News
This is what we have been up to....
New team photo
left-to-right: Joshi, John, Rose, Michael, Christina, Suneet, Niels, Arya, Jordan
Missing: Isabel, Rylee, Sanja
Welcome to the team
Isabel officially started her PhD in our group at TU Darmstadt. We are excited to have her join the team, and hopefully visit Arizona soon! Isabel will work on the DFG-funded project on magnetic 2D MXenes.
Mini group hike
It was National Science Day and we celebrated with donuts and a mini group hike around Papago Park.
Niels is visiting
We went for a happy lunch to celebrate Niels visiting us from TU Darmstadt for 2 weeks!
Latest group publication
This one is not a MAX phase! It highlights the power of sol gel-based syntheses and how the ingredients of the gel influence the magnetic properties of the antiperovskite Mn3GaC.
Congratulations, Niels!
Talk at Mines
Christina was invited to give a talk in the Chemistry Department at the Colorado School of Mines. It was a fun two days meeting old and new friends, discussing with students and hiking mountains.
Rose and Rylee present a poster at the Western Coatings Symposium
Grad student Rose and undergraduate student Rylee had the opportunity to present their work at the Western Coatings Symposium. Well done!
Two group talks @ECOSS36
Niels and I presented at the 36th European Conference on Surface Science that took place in Lodz, Poland, this week. It was fun to connect with other researchers interested in MAX phases and MXenes. And great job, Niels!
Isabel defends Master
Time flies! This week Isabel gave her Master talk at TU Darmstadt, and defended her Master thesis. Great job and we are excited to have you start your PhD project this fall!
Rose's poster @NASSCC
It is early August and the North American Solid State Chemistry Conference is underway!
Rose is representing the group and presenting her work titled "Structural Analysis of the MAX phase (Mo0.75V0.25)5AlC4 and its MXene (Mo0.75V0.25)5C4Tx"
Latest Group Review
Who needs another review on MAX phases and MXenes? We do! And we did! We focus on the synthesis science and more exotic members of these two families and also discuss MAB phases.
Check it out!
Open access thanks to TU Darmstadt!
Last REU week
10 weeks REU program flew by! Last week, Lauren presented her infographic on the work she has done in the group. Excellent job, Lauren, we will miss you!
Niels' talk @ECerS
In July Niels represented the group at the Conference of the European Ceramics Society in Lyon, France. He gave an excellent talk
"Wet-chemical assisted synthesis of nitride and carbonitride MAX phases".
Rose's 1st first-author paper
Huge collaborative effort with fantastic scientists at NIST, UCL (UK) and the Diamond Light Source (GER). We study the structure of an interesting "514" MAX phase, exfoliate it with different etchants and look at the electrocatalytic behavior of its 2D sibling. Congratulations, Rose!
Welcome Lauren
Meet Lauren Driggers who joined our group for the 10-week REU program in Sustainable Chemistry and Catalysis. We are excited to have you, Lauren!!
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Christina gets tenure
The good news hit the group on May 5th, 2023.
Here is what Christina has to say:
"Thinking about what got me to this moment in my life... Parents that raised me believing that I can achieve anything in life, friends that made studying and lab work at the University of Mainz fun, supportive advisors that opened doors for me and walking through them even when it was scary, making life-long connections and friendships at UCSB, seizing every opportunity to travel and live in a different country, including time at Seoul National University, endless support from family when the boys were little and I thought about quitting more times than I can count, a dedicated team that makes coming into work fun and easy and students that trust me to be a part of their own journey, many colleagues at ASU that have believed in me and gave me space to grow, and the humans closest to me, family and friends that see me and that I am so grateful to always have in my corner. To all of you - thank you"
Latest group publication
Another excellent collaboration within our Collaborative Research Center Hommage where we provide a fundamental strategy for the preparation of bulk magnetic MAX phases. The work is published in Chemistry of Materials.
Congratulations, Niels!
GrouP hike celebrations
Group hike and brunch get-together to celebrate numerous achievements of our group members.
Thank you for coming out, everyone!
Congratulations, Rose and John
...for winning the Distinguished Teaching Assistant Award.
This is a great achievement and shows their commitment to our undergraduate students at ASU.
Rose, 2nd from left - John, 7th from left.
This is a great achievement and shows their commitment to our undergraduate students at ASU.
Rose, 2nd from left - John, 7th from left.
Congratulation, Rylee
Our undergraduate student Rylee won the School of Molecular Sciences Scholarship.
This is a fantastic achievement and we the whole team is proud of her!
This is a fantastic achievement and we the whole team is proud of her!
Congratulations, Sanja
Sanja succesfully defended her Bachelor Thesis at TU Darmstadt.
Wonderful talk and all questions from the committee handled really well. We are proud of you!
Wonderful talk and all questions from the committee handled really well. We are proud of you!
Congratulations, Jordan
Jordan passed his Orals this semester.
Officially a PhD candidate!
January 2023: Birkel Lab Arizonaversary
4 years Birkel Lab @ASU