PLENARY SPEAKERS

Mildred Dresselhaus, MIT
Presentation: "Addressing Grand Energy Challenges Through Advanced Materials"

Mildred Dresselhaus is an Institute Professor of Electrical Engineering and Physics at MIT. She has been active in many aspects of materials research with particular emphasis on carbon science including nanostructures such as carbon nanotubes, but also including bismuth nanowires and other materials systems relevant to low dimensional thermoelectricity. She is the recipient of the National Medal of Science and 21 honorary degrees worldwide. She has served as President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Treasurer of the National Academy of Sciences, President of the American Physical Society and is currently Chair of the Governing Board of the American Institute of Physics. She is also a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the American Philosophical Society, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She served as the Director of the Office of Science at the DOE in 2000--2001 and co-chaired a DOE report "Basic Research Needs for the Hydrogen Economy (2003).

Michael Gräetzel, Ecole Polytechnique de Lausanne
Presentation: "The Advent of Mesoscopic Solar Cells"

Professor at the Ecole Polytechnique de Lausanne, Michael Graetzel directs there the Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces. He discovered a new type of solar cell based on dye sensitized mesoscopic oxide particles and pioneered the use of nanomaterials in electroluminscent and electrochromic displays as well as lithium ion batteries. Author of over 500 publications, two books and inventor of 46 patents, his work received over 30'000 citations ranking him amongst the most highly cited scientists in the world. He has received numerous prestigious awards including the European Millennium innovation award the Faraday medal of the British Royal Society and the Gerischer medal of the Electrochemical Society. He received a doctors degree in natural science from the Technical University Berlin and honorary doctors degrees from the Universities of Uppsala and Turin. He is a member of the Swiss Chemical Society as well as of the European Academy of Science and was elected honorary member of the Société Vaudoise de Sciences Naturelles.

Charles Lieber, Harvard University

Charles M. Lieber was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1959. He attended Franklin and Marshall College for his undergraduate education and graduated with honors in Chemistry. After doctoral studies at Stanford University and postdoctoral research at the California Institute of Technology, he moved to the East Coast in 1987 to assume an Assistant Professor position at Columbia University. Here Lieber embarked upon a new research program addressing the synthesis and properties of low-dimensional materials. Lieber moved to Harvard University in 1991 and now holds a joint appointment in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, as the Mark Hyman Professor of Chemistry, and the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences. At Harvard Lieber has pioneered the synthesis of a broad range of nanoscale materials, the characterization of the unique physical properties of these materials, and the development of methods of hierarchical assembly of nanoscale wires, together with the demonstration of applications of these materials in nanoelectronics, nanocomputing, biological and chemical sensing, and nanophotonics. Lieber has also developed and applied a new chemically sensitive microscopy for probing organic and biological materials at nanometer to molecular scales. This work has been recognized by a number of awards, including the ACS Award in the Chemistry of Materials (2004), World Technology Award in Materials (2004 and 2003), Scientific American Award in Nanotechnology and Molecular Electronics (2003), New York Intellectual Property Law Association Inventor of the Year (2003), APS McGroddy Prize for New Materials (2003), Harrison-Howe Award (2002), MRS Medal (2002), Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology (2001), NSF Creativity Award (1996), and ACS Pure Chemistry Award (1992). Lieber is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and serves on the Editorial and Advisory Boards of a number of science and technology journals. Lieber has published more than 260 papers in peer-reviewed journals and is the principal inventor on more than 25 patents. In his spare time, Lieber founded a nanotechnology company, NanoSys, Inc., with the modest goal of revolutionizing commercial applications in chemical and biological sensing, computing, photonics, and information storage.

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Tom Autrey, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Presentation: "Nanotechnology Approaches to Hydrogen Storage"

Tom Autrey is a Staff Scientist in the Fundamental Science Division at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Dr. Autrey's research interest are focused on developing new materials for on-board and small power hydrogen storage for fuel cell applications. He is a PI on the US DOE Office of Science Hydrogen Fuel Initiative, Control of Hydrogen Release and Uptake in Condensed Phases, and on the US DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's Hydrogen Storage Center of Excellence. Last year Dr. Autrey served as the Program Chair for the Fuel Chemistry Division of the American Chemical Society and taught a tutorial on Chemical Hydrogen Storage at the Fall Materials Research Society meeting. He is currently organizing a symposium on Hydrogen Storage that will be held the American Chemical Society Fall National meeting in in San Francisco. He serves on the US organizing committee for the International Hydrogen in Metals Conference and on the Advisory Board for the Hydrocarbon Resources Gordon Research Conference.

Bruce Clemens, Stanford University
Presentation: "Nanostructured Materials for Hydrogen Storage"

Brent Fultz, California Institute of Technology
Presentation: "Nanostructured Materials for Lithium and Hydrogen Storage"

Brent Fultz received his undergraduate degree from MIT, and his Ph.D. from U. C. Berkeley in 1982. He was a Presidential Young Investigator; he also received an IBM Faculty Development Award and a Jacob Wallenberg Scholarship. He consulted for an electronics testing company, Everett Charles Technologies, for the Defense Science Board, and was a member of the Science Advisory Board of Actium Materials. Fultz has authored or co-authored well over 280 publications. With his friend, Prof. J. Howe of Univ. Virginia, he has published a graduate-level textbook on diffraction and microscopy of materials (now in its 2nd edition). Brent Fultz is leading the ARCS spectrometer project at the Spallation Neutron Source. Scientific computing offers new opportunities for elevating the sophistication of neutron scattering experiments, and new science is the main goal of Distributed Data Analysis for Neutron Scattering Experiments, DANSE .

Mercouri G Kanatzidis, Michigan State University
Presentation: "Bulk Nanostructures for Thermoelectrics"

Mercouri G Kanatzidis received his Ph.D. degree in chemistry from the University of Iowa in 1984, after obtaining a Bachelor of Science degree from Aristotle University in Greece. He is currently a University Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at Michigan State University where he has served since 1987. He was a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Michigan and Northwestern University from 1985 to 1987. He was NSF Presidential Young Investigator, Beckman Young Investigator and Guggenheim Fellow. His research interests include novel chalcogenide intermetallic compounds. He is also active in exploratory synthesis of thermoelectric materials, the synthetic design of framework solids, and nanostructured materials. The bulk of his work is described in the more than 400 publications.

Dr. Arthur J. Nozik, University of Colorado, Boulder
Presentation: "Carrier Dynamics and Multiple Exciton Generation in Semiconductor Nanocrystals: Relevance to Third Generation Solar Photon Conversion"

Dr. Arthur J. Nozik has been a Senior Research Fellow at the U.S. DOE National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) since 1983 and Professor Adjoint in the Chemistry Department at the University of Colorado, Boulder since 1998. He received his BChE from Cornell University in 1959 and his PhD in Physical Chemistry from Yale University in 1967. Before joining NREL in 1978, then known as the Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI), he conducted research at the Materials Research Center of the Allied Chemical Corporation and the American Cyanamid Corporation. Dr. Nozik's research interests include size quantization effects in semiconductor quantum dots and quantum wells, and the applications of these nanostructures to solar photon conversion, photogenerated carrier relaxation dynamics in semiconductor structures, photoelectrochemistry of semiconductor-molecule interfaces, photoelectrochemical energy conversion, photocatalysis, optical, magnetic and electrical properties of solids, and Mössbauer spectroscopy. He has published over 170 papers and book chapters in these fields, holds 11 U.S. patents, and has delivered over 185 invited talks He has served on numerous scientific review and advisory panels, editorial boards, and has received several awards in energy research including the Research Award of the Electrochemical Society in 2002. Dr. Nozik was a Senior Editor of The Journal of Physical Chemistry from 1993 - 2005. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a member of the American Chemical Society, the Electrochemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Materials Research Society, and the Society of Photo Optical Instrument Engineers.

Ken Okazaki, Tokyo Institute of Technology
Presentation: "Hydrogen-Based Advanced Energy Systems and Related Nano-Energy Researches"

He received the Ph.D. degree in mechanical engineering from Tokyo Institute of Technology in 1978. He was with Toyohashi University of Technology from 1978 to 1992 and he has been a professor of Tokyo Institute of Technology since December 1992. His research subjects cover a wide range of energy and environmental issues including hydrogen-based advanced energy systems and fuel cells, clean and high-efficiency coal/biomass technologies for global environmental protection, non-equilibrium plasma chemistry and applications, advanced microsystems etc.. He has been holding important posts on various committees in the government and academic societies. He received many awards from the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, Heat Transfer Society of Japan, Japan Institute of Energy and others.

Friedrich B. Prinz, Stanford University
Presentation: "Thin Film Solid Oxide Fuel Cells"

Professor Prinz is the Rodney H. Adams Professor of Engineering and Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering. Professor Prinz received his Ph.D. degree in Physics from the University of Vienna in 1975. Dr. Prinz's current research activities address a wide range of problems related to design and rapid prototyping of organic and inorganic devices. His current work focuses on the fabrication and physics of fuel cells as well as the creation of biological cell structures. His group uses atomic force microscopy and impedance spectroscopy to characterize the behavior of electrochemical systems with micro and nano-scale dimensions.

Zhifeng Ren, Boston College
Presentation: "Nanocomposite Approach to High Figure-of-Merit Thermoelectric Materials"

Z. F. Ren is a full professor in Physics at Boston College, a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He got his PhD on Condensed Matter Physics in 1990. He currently focuses on nanomaterials synthesis, characterization, and applications including carbon nanotubes and semiconducting nanowires of ZnO, Si, Ge, etc., nanocrystals of Si, Ge, PbTe, PbSe, Bi2Te3, Bi2Se3, etc. One of the major areas is to achieve high figure-of-merit thermoelectric nanocomposites. He has published 180 peer-reviewed papers and 20 patents including the pending ones. He has organized and chaired meetings including NT'02, MRS 05 spring, etc. He co-founded NanoLab, Inc. in 2000 to commercialize nanotechnology.

Debra R. Rolison, University of Utah
Presentation: "Architectural Design, Interior Decoration, and 3-D Plumbing En Route to Multifunctional Nanoarchitectures for Energy Storage and Conversion"

Rolison received a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1980 and immediately joined the Naval Research Laboratory as a staff scientist; she currently heads the Advanced Electrochemical Materials section and is also an Adjunct Full Professor of Chemistry at the University of Utah. Her research at the NRL focuses on multifunctional nanoarchitectures for catalytic chemistries, energy storage and conversion, biomolecular composites, porous magnets, and sensors. She is a Fellow of the AAAS (2001) and of AWIS (2006), and has served on numerous editorial advisory boards in chemistry and nanoscience. She lectures on the impact of nano(bio)technology on society and the ethical obligations of scientists who perform research in nanoscale science and technology. Rolison also writes and lectures widely on issues affecting women in science. In 2000, she proposed using Title IX, which prohibits discrimination in any educational "program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance", to evaluate academic Science & Engineering departments. Her strategy was echoed in the 2004 General Accountability Office report Women's Participation in the Sciences Has Increased, but Agencies Need to Do More to Ensure Compliance with Title IX. The primary recommendation in this report to the U.S. Congress directs the agencies that fund scientific research to "take actions to ensure compliance reviews of grantees are conducted as required by Title IX."

Philip N. Ross, Jr., Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Presentation: "Electrocatalysis by Pt-Transition Metal Bimetallic Surfaces and Nanoparticles"

Philip N. Ross, Jr. is a Senior Scientist in the Materials Sciences Division and Program Leader of the electrochemical science program in the Environmental Energy Technologies Division. Dr. Ross has published over 230 journal articles, holds 5 patents, and is co-editor (with Prof. Jacek Lipkowski) of the Frontiers in Electrochemistry Series published by Kluwer. He obtained a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from Yale University in 1965, a M.S. degree in chemical engineering in 1969 from the University of Delaware, and a PhD degree in engineering and applied science from Yale University in 1973. Thereafter, he joined the research staff of the United Technologies Corporation (UTC), first at the Advanced Materials Laboratory of the Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Division, then the Corporate Research Center. In both positions at UTC he conducted research supporting the corporations fuel cell technology programs. He moved to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 1978. He has continued to conduct supporting research for fuel cell technologies since joining LBNL, and has added research on lithium batteries and fundamental electrochemistry. He has held several management positions at LBNL, including associate division director of the Materials Sciences Division (1989 - 1992) and acting scientific director of the Advanced Light Source (1992 - 1993). He was Chairman of the Gordon Conference in Electrochemistry in 1989, and received the David C. Grahame Award in Physical Electrochemistry from the Electrochemical Society in 1998. He was a detailee to the Office of Basic Energy Sciences, U.S. Department of Energy, in 1987-88, and has served on numerous DOE advisory groups and panels.

Joel Schindall, MIT
Presentation: "Nanotechnology-Enabled Energy Conversion and Storage"

Professor Schindall joined the MIT faculty in June of 2002 after a 35 year career in the defense, aerospace and telecommunications industries. He has taught courses in satellite communications, introductory circuit theory, writing and communication skills, and research project identification (including joint projects with local industry). His research includes the concept and development of a nanotube-enhanced ultracapacitor which holds the promise of being superior to electrochemical batteries as a means of efficient regenerative electrical energy storage. He is also supervising research on reliability of safety-critical systems (such as x-by-wire), noise-canceling headphones, underwater acoustic networking, and a biologically-based pulse interval processor.

Prior to joining MIT, Dr. Schindall was Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Loral Space and Communications. His responsibilities included overseeing the satellite research and development activities of Space Systems/Loral (originally Ford Aerospace).

Earlier in his career, Dr. Schindall served as Senior VP and Chief Engineer for Globalstar, President of Loral's Conic Division, and Manager of the Recon Division at Watkins-Johnson. Globalstar is an operational cellular-like satellite communication system, which includes 48 low earth orbit satellites, tens of thousands of portable telephones, and 36 gateways. Loral Conic designs and manufactures rugged telemetry equipment used in flight-testing of missiles and spacecraft. At Watkins-Johnson, Dr. Schindall's work included a direct role in conceiving and developing an entire family of advanced computer-controlled microwave receivers.

Dr. Schindall received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1963, 1964 and 1967. He also held a First Class FCC radiotelephone license and, for four years, was Chief Engineer at WBCN, a commercial FM radio station in downtown Boston.

Li Shi, UT Austin
Presentation: "Thermoelectric Characterization of Individual Nanowires"

Li Shi has been an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Texas Materials Institute at the University of Texas at Austin since 2002. He received his B.E. degree from Tsinghua University in 1991, M.S. degree from Arizona State University in 1997, and Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from University of California at Berkeley in 2001. Dr. Shi was a Research Staff Member at IBM Research Division from 2001 to 2002. He received the CAREER award from the National Science Foundation in 2003, the Young Investigator Award from Office of Naval Research in 2004, and the ASME Transaction Journal of Heat Transfer Outstanding Reviewer Award in 2005.

LUNCH SPEAKERS

Ernest Moniz, MIT

Ernest J. Moniz is the Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Physics and Engineering Systems and co-Director of the Laboratory for Energy and the Environment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he has served on the faculty since 1973. Dr. Moniz served as Under Secretary of the Department of Energy from October 1997 until January 2001. In that role, he had programmatic oversight responsibility for the offices of Science; Fossil Energy; Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy; Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology; Environmental Management; and Civilian Radioactive Waste Management. He served as DOE chair of the Laboratory Operations Board and of the Research and Development Council, through which he initiated a portfolio approach to managing and advancing the Department's R&D programs. He also led a comprehensive review of the nuclear weapons stockpile stewardship program and served as the Secretary's special negotiator for Russia initiatives, with a particular focus on the disposition of Russian nuclear weapons materials. Dr. Moniz also served from 1995 to 1997 as Associate Director for Science in the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President, where his responsibilities spanned the physical, life, and social and behavioral sciences, science education, and university-government partnerships. At MIT, Dr. Moniz served as Head of the Department of Physics and as Director of the Bates Linear Accelerator Center, a DOE user facility. His principal research contributions have been in theoretical nuclear physics, particularly in advancing nuclear reaction theory at high energy. His current research centers on energy technology and policy studies. He is co-chair of the MIT Energy Research Council, an interdisciplinary faculty group that is advancing the MIT President's energy initiative.

Dr. Moniz received a Bachelor of Science degree summa cum laude in physics from Boston College, a doctorate in theoretical physics from Stanford University, and honorary doctorates from the University of Athens, the University of Erlangen-Nurenburg, and Michigan State University. Dr. Moniz is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Humboldt Foundation, and the American Physical Society and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He received the 1998 Seymour Cray HPCC Industry Recognition Award for vision and leadership in advancing scientific simulation. He serves on the Boards of the Gas Technology Institute, Nexant, and American Science & Engineering, on the Keystone Energy Board, and on the advisory councils of EPRI, Cummins, BP, and the Massachusetts Executive Office of Environmental Affairs.