Nanomaterials play critical roles in numerous energy conversion and storage systems, such as fuel cells, batteries, and supercapacitors. They are used either as the electrodes for cation insertion/extraction or as catalysts to facilitate chemical and electrochemical reactions. The understanding of how nanomaterials change under chemical and electrochemical conditions is beneficial for revealing the reaction mechanism, thus helping the design of efficient energy conversion and storage devices. In this talk, I will focus particularly on the discussion of in situ studies of several nanomaterial systems (e.g., Mg-batteries, fuel cells, catalysts and supercapacitors) using advanced synchrotron X-ray methods. The combination of X-ray Scattering (powder X-ray diffraction, X-ray reflectivity, coherent Bragg rod analysis, etc.) and X-ray spectroscopy (ambient pressure X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, etc.) can provide atomic, chemical and electronic structure information of these nanomaterials in operations. These mechanistic studies can lead to better rational design of nanomateials.

In situ synchrotron x-ray studies of nanomaterials for energy conversion and storage applications

251st National Meeting (2016)

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