We have recently been informed that the editors of Nature Communications have put together an Editors' Highlights webpage of recent research called "Energy" and have chosen our article entitled "Knowledge-driven design of solid-electrolyte interphases on lithium metal via multiscale modeling" to be featured!

The Editors' Highlights pages aim to showcase the top 50 papers recently published in Nature Communications. We congratulate all the authors on their great work and wish them many more! To access the page and read the article, please go to ➡️ https://www.nature.com/ncomms/editorshighlights

IAM-ET and our dearest alumni met today on the occasion of the 20th Symposium on Modeling and Experimental Validation of Electrochemical Energy Technologies, which took place in Baden, Switzerland. This exciting meeting enabled a fruitful exchange of knowledge and experience between former and future graduates of our institute! We thank everyone for their contributions ! Our director Prof. Dr. Ulrike Krewer was also present as an invited plenary speaker and presented the research topics of our institute.

On March 12, the President of the European Innovation Council Board, Dr. Michiel Scheffer, visited our institute with his group as part of his visit to KIT. During his visit, our institute director Prof. Dr. Krewer briefly introduced our institute and the working groups. Our PhD students Niklas Oppel, Cedric Großelindemann and Mikhail Gerosimov showed them our laboratories and briefly explained the research topics we are pursuing at the institute. The Vice President for Transfers and International Affairs at KIT, Prof. Dr. Thomas Hirth, accompanied the group thoughout the visit. We would like to thank the head of our institute and our PhD students for their time and look forward to scientific collaborations in the future!

On February 29th we had our annual staff meeting at the institute. The meeting started with a brief introduction by Prof. Krewer, followed by a short introduction of each research group by their group leader. We were also given the safety instructions by our responsible technicians to refresh our memories.

On December 13, IAM-ET held its traditional Christmas party at Campus East, where all staff and students came together and enjoyed the evening with delicious food, music, kareoke and games! We celebrated our hard work and success in 2023 and gathered motivation and energy for the year ahead! #HappyNewYear

Our recent workshop on the "Electrochemical Energy Conversion and Storage" was a resounding success by the participation of our researchers, group leaders as well as our director, Prof. Ulrike Krewer!

From October 16 to 18, we explored various aspects of electrochemistry, shedding light on batteries, fuel cells, electrolyzers, electrocatalysis, electrosynthesis, and microstructures. The workshop proved a treasure trove of knowledge, offering fresh insights and potential solutions to scientific and industrial challenges. This event exemplified once more the power of collaboration and knowledge-sharing, igniting our enthusiasm for our future work on the electrochemical energy conversion and storage technologies! ⚡ #NeustadtRecap

It was a great pleasure to host the ETOS - Electrifying Technical Organic Syntheses Kickoff Symposium at our institute on September 21 and 22!
More than 80 guests from research and industry met at KIT, including key members of the ETOS Steering Committee and the International Scientific Advisory Board. The symposium started with warm welcomes from Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrike Krewer (IAM-ET, KIT) and Prof. Dr. Siegfried Waldvogel (JGU Mainz). The special guests, Prof. Dr. Oliver Kraft (Vice President of KIT), Prof. Dr. Stefan Müller-Stach (Vice President of JGU Mainz), Dr. Anastasia Vogel (BMBF) as well as Dr. Dieter Labruier and Dr. Nathalie Wiaterek (Project Managers of Projektträger Jülich) addressed the audience and emphasized the importance of ETOS. It was a fantastic atmosphere full of motivation as the project aims to make sustainable organic electrosynthesis a key technology in Germany. We congratulate all the contributors and wish them much success on their exciting journey!

Congratulations to our PhD student M.Sc. Swantje Pauer. Her poster contribution presented at the 74th Annual Meeting of the International Society for Electrochemistry (ISE) in Lyon, France, September 3-8, 2023, was awarded the BEST POSTER prize.

Swantje's poster, titled 'Model-based kinetic analysis and identification of the reaction mechanism of cyclohexanone reduction in a PEM cell,' targets the electrification of cyclohexanol synthesis and sheds light on the reaction mechanism behind the process. As an excellent example of interdisciplinary research, it shows how experimental work can be combined with model-based dynamic analysis. This success is a testament to the outcome of a fruitful collaboration with the group of Prof. Mahito Atobe and Prof. Naoki Shida from Yokohama National University, Japan. This partnership was initiated as part of the international activities of the BMBF Cluster4Future ETOS - Electrification of Technical Organic Syntheses and underlines the global impact of ETOS.

In the summer of 2023, we welcomed Ms. Elizabeth Katzman, a dedicated student from Columbia University, within the framework of the DAAD RISE program. During her internship from June 5, 2023 to August 25, 2023, Elizabeth focused on the parameterization and modeling of a high-temperature electrolysis cell under the supervision of Daniel Esau and Cedric Großelindemann. Her contributions are not only an asset to her academic career, but also an asset to our institute's international scientific network.
Elizabeth is the second intern we have hosted under this program, and as such, this collaboration is a good example of our commitment to fostering academic excellence across borders. As we say goodbye to Elizabeth, we look forward to continuing to grow these successful partnerships!

The 10th German-Japanese Symposium on Electrosynthesis (GJSE) was held at Keio University in Yokohama, Japan, from June 14-15, 2023.

This year, the German electrosynthesis community was invited by the Japanese committee consisting of Prof. Dr. Mahito Atobe (Yokohama National University), Prof. Dr. Takashi Yamamoto (Keio University), and Prof. Dr. Naoki Shida, co-chair (Yokohama National University). From IAM-ET, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrike Krewer, Dr. Philipp Röse and M.Sc. Swantje Pauer participated and contributed their engineering perspective on organic electrosynthesis.
The focus of the GJSE is to bring together organic electrosynthesis researchers from both chemistry and engineering backgrounds, and to foster a vibrant exchange of knowledge between Germany and Japan. The synergy between these robust communities is of immense importance as their expertise seamlessly complements each other.
We would like to thank our hosts and look forward to the next meeting and further collaboration.

In mid-March, we were pleased to welcome project partners ("SOE-MOD") from the Netherlands at the IAM-ET.  In a workshop, we were able to give our colleagues from TNO (Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research) and the University of Twente an understanding of how our test benches for high-temperature solid electrolyte cells work. 

We are very glad to welcome Dr. Pooria Hadikhani to our team at the IAM-ET. Pooria was awarded the Young Investigator Group Preparation Program Fellowship (YIG Prep Pro) at KIT to build and lead his post-doc research group for a research project in the field of water electrolysis. His research project aims to increase the understanding of physical phenomena in flow-based electrolyzers. These electrolyzers rely on the fluidic flow instead of membranes for the gaseous product separation. The understandings yielded in this project will lead to design improvements for achieving higher efficiencies and throughputs. We wish Pooria a very good start and a successful time at IAM-ET and KIT.

On January 18, the members of our institute met for the annual IAM-ET General Assembly. In an open and inspiring atmosphere, the group leaders presented highlights from their working groups and Prof. Krewer gave an overview of the past year's achievements as well as the plans for the current year. We look forward to many new projects, working with new colleagues, and a successful year.

On November 3, 2022, we had the pleasure to welcome our colleague Dr.-Ing. habil. André Weber at his inaugural lecture at the KIT Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology. Under the title "Hydrogen Production via Electrolysis", he presented current works on the production of hydrogen by means of different electrolysis processes.
We warmly congratulate him on his successful habilitation in electrical engineering and look forward to future projects and discoveries under his leadership.

Congratulations to our PhD student Janika Wagner (in the picture: 3rd from right) for the poster award at the 773rd WE-Heraeus Seminar Materials and Energy - New Directions for the "Energiewende" of the Wilhelm and Else Heraues Foundation on October 27, 2022. In her poster Kinetic Monte Carlo Simulation of the Growth of SEI at the Li/Electrolyte Interphase, Janika Wagner presents her investigation of the solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) between the lithium metal anode and liquid electrolytes using kinetic Monte Carlo (kMC) modeling. Her work provides a mechanistic understanding of the hitherto incompletely understood degradation of liquid electrolytes in lithium-metal batteries.

At our institute, we not only focus on advancing the field of electrochemical energy technologies, but we also value team building and having fun outside of the lab. On October 21, our group electrocatalysis took a break from research to visit Cage Quests Escape Rooms for a thrilling team building adventure. Split into two groups, our group members collaborated and put their problem-solving skills to the test. Through communication, teamwork, and critical thinking, they overcame obstacles, solved the puzzles and successfully escaped from a the rooms.

Visit from the USA: Dr. Tatyana Reshetenko, Assistant Researcher at Hawai'i Natural Energy Institute, came to IAM-ET for one week as part of a research stay. At her home institute, her research focuses on investigating PEMFC performance under different operating conditions, local variations in MEA material properties, and exposure to fuel, air, and system contaminants using a segmented cell system.

The photo was taken during her presentation "Comprehensive characterization of PEMFC performance using a segmented cell approach" to scientists from IAM-ET and DFG Research Group 2397 - Multiscale Analysis of Complex Three-Phase Systems.

In the summer of 2022, we were pleased to welcome Ms. Kristella Putz (Image: 3rd from the left) from Pennsylvania State University (USA) to our institute for a research internship as part of the DAAD RISE program. The DAAD supports selected projects with a scholarship for the exchange students. Together with her supervisor Mr. Cedric Großelindemann (Image: 3rd from the right), Kristella successfully worked on theoretical as well as experimental problems for high temperature solid electrolyte cells. The exchange promotes our international networking, so we are already looking forward to the next DAAD RISE internship.

We have made it! After more than 1½ years of conception and application phase, "ETOS - Electrification of Technical Organic Syntheses" emerges as one of seven winners of the Clusters4Future competition.

In the two-stage competition, the team of JGU Mainz and KIT headed by Prof. Dr. S. Waldvogel and Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrike Krewer succeeded against 117 applicants in front of a distinguished jury of experts. The Future Cluster will be funded for up to nine years with a maximum of 45 million Euros by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. The first of three implementation phases will begin in February 2023.

More information:
BMBF-Pressemitteilung 49/2022
ETOS.uni-mainz.de
Twitter  | @ETOS_OrgElekSyn
Linked | ETOS

We congratulate our Ph.D. student Walter Cistjakov for the Poster Prize at the 31st Topical Meeting of the International Society of Electrochemistry! In the joint work with the Cluster of Excellence SE2A on “Model based Investigation of Carbon Surface Passivation in Lithium-Sulfur Battery” he shows how to improve the performance of sulfur cathodes. Congratulations!

The project consortium around the BMBF Future Cluster Initiative ETOS (Electrification of Technical Organic Syntheses) is organizing the ETOS Winter School for the first time on January 27 and 28. ETOS plans to be the first large-scale technology platform to combine organic synthesis with electrochemical process engineering to generate novel solutions and key technologies for sustainable processes and products along the entire value chain.

The Winter School will provide undergraduate and graduate students with an overview of the chemical and engineering challenges in developing this alternative technology. Participation in the digital event is free of charge. To register by January 21, 2022, and for more info, visit etos.uni-mainz.de/2021/12/20/winter-school-at-january-2022/.

We congratulate Ms. Johanna Hoppe for the poster award of the 72nd annual meeting of the International Society for Electrochemistry. In her work "Kinetic Monte Carlo simulation of the influence of electrolytes on Li2Scrystal growth" she collaborated with researchers from IAM-ET, TU Braunschweig, KAIST and the University of Bayreuth.

Our electrocatalysis working group spent the 9th of September on the water as part of a team-building trip. In canoes we went on the beautiful Altrheinarm near Leopoldshafen from the Old Harbour to the Schmugglermeer and back again.

Lars Bläubaum has received the Lecture Video Award for the best presentation video at the Advanced Battery Power Conference 2021 with his presentation "Investigation on the Gas Saturation of Electrolyte on the Performance of Lithium-Ion Batteries". The whole team of the IAM-ET congratulates Mr. Bläubaum!

11.01.2021: The Institute for Applied Materials, Sub-Institute Materials of Electrical Engineering (IAM-WET) under the direction of Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrike Krewer will be renamed Sub-Institute Electrochemical Technologies (IAM-ET) by resolution of the Supervisory Board as of 01.01.2021. The IAM-ET will continue to be assigned to Division 3.

We are pleased to announce that effective April 1, 2020, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrike Krewer has taken over the directorate of the IAM-WET. Prof. Krewer is a distinguished researcher with a proven track record of excellence in the field of electrochemical technologies.

Prof. Krewer brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the IAM-WET. Her research interests include electrochemical energy storage and conversion, such as battery, fuel cell and electrolysis technologies. She has published numerous papers in high-impact journals, and her work has been widely recognized by the scientific community.

We look forward to working with Prof. Krewer as she leads the IAM-WET into a new era of excellence and innovation. Please join us in welcoming her to this exciting new role!

As part of the 11th Carl Benz Memorial Lecture, the Carl Freudenberg Prize was awarded on November 28, 2019. The prize has been awarded for more than sixty years to outstanding scientific work at today's KIT. This year, Dr.-Ing. Philipp Braun (in the picture: 2nd from left), an alumnus of IAM-WET, was among the prize winners. He received the award for his dissertation on "Electrical Characterization and Modeling of Solid State Batteries", which he wrote at the Institute and with which he received his PhD with distinction at the KIT Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology in spring 2019.

The model he developed for lithium-ion solid-state batteries allows very precise prediction of performance at an early stage of development: "It shows the advantages of solid-state batteries compared to today's batteries and accelerates the development process from a laboratory cell to a technical system," said award winner Braun about his work. His scientific dream: "Professionally, I hope to work in this highly dynamic environment for many years to come and see the lithium-ion solid-state battery being used everywhere as a matter of course in ten years as lithium-ion batteries are used in our smartphones and electric vehicles today."

As chairman of the jury, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Dr. h.c. Albert Albers (Head of the Institute for Product Development (IPEK) at KIT, far left in the photo), who acknowledged the work of the award winners in his speech, and Dr. Julia Kubasch (second from right), Head of Scientific Networks at Freudenberg Technology Innovation, presented the certificates: In addition to Dr. Braun, Dr. Akanksha Bhutani, Mr. Matthias Luh M.Sc. and Dr. Bartosz Gladysz (from left to right) were pleased to be honored with the Carl Freudenberg Award.

This prize was donated by the Freudenberg Group on the occasion of its 100th anniversary in 1949; it is awarded every two years and this year was endowed with a total of 11,000 euros. The Carl Benz Memorial Lecture was moderated by Prof. Dr. Frank Gauterin (KIT, far right).

Sources: www.freudenberg.com, Jonas Reinemann (IPEK, KIT)

30.10.2019: During a lecture of the IAM-WET at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Brian Schardt, master student of the Electrical Engineering and Information Technology program, was awarded with this year's ITK Student Award . Dr. Sebastian Jakobs, Expert Engineer Functional Safety at the technology company ITK Engineering GmbH (ITK), presented Mr. Schardt with the award, which he received for his student work in which he implemented a modeling approach in Matlab that allows the calculation of battery overvoltages from an impedance. This tool is used, for example, to simulate discharge characteristics of a battery or to predict energy and power densities.

This year, the ITK Student Award was presented for the seventh time to students from all over Germany for their commitment and outstanding final and project work.

Large storage capacities, short charging times and no flammable liquid electrolytes - the solid-state battery should enable safe electromobility with long ranges in the future. In the "FestBatt" competence cluster, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding the development of the next generation of batteries with 16 million euros. Fourteen scientific institutions are involved, including the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). The competence cluster is coordinated by the Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU).

The official press release can be found here.

From September 19-21, 2018, the "6th German-Japan Joint Workshop on Advanced Secondary Battery Technologies" took place at KIT. About 50 invited participants from renowned universities and research institutions from both countries met for this scientific symposium, which is dedicated to promising research work on battery technologies in Japan and Germany on an annual basis. Sponsored by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Japanese New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), the workshop was jointly organized by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ellen Ivers-Tiffée (KIT Institute for Applied Materials) and Prof. Dr. Jens Tübke (Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology) and opened by KIT Vice President for Research Prof. Dr. Oliver Kraft.

Michael Dippon won an award at the 8th AABC Europe 2018 for his poster titled "Temperature Gradients in Lithium-Ion Batteries determined by In-Situ Electrothermal Impedance Spectroscopy (ETIS)".

Photo: © Mike Auerbach for KLiB e. V.

Philipp Braun won 1st place at the 6th Battery Forum Germany with his poster on "Assessment of All-Solid-State Batteries with Different Solid Electrolytes".

Jonglack Kim from the Max Planck Institute for Coal Research has won the Poster Prize at the 51st Annual Meeting of German Catalysts 2018. The poster with the title "Hierarchically porous micromonolithic structures with hybrid backbones as catalysts for intensified syngas-to-liquid processes" contains among others results of a joint project between the IAM-WET and the group of Dr. Prieto at the MPI in Mülheim. We congratulate Mr. Kim and Dr. Prieto!

Our former PhD student Dr.-Ing. Michael Schönleber was awarded the Carl Freudenberg Prize (1st place) for his dissertation "Method for characterizing the low-frequency behavior of lithium-ion batteries". The Carl Freudenberg Prize, which is endowed with 10,000 euros, serves to promote science at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). It is awarded every two years for the best scientific work with a scientific-technical background.
Unfortunately, Mr. Schönleber has left the institute after completing his doctorate and now devotes himself to the industrial implementation of his research results on modeling and simulation of lithium-ion batteries in Batemo GmbH, which he co-founded. We wish Mr. Schönleber all the best on his way and keep our fingers crossed for the success of his company!

Michael Weiss won an award at the 7th AABC Europe 2017 for his poster titled "Lifetime Analysis of Lithium-Ion Batteries by OCV-curve Measurements and Impedance Spectroscopy".

11/23/2016: During the Carl-Benz Memorial Lecture at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Leonie Tatzel, master student of the Electrical Engineering and Information Technology program, was awarded the 3rd prize of the Ernst-Schoemperlen Prize 2016 for her bachelor thesis on "Electrochemical characterization of a commercial high-performance pouch cell". With the Ernst-Schoemperlen Prize, a highly endowed award for outstanding scientific final theses and doctoral dissertations of KIT in the field of automotive engineering and automotive economics has existed in the region for about 25 years. With a total sum of € 10,000, this award stands out from the multitude of existing prizes.

IAM-WET and its research work in the field of electromobility are part of a new image film about the Institute for Applied Materials (IAM) of KIT. This film was currently produced in the broadcasting format MRS-TV of the renowned Materials Research Society (MRS), which portrays worldwide leading research institutions in the field of materials science.

You can find a link to the film here.

The Christian Friedrich Schoenbein Medal in Silver was awarded this year to our colleague Sebastian Dierickx during the "European SOFC & SOE Forum 2016" in Lucerne for his scientific contribution "Electrochemical Analysis of Sulfur Poisoning in Ni/8YSZ Cermet Anodes".

The award recognizes scientists for their research work in the field of high temperature fuel cells. The "European SOFC & SOE Forum", which was attended by 500 international participants, is one of the world's most outstanding scientific events in this field. The IAM-WET team was represented there with 4 lectures and 4 posters.

Dipl.-Ing. Torsten Breitel (ITK Engineering AG), award winner Ravindra Goyal B. Sc. (IAM-WET), Dipl.-Ing. Michael Schönleber (supervisor at IAM-WET) and Dr.-Ing. Wolfgang Menesklou (IAM-WET).

The 2015 ITK Student Award was presented to Mr. Ravindra Goyal for his Bachelor thesis in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology. During the Sensors lecture in October, Dipl.-Ing. Torsten Breitel from ITK Engineering AG presented the award to Ravindra Goyal. The Bachelor graduate convinced the international technology company with his outstanding Bachelor thesis in the Electrical Engineering and Information Technology course. His thesis dealt with the "Validation of impedance spectra of electrochemical systems" and was an assignment of the research group Batteries at IAM-WET.

The ITK Student Award is presented to the best students of ITK Engineering's partner universities from all over Germany. Students are awarded for particularly good project work or final theses with practical relevance in technical courses of study.

The Electrochemical Society (ECS) has awarded Professor Dr.-Ing. Ellen Ivers-Tiffée, head of the Institute for Applied Materials - Materials of Electrical Engineering at KIT. Materials of Electrical Engineering at KIT, on the basis of her scientific in the field of electrochemistry of high-temperature fuel cells and lithium-ion batteries. and lithium-ion batteries. The presentation of the certificate took place during the 228th ECS Meeting in Phoenix, Arizona (USA) in October 2015. The ECS, founded in 1902, is one of the world's most important scientific societies in the field of solid-state and electrochemistry. electrochemistry and comprises more than 8000 members in more than 70 countries.

One of the first vehicles fully tailored to the requirements of electric mobility from a German manufacturer, the BMW i3, was delivered to the IAM-WET on 28.10.14. The vehicle has a purely electric range of about 140 km, which can be increased to about 300 km with the help of a range extender. An interface for reading out battery-relevant data is being installed by BMW AG and enables the investigation of battery behaviour under freely definable driving profiles as part of a joint research project. The picture shows the head of the IAM-WET, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ellen Ivers-Tiffée, and the scientific staff members Dipl.-Ing. Michael Weiss, Dr.-Ing. Jörg Illig and Dipl.-Ing. Michael Schönleber collecting the vehicle at BMW-Welt in Munich.

The Christian Friedrich Schönbein Medal in Gold was awarded this year Mrs. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ellen Ivers-Tiffée from the Institute for Applied Materials - Materials in Electrical Engineering (IAM-WET) at KIT during the "European SOFC & SOE Forum" in Lucerne. The award honors scientists for their research work in the field of high-temperature fuel cells. The "European SOFC & SOE Forum", which was attended by 500 international participants, is one of the world's outstanding scientific events in this field. The IAM-WET team was represented there with six talks and 4 posters.