Sasha has successfully passed his PhD examination with good grades!
During his doctoral research, Sasha worked at SOPSEM group (Prof Dr. Heiß) with pigments and their application in photocatalysis and in electrochromic smart devices. For the photocatalysis Sasha shaped quinacridone to the hedgehog-like nano-microstructures and covered them with platinum, as well as he used pigment-doped carbon nitride. Those systems were able to enhance H2O2 generation from water and showed good stability. Alongside with this Prussian blue and cerium oxide were modified for the smart windows applications. Prussian blue-based inks were optimized to achieve optical transparency without the formation of aggregates. While for the cerium oxide various methods of stripping oleylamine from the surface of nanocrystals were investigated. This improved the electrical conductivity and allowed to utilize it subsequently as an ion storage material. Fabricated electrochromic devices based on Prussian blue and cerium oxide showed improved performance and promising results. Sasha will continue working at HI ERN, investigating the correlation between external influences and the degradation of backside polymer films of PV modules. Congratulations and all the best in the future career!
