocatalytic water splitting.
	February 2020 Frederick Stappen Nielsen successfully defended his PhD thesis “Functional gold nanomaterials and graphene platinum catalysts for electrochemical energy conversion” supervised by Jingdong Zhang, Christian Engelbrekt, Jens Ulstrup and Jens Øllgaard Duus.
	February 2020 Associate Professor Björn Wickman from Chalmers University of Technology visited the group and gave a Department seminar, “Electrocatalytic nanomaterials for tomorrow’s fuel cells”.
	October 2019 Our recent work is featured on the cover of the Oct. 6 issue of Nanoscale, and the Oct. 17 issue of Journal of Physical Chemistry C. You can read the papers here and here
	September 2019 Together with the DTU ChemClub, Christian organized the first DTU Chemistry Young Researcher Mini Symposium with the topic ”Catalysts in Action”. The well-attended symposium had a very exciting and diverse program with PhD students and postdocs from Queen’s College New York, College of Staten Island, Uppsala University, DTU Nanolab and DTU Chemistry. The aim was for young researchers to learn about cutting edge science from different fields all related to the topic of watching catalysts in action to inspire new ideas and collaborations.
	August 2019 Collaborative work between DTU Chemistry, Kazan National Research Technological University and Xiamen University is published in the journal Nanoscale with the titleChemistry of cysteine assembly on Au(100): electrochemistry, in situ STM and molecular modeling. The paper is selected as a “2019 Nanoscale HOT Article” and will be featured on the cover.
	June 2019 The paperImplications of byproduct chemistry in nanoparticle synthesisis published in J. Phys Chem. C and will be featured on the front cover. This work is a collaboration between research groups at DTU Chemistry, UC San Diego and UC Irvine.
	June 2019 Christian presents his independent postdoc work at the annual meeting of the Danish Chemical Society at Copenhagen University with a poster titledShell-localization of light energy in Au@Pt NPs: A photoelectron and ultrafast transient absorption spectroscopy study.
	April 2019 Christian visits the group of Prof. Tönu Pullerits at Lund University to explore future collaboration on plasmonic chemistry. Christian gives a short seminar with the titlePlasmonic photocatalysis: Driving or enhancing chemical reactions via excitations of plasmons.
	December 2018 Christian finishes his work at UC Irvine and returns to DTU in Denmark to finish the project.
	October 2018 Christian participates in the Kratos Analytical North American Users’ Meeting at UC Irvine about new research and best practices of using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy.
	July 2018 A second round of experiments are undertaken at the Antares beamline of Synchrotron Soleil (Paris). Christian, PhD student Wei Huang and senior researcher Kaibo Zheng. Nano-ARPES is used to map the spatial distribution of gold and platinum in nanoporous films.
	May 2018 Christian and postdoc Nedjeljko Seselj visits the National Fuel Cell Research Center at the University of California Irvine.
	March 2018 Christian, PhD student Wei Huang and senior researcher Kaibo Zheng travel to Synchrotron Soleil (Paris) as part of the MAX4ESSFUN Interreg projectStructural Study of Nanoporous Gold Films Engineered by Platinum Adlayers for Catalysisof which Christian is a co-supervisor. At Soleil, photoelectron spectroscopy is carried out at the Antares beamline.
	January 2018 The paperTailored Electron Transfer Pathways in Au_core/Pt_shell–Graphene Nanocatalysts for Fuel Cellsby Nedjeljko SeseljChristian EngelbrektYi DingHans Aage HjulerJens UlstrupJingdong Zhang is published in Advanced Energy Materials.
	October 2017 Christian and PhD student Frederick Stappen visited Chinese partner universities as part of the International Network Programme “Establishment of Danish-USA-Chinese Network on Theranostic Nanomaterials for Cancer”. Christian gave the seminarsBrief Introduction to the NanoChemistry Group at Technical University of Denmark (DTU)at Sichuan University (Chengdu), and Southeast University (Nanjing). During the same trip, Christian presented the talksPlasmonic Photocatalysis – Plasmon-enhanced and -driven chemical reactionsat Shandong University (Jinan), andIntro to DTU, UCI, and main research interestsat Tianjin University of Technology, TUT (Tianjin). In addition, Christian and Frederick visited the Center for Electron Microscopy at TUT, and East China University of Science and Technology (Shanghai).
	August 2017 Mikkel Undall-Behrend Christiansen successfully defends his MSc thesisFunctionalization of Nanoporous Gold Films via Chemical Modification. The project was supervised by Jingdong Zhang and Christian Engelbrekt.
	July 2017 Christian attends the EuCheMS Inorganic Chemistry Conference (EICC-4) in Copenhagen, and is co-author of three posters:Unexpected interactions between gold and N-morpholino-sulfonatespresented by PhD student Frederick Stappen,Chemical Synthesis and Electrochemical Characterization of Nanoporous Gold filmsby MSc student Mikkel Christiansen, andSide Effect of Good’s Buffers on Optical Properties of Gold Nanoparticle Solutionsby Postdoc Michal Wagner. MSc student Gerard Montserrat Sisó successfully defends his thesisLight driven evolution of gold nanoparticle morphology and propertiesevaluated by Prof. Kjeld Schaumburg from Roskilde University.
	June 2017 The first annual NSC-CaSTL symposium is held in Tervakosken Tervaniemi and University of Jyväskylä in Finland.
	May 2017 Christian visits the groups of Prof. Lixin Ma at University of Missouri and Prof. Jun Lou at Rice University. During the visits, Christian gave the seminarBrief introduction to the NanoChemistry group at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU)and got a tour of the facilities.
	April 2017 Christian attends the 2018 SCSMM Spring Symposium held by the Southern California Society of Microscopy and Microanalysis at UC Los Angeles.
	March 2017 Christian joins the Center for Chemistry at the Space-Time Limit (CaSTL) as a visiting research scholar. CaSTL is an NSFCenter for Chemical Innovationwith members from University of California Irvine, Northwestern University, PennState University, University of Utah, University of Pittsburgh and University of Jyväskylä.The is to develop the essential science and technology to probe single chemical events in real space and time.The tools are designed to unravel elementary steps in chemistry, in heterogeneous and nanocatalysis, and in photophysics.The ultimate aim is to apply such tools to address grand challenges in chemistry. Christian participated in the 3^rdPan American Materials Congress and the 146^thAnnual Meeting of the Minerals, Metals & Materials Society in San Diego, California. He presented the posterPlasmon-enhanced solar fuel production with gold-metal oxide hybrid nanomaterials. Christian took the opportunity to visit collaborators at UC San Diego and discuss current joint projects.
	February 2017 Gerard Montserrat Sisó joins the project and starts his master projectLight-driven evolution of gold nanoparticle morphology and propertieswith Christian Engelbrekt and Qijin Chi as supervisors. Gerard will look at stability and morphological changes to gold colloids while they are excited with visible light.
	September 2016 Christian Engelbrekt presented his recent results with a poster at the International Conference on Advances in Semiconductors and Catalysts for Photoelectrochemical Fuel Production in Berlin, Germany.
	August 2016 Working with solar energy research has its benefits. Investigating how gold nanoparticles and sunlight can purify water means doing experiments in the sun. Christian Engelbrekt is working with plasmon-based photocatalysis at University of California Irvine. The first section of his collaborative project between UCI and DTU runs for 6 months until August 2016 after which the work is brought further at DTU. Christian demonstrated how sunlight and gold nanoparticles can be used to distil water to a group of 15 3rd-5th grade teachers from Orange County as part of theEquitable Science Curriculum Integrating Arts in Public Education(ESCAPE) program.
	July 2016 The recent paper ”Side Effects of Good’s Buffers on Optical Properties of Gold Nanoparticle Solutions” is highlighted on the inside cover of the special issue of ChemElectroChem on monolayer-protected clusters.Read the inside cover.
	May 2016 Christian participates in the Kratos Analytical North American Users’ Meeting at UC Irvine about new research and best practices of using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy.
	April 2016 The article'Atomically Thin Pt Shells on Au Nanoparticle Cores: Facile Synthesis and Efficient Synergetic Catalysis' is selected as a Hot Article for 2016 and as such it has been included in the Hot Article 2016 web collection for Journal of Materials Chemistry A which can be viewedhere.
	September 2015 DKK 10 mill. from DFF to DTU Chemistry Christian Engelbrektreceives DKK3.471.711 kr.to the project'Development of new metal oxide/noble metal hybrids as plasmonic bi-functional nanocatalysts for solar energy.' Read the news(in Danish)
	The DFFawards millions to promising talents Read the news on www.dtu.dk(in Danish)

Updated by Jakob Mikael Espersen on 2 November 2020