Madeline is a PhD candidate in chemistry working in the lab of Prof. Nate Lewis. She graduated from the University of Arkansas in 2017, with a BS in chemistry and a minor in sustainability. At Arkansas, Madeline developed new electroanalytical tools to explore diffusion in electrochemical systems towards the generation of new sensor technologies, and also worked for the Office for Sustainability, focusing on improving waste management within student organizations. Currently, Madeline is developing an inorganic phototropic growth process for semiconductor materials. This process is inspired by natural phototropism wherein plants like palm trees grow toward the sun to maximize light collection. Madeline aims to copy this process at a size scale approximately a billion times smaller and investigate the way that tuning the input illumination (analogous to the sunlight in natural systems) can direct semiconductor growth and structure evolution at the mesoscale. This work will produce a bench-top, template-free, and high-throughput method to generate intricate nanostructured architectures over macroscopic areas that are generally useful and have potential application in the generation of high-efficiency solar absorbers and platforms for catalysts used to drive environmentally-important chemical transformations.
RSI Research: Evolution-Optimized Design and Synthesis of Complex Mesostructures for Effective Light Harvesting and Chemical Production
