Scientific Program

Alexei Kornyshev graduated in 1970 from the Moscow Institute of Engineering Physics with a degree in theoretical nuclear physics. He matured as a scientist at the Frumkin Institute of Electrochemistry (Acad.Sci.) in Moscow, where he did there his PhD (1974) with Prof. R.R.Dogonadze in Theoretical and Mathematical Physics and DSc in Chemistry (1986), having worked there till 1991. In 1992 he was invited to Research Centre Jülich, Germany, where he then worked for 10 years leading a Theory Division in the Institute for Materials and Processes in Energy Systems of Research Centre “Juelich”, Germany, a position combined later with a Professorship of Theoretical Physics at the University of Düsseldorf. In 2002 he joined Imperial College London where he holds a chair of Chemical Physics since then.
His interests span widely in theoretical condensed matter chemical physics and its application to electrochemistry, nanoscience, biological physics and energy research, using methods of theoretical physics and computer simulations, and working in close collaboration with experimentalists. An author of >300 original, refereed papers published in physics and chemistry journals, and >30 monographic/feature articles and book-chapters, he is known by his works founding works in the theory of solvation; nonlocal dielectric properties of water, nonlocal electrostatics, solid-liquid and liquid-liquid electrochemical interfaces; electron and proton transfer in complex environment (including membranes and complex electrodes) and single molecules (including molecular diodes- jointly with A.M. Kuznetsov and J.Ulstrup); physical theory of fuel cells (with M.Eikerling and A. Kulikovsky); interaction, recognition and assembly of biomolecules, and DNA biophysics. In the latter area he has performed a series of works published together with S.Leikin (NIH) known as Kornyshev and Leikin theory, developed further with his co-workers, D.J.(O’)Lee and A.Wynveen, which included the prediction of a physical mechanism of recognition of homologous genes. He has led the programme of experimental verification of that prediction at Imperial/NIH and jointly with Harvard University (M.Prentiss). Room temperature ionic liquids at electrified interfaces and in nanoconfinement and their applications to supercapacitors and electroactuators is another important direction of his research, where since his pioneering 2007 paper he has published a series of seminal articles jointly with M.V.Fedorov, S. Kondrat, R.Qiao, G.Feng, M.Bazant and others. Together with M.Urbakh and F. Bresme he has been working on the theory of nanoscale friction with ionic liquid lubricants. In 2010 together with M. Urbakh and M.Flatte he has launched a theoretical investigation of self-assembled electrochemically-controlled nanoplasmonic systems, which in cooperation on experimental front with J.Edel and A Kucernak at Imperial College, and D.Sikdar on theory has developed in a new field of electrochemical photonics. This way the Imperial team has built electrotuneable window-mirror, electrovariable colour mirror, electrotuneable SERS sensors, and other funky metamaterials, demonstrating unprecedented harmony between theory and experiments.
Through his research career he has led many international projects with groups in USA, China, Germany, Denmark, Israel, France, Canada, Russia, Ukraine, Estonia, and Poland. He was a recipient of 1991 Humboldt Prize in Physical Chemistry/Electrochemistry, 2003 Royal Society Wolfson Award, 2003 Schönbein Silver Medal (“for outstanding contributions to understanding the fundamentals of fuel cells”), 2007 Barker Electrochemistry Medal (“for his pioneering works and outstanding achievements in the application of modern theory of condensed matter to electrochemical systems”), 2010 Interdisciplinary Prize, Medal and Lectureship of the RSC (“for his many outstanding contributions at the interfaces of chemistry with both physics and with biology”), 1st Lynden-Bell Award (2017) “in recognition of his outstanding career in the field of ionic systems within condensed matter theoretical chemical physics”, and finally 2022 Electrochimica Acta Gold Medal of the ISE. He is an elected/appointed Fellow of four learned societies: IUPAC, Institute of Physics, Royal Society of Chemistry, International Society of Electrochemistry, and is a Foreign Member of the Royal Danish Academy of Science. He was on board of several international journals; currently at Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter (IOP) and Current Opinion in Electrochemistry. He is a honorary Professor of HUST, Wuhan, China, with his research there focussed on novel nanomaterials and scenarios for sustainable energy.

Dr. David Lou received his B.Eng. (1st class honors) (2002) and M.Eng. (2004) degrees from the National University of Singapore. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in chemical engineering from Cornell University in 2008. Right after graduation, he joined Nanyang Technological University (NTU) as an Assistant Professor. He became a Full Professor since September 2015. He was appointed as the Cheng Tsang Man Chair Professor in Energy in 2019. He was elected as a Fellow of Singapore National Academy of Science, and the Academy of Engineering, Singapore in 2022. He joined City University of Hong Kong in February 2023 as a Chair Professor.

His main research interest is on designed synthesis of nanostructured materials for energy applications including batteries, electrocatalysis and photocatalysis. He has published over 380 papers with a total citation of >109,000 (WoS) or >119,000 (Google scholar), and an h-index of 194 (WoS) and 205 (Google scholar) as of December 2022. He was listed as a Highly Cited Researcher by Thomson Reuters/Clarivate Analytics for 9 years consecutively in 2014-2022. He currently serves as a Deputy Editor for Science Advances and an Associate Editor for Journal of Materials Chemistry A.

Mark Orazem is a Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Florida. Prof. Orazem is a Fellow of both the Electrochemical Society and the International Society of Electrochemistry, and he served as President of the International Society of Electrochemistry in 2011-2013. He is a specialist of electrochemical engineering, and his work has encompassed models for cathodic protection of pipeline networks, mechanistic models for corrosion, characterization of electrodes used to stimulate neurons, characterization of enzymatic glucose sensors, electrokinetic separation of clay from effluent produced by the phosphate mining industry, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. He co-authored, with Bernard Tribollet, a textbook entitled Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy, now in its second edition. Both editions were translated into Chinese and published by Chemical Industry Press. His edited book on Underground Pipeline Corrosion was published by Woodhead Publishing in 2014. In 2012, Prof. Orazem received the Henry B. Linford Award of the Electrochemical Society. With his co-author Bernard Tribollet, Prof. Orazem is a recipient of the inaugural 2019 Claude Gabrielli Award for contributions to electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. Prof. Orazem also received the 2022 Electrochemical Society Corrosion Division H. H. Uhlig Award.

Alain Walcarius has been active in research fields at the intersection between electrochemistry, analytical chemistry and materials science. He studied chemistry at the University of Namur (Belgium), graduating in 1989 and earning a PhD degree in 1994. After a postdoctoral stay in the Joe Wang group in New Mexico State University (USA), he joined the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS, France) in 1996 as a Research Associate. He is currently Senior Researcher at the Laboratory of Physical Chemistry and Microbiology for the Materials and the Environment (LCPME, Lorraine University & CNRS, Nancy, France) and Officer at the Chemistry Institute of CNRS in Paris. His electrochemistry group works in the area of chemical reactions at solid/liquid interfaces, and his main recent contributions concern the electrochemistry of sol-gel and mesoporous materials, especially silica-based organic–inorganic hybrids, with applications in the field of electrochemical reactors and sensors. He is author/co-author of about 300 scientific papers and has given more than 100 invited talks. He served as member of several editorial boards (currently Sensors & Actuators B and Electroanalysis). In 2006, he was recipient of the Tajima Prize of the International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE), he became an ISE Fellow in 2016, and he served as the Chair of Division 1 (Analytical Electrochemistry) in 2019/2020. He was awarded the Langevin Prize of the French Academy of Science in 2019.