HZB researcher Olga Kasian honored as young scientist
Prof. Dr. Olga Kasian received the award from the Chairwoman of the Foundation Council, Prof. Dr. Cornelia Denz, who is also PTB President. © Werner-von-Siemens-Ring-Stiftung
Four young scientists received this award in Göttingen. © Werner-von-Siemens-Ring-Stiftung
The Werner-von-Siemens-Ring Foundation has accepted Prof. Dr. Olga Kasian into its network in recognition of her outstanding scientific achievements. Olga Kasian heads a junior research group on electrocatalysis at HZB and is a professor at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU). The foundation has been honoring young researchers in the technical and natural sciences since 1977 and offers them unique opportunities for interdisciplinary networking.
Electrolysis for hydrogen production from renewable energies
Olga Kasian is being recognized for her research activities on electrolysis for hydrogen production from renewable energies. "Green hydrogen as energy storage has a high potential to become a key technology in a carbon-free global energy sector. Thus, it enables the transformation of our energy system in many sectors," Olga Kasian explains the relevance of her research.
To produce "green" hydrogen, the company relies on the electrocatalytic splitting of water with renewable electricity from wind or sun. However, the catalytically active materials used in this process for electrolysis age over time and their efficiency decreases. Olga Kasian is studying these changes at the atomic level in order to target them and improve the stability of the catalytically active materials.
About Olga Kasian
Olga Kasian has headed the Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) since 2019, which focuses on dynamic changes in materials during electrocatalytic reactions. She has been a professor of materials for electrochemical energy conversion at Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) since 2021.
She received her PhD in electrochemistry from the Ukrainian State University of Chemical Technology in 2013. She then worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg. In 2015, she received a fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and moved to the Max Planck Institute for Iron Research in Düsseldorf.
About the award
During a ceremonial award presentation in Göttingen on June 20, 2022, the board of the Werner von Siemens Ring Foundation honored a total of four young scientists. The certificates were presented by Prof. Dr. Cornelia Denz, Chair of the Foundation Council, who is also PTB President. Every two years, the Council of the Foundation honors young scientists who are usually not older than 35 years.
- “Jugend-forscht” winners at HZB (Update)Charlotte Klar and Katharina Austermann (both 18) have already come a long way: With their experiments on pyrolytic graphite, they are trying to solve a puzzle they found in the technical literature on diamagnetism. With their work, they convinced both the Jugend-forscht-Jury at the Berlin South Regional Competition and the Berlin Competition. Now, they will join the national competition which will take place from 18 to 21 May in Bremen.
- Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Grant for Dr. Jie WeiIn April, Dr. Jie Wei started his research work in the Helmholtz Young Investigator Group Nanoscale Operando CO2 Photo-Electrocatalysis at Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) and Fritz Haber Institute (FHI) of the Max Planck Society. Wei received one of the highly competitive Humboldt postdoctoral research fellowships and will pursue his two-year project under the guidance of the academic hosts Dr. Christopher Kley and Prof. Dr. Beatriz Roldan Cuenya.
- Calculating the carbon footprint of publicationsProf. Dr. Jens Eisert heads the Quantum Computation and Simulation research group, which is jointly funded by Freie Universität Berlin and HZB. The theoretical physicist recently received an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council ERC for his research project "DebuQC". But Eisert is not only an award-winning scientist, he is also concerned about global warming. Last year, on the initiative of Ryan Sweke, he and his team published a proposal that deserves attention: scientific publications on theoretical physics or chemistry could include a simple table listing the greenhouse gases emitted during the research. This would raise awareness of the fact that research is not climate neutral.