Building and understanding the behaviour of high-performance and sustainable batteries by rationalising structural electrode design

Dr. Nuria Tapia-Ruiz from Imperial College London.

Dear all, 

We are delighted to invite you to SoC seminar featuring  Dr. Nuria Tapia-Ruiz from Imperial College London. 

Abstract: 

New batteries are needed to mitigate climate change and reach a carbon-neutral society. These devices are vital in transport decarbonisation and storing intermittent renewable energy. Diversification of battery technologies with more sustainable materials will be critical to achieve this goal, given issues related to the use of essential elements of some of these devices, such as Li-ion batteries. In my talk, I will provide an overview of my research on Na-ion batteries, a sustainable and low-cost battery technology with first products being commercialised. I will emphasise our work related to the design of novel layered oxide positive electrodes (with and without oxygen redox) and oxide-based and hard carbon negative electrode materials (and their interfaces), highlighting the importance of a multi-technique approach to understand degradation processes happening in these electrodes and their interfaces to provide a rational materials design.

https://www.tapiaruizgroup.com/home

Bio

Nuria Tapia-Ruiz is a Senior Lecturer in Chemistry at Imperial College London. Nuria graduated in Chemistry from the University of Barcelona. After this, she pursued her PhD studies in hydrogen storage materials with Prof. Gregory at the University of Glasgow. She then moved to the University of St. Andrews to work as a Postdoctoral Fellow with Prof. Bruce in energy storage materials. In 2014, she moved with Prof. Bruce and his research group to Oxford (Materials Department, University of Oxford) to work as a Research Fellow where she took up the role of Team Leader of the Sodium-ion battery team. She started her independent career as a Lecturer in Chemistry at Lancaster University in 2017 and was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2020. ​In November 2022, her research group and lab moved to Imperial College London. Dr Tapia-Ruiz has been the recipient of some awards including, the SRUK Emerging Talent Award (2022), the Lancaster Researcher of the Year Award (2021), the Royal Society of Chemistry mobility Award (2019), the CAMS Fellowship Award (2019), the STFC Batteries Proof of Concept Award (2017) and the STFC Batteries Experimental Design Award (2016). 

The Tapia-Ruiz lab consists of a multidisciplinary research group of students and postdocs interested in the Physics and Chemistry of Materials for Energy Storage, primarily in electrochemical energy storage devices such as rechargeable batteries and supercapacitors. Our research aims to provide a rational design of electrochemical energy storage materials (electrodes and electrolytes) to improve battery performance in terms of energy, power, and durability. We are interested in a range of battery chemistries with a particular focus on low cost and sustainability, from Li-ion batteries to post-lithium battery technologies and employ a comprehensive range of lab and synchrotron-based techniques to probe materials at different length scales that allow us to gain insight into the structure-property relationships that govern the electrochemical activity in these materials.