Heather Au
Work Package 1
Heather was a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at Imperial College London working on cathode development as part of Work Package 1. She graduated with an MSci in Natural Sciences (Chemistry) from the University of Cambridge and went on to gain a PhD from Imperial College developing covalent modification strategies on carbon nanomaterials. She has held postdoctoral research positions at Queen Mary University of London and Imperial College, investigating the charge storage mechanisms in hard carbon anodes for sodium-ion batteries.
Heather is presently a Co-investigator on LiSTAR based at Imperial College London.
Xiaoyu Dai
Work Package 1,2,3
Xiaoyu began LiSTAR phase 2 as a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at University College London working on LiS electrode microstructure characterization and modelling. She previously graduated with an MSc in Materials Science and Engineering from the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland) and went on to gain a PhD in Energy at the same university with a focus on numerical characterization and engineering of transport in morphologically complex heterogeneous media. We would like to thank Xiaoyu for her contribution to the project.
Sam Fitch
Work Package 4
Samuel is a Faraday Institution Research fellow based at the University of Southampton working on electrolyte developments and electrochemistry as part of Work package 2. He graduated with an MSc Chemistry by Research in 2016 and he is in progress to complete his PhD at the University of Southampton in 2020, evaluating metal nitrides as suitable negative electrode materials for lithium and sodium ion batteries.
Mengjun Gong
Work Package 5
Mengjun was a final-year PhD student working as a Research Assistant on the LiSTAR project, based at Imperial College London. She worked on developing new cathode materials to improve the kinetics of the Sulfur reaction. She studied the materials using Rotating Ring Disk Electrode, for greater implementation in a coin cell format. She achieved her BSc in Chemistry in 2018 and in 2019 she was awarded the Basil Furneaux Memorial Fund for her MRes Green Chemistry degree from Imperial College London. In the same year, she started her PhD in non-precious metal catalysts as cathode materials for fuel cells, completing in 2023.
Project Lead
Jen Hack
Jen was Project Lead on the LiSTAR project, based at UCL. Prior to joining the LiSTAR team, she held an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellowship at UCL Chemical Engineering, investigating zinc-air battery anode shape-change and failure. Jen received an MChem from Durham University in 2015 and her PhD in fuel cells from UCL in 2021. Her research interests focused on the use of X-ray and neutron imaging techniques for studying performance and degradation of electrochemical devices, as well as engineering electrode designs with enhanced properties to extend device lifetime and mitigate failure.
Alexander Kibler
Work Package 2
Alexander was a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at the University of Nottingham working on the design, synthesis and application of redox mediators in next-generation batteries. After completing his MSc in Chemistry from the University of Nottingham in 2015, he completed his PhD in Sustainable Chemistry at the University of Nottingham 2019 investigating the electronic properties and photocatalytic activity of hybrid organic-inorganic polyoxometalates.
Alexander joined UCL in 2024 and is now a Co-I on the project.
Zhuangnan Li
Work Package 1
Zhuangnan was a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at the University of Cambridge working on cathode development as part of Work Package 1. After completing his MEng in material science at the University of Manchester, he gained a PhD in chemistry from University College London in 2020, investigating graphene-based materials for electrochemical energy storage.
We would like to thank all LiSTAR Phase 1 Research Fellows for their invaluable research and contributions to the first phase of the LiSTAR project which ran from 1st October 2019 to 31st March 2023. Phase 2 commenced on 1st April 2023 and will run to 31st March 2025.
Ismail Sami
Work Package 1
Ismail is a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at the University of Cambridge. He completed his MPhys in Theoretical Physics at the University of Manchester, with a year abroad at the University of California, Berkeley. After graduating with a MRes in Engineering at the University of Cambridge, he continued on to gain a PhD in developing layered materials for energy storage.
Ye Wang
Work Package 1
Ye Wang was a Faraday Institution Research Fellow based at University of Cambridge working on Work Package 1. She obtained her BEng from Xiamen University, China in 2015 in materials science and engineering. After that, she went to the Institute of Supramolecular Science and Engineering (Strasbourg, France) for her Master (2017) and PhD study (2021) investigating chemical functionalization of 2D materials.