Defect Chemistry: The Mechanistic Level of Energy Research by Professor Joachim Maier

NTU MSE Seminar Hosted by Professor Chen Xiaodong

Abstract

Defects are deviations from the fully ordered situation. Point defects in solids such as vacancies or interstitial ions are thermodynamically required and enable the “inner life” in an otherwise completely rigid environment. They enable transport and storage in the solid state. 

The fact that knowledge of their behavior is necessary to mechanistically understand the thermodynamic and kinetic situation in processes such as fuel cells, batteries or photovoltaics, is shown by means of selected examples. 

The special role of interfaces (2D defects) and the varied distribution of point defects in their vicinity is highlighted as well.

Biography


Professor Joachim Maier  
Director Emeritus
Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Stuttgart

Prof. Dr. Joachim Maier is Director Emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, where he served as Director from 1991 to 2023. He studied chemistry and completed his PhD in physical chemistry at the Universität des Saarlandes (1982) and his habilitation at the Universität Tübingen (1988) and has held an Honorary Professorship at the Universität Stuttgart since 1992. A leading figure in solid state ionics and the physical chemistry of solids, he served as Editor-in-Chief of Solid State Ionics and as President of the International Society for Solid State Ionics. His work has been recognised with numerous honours, including the Carl Duisberg Prize, the Hackerman Award of the Electrochemical Society, and the Ross Coffin Purdy and Edward C. Henry Awards of the American Ceramic Society, and he is an elected fellow of academies and societies including the Leopoldina, Academia Europaea, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and IUPAC. He has published more than 1,000 peer-reviewed papers (over 109,000 citations; h-index 172), holds 24 patents, and has delivered more than 600 invited talks.