School of Chemistry Colloquium: Dr Robert Weatherup (University of Oxford) Revealing Reactions at Electrochemical and Catalytic Interfaces with Operando X-ray Spectroscopy

The performance of materials for energy storage and conversion depends critically on reactions taking place at the interfaces between these materials and their operating environment. As the reaction conditions change, so too do these interfaces, with often dramatic effects on their structure and chemical state. Understanding the evolution of interfaces under realistic conditions is thus critical to the selection and design of improved materials. However, it is extremely challenging to extract this information during operation, due to interference from the bulk phases either side of these buried interfaces, which disturb most interface-sensitive probes.
I will summarise our recent efforts in developing and applying operando approaches for determining the chemical evolution of electrochemical (solid-liquid) and catalytic (solid-gas) interfaces. This includes enclosed reaction cells sealed with X-ray/electron-transparent membranes such as thin (