Materials Needs for Energy Sustainability by 2050: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Host

Y. Shirley Meng, The University of Chicago, Argonne National Laboratory

Y. Shirley Meng is a professor of molecular engineering at the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering. She also serves as the chief scientist of the Argonne Collaborative Center for Energy Storage Science (ACCESS) Argonne National Laboratory.

Her work pioneers in discovering and designing better materials for energy storage by a unique combination of first-principles computation guided materials discovery and design, and advanced characterization with electron/neutron/photon sources. Meng is the principal investigator of the research group - Laboratory for Energy Storage and Conversion (LESC). She has received several prestigious awards, including the Faraday Medal of Royal Chemistry Society (2020), International Battery Association Battery IBA Research Award (2019), Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists Finalist (2018), C.W. Tobias Young Investigator Award of the Electrochemical Society (2016), Science Award Electrochemistry by BASF and Volkswagen (2014) and NSF CAREER Award (2011). Meng is the elected fellow of Electrochemical Society (FECS) and elected fellow of Materials Research Society (FMRS). She serves as the editor-in-chief for Materials Research Society MRS Energy & Sustainability Journal.

Meng received her PhD in Advanced Materials for Micro & Nano Systems from the Singapore-MIT Alliance in 2005, and her bachelor’s degree with first-class honor from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2000. She worked as a postdoctoral research fellow and became a research scientist at MIT from 2005-2007. Meng was the Zable Endowed Chair Professor in Energy Technologies at the University of California-San Diego (UCSD) before joining PME at the University of Chicago.

Panelists

Peter F. Green, National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Peter F. Green is the Deputy Laboratory Director for Science and Technology and the Chief Research Officer for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.  He is a former President of the Materials Research Society (MRS), and a fellow of the American Physical Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry (UK), the American Association of Arts and Science and the MRS. Green earned BA and MA degrees in physics, together in 1981, from Hunter College, and his PhD in materials science and engineering (MSE) in 1985 from Cornell University. Green began his professional career at Sandia National Laboratories, where he spent just over a decade. Subsequently, he became the BF Goodrich endowed Professor of Materials Engineering, and professor of chemical engineering at the University of Texas, Austin. He later became the Vincent T. and Gloria M. Gorguze endowed professor of engineering, professor and chair of MSE, and professor of chemical engineering at the University of Michigan (UM), Ann Arbor. He was the 2022 Distinguished Alumni Awardee for the MSE Department, Cornell University. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Sabrina Sartori, 2023 MRS President, University of Oslo

Sabrina Sartori works as full professor of physics at the University of Oslo, Norway, and leader of the section Energy Systems at the Department of Technology Systems. She studied physical chemistry at the University of Padova and graduated with a PhD degree in materials science and engineering from the University of Bologna in 2003. In 2006, after three years as a post-doc at the University of Padova, she moved to Norway, working as a research scientist at the Institute for Energy Technology before being appointed at the University of Oslo since 2013.

Her research interests are focused on solid-state physics and chemistry including synthesis and characterization of materials for energy conversion and storage, for instance using small-angle neutron and X-ray scattering, in situ and operando synchrotron radiation powder X-rays, and powder neutron diffraction. In particular, she is an expert on hydrogen storage and hydrogen-based systems for vehicular applications and for the integration of renewable energy sources in stationary applications, either grid connected or standalone.

Sartori is leading the master program Renewable Energy Systems at the University of Oslo and is engaged in interdisciplinary collaborative projects with academic and industrial partners for sustainable materials and technology development.

Sartori is active in various scientific committees and organizations and since 2013 is an expert member of IEA Hydrogen Implementing Agreement Task 40 (previous Task 32). Sartori served in the MRS Board of Directors for the period 2015-2017, and has been elected in the presidential line of the Materials Research Society for 2022-2024, serving as President in 2023. 

Yael Vodovotz, The Ohio State University

Yael Vodovotz received her PhD degree from the University of Massachusetts in food science followed by a postdoctoral position at NASA as part of a joint effort between University of Houston and NASA-Johnson Space Center where she worked on various aspects of the Advanced Life Support food system as well as teaching at the University of Houston. Her NASA work continued as an assistant professor at Baylor Medical School, part of the National Space Biomedical Research Institute. She joined The Ohio State Department of Food Science and Technology as an assistant professor in 2000, and is currently a professor. She became center director for the Center for Advanced Functional Foods, Research and Entrepreneurship in 2016. Vodovotz and has been working on physico-chemical and molecular properties of foods and bioplastics and has over 100 publications. She has been working with an interdisciplinary team of researchers from Horticulture and Plant Science and Chemical and Biomplecular Engineering to advance the field of bioplastics for packaging applications and is team lead of Alternative Matters . Key to their approach is to translate innovative research to the commercial market through industry collaborations. She was co-lead of the ERVA (NSF Engineering Research Visioning Alliance) Engineering Materials for a Sustainable Future.