So what does a materials chemist do?
Hi! My name is Michael Nolan. I work as a researcher in Cork’s Tyndall National Institute in Materials Chemistry, designing new materials on computer through simulations. This means that I use large computers in Ireland and Europe to design new materials that will be used in production of energy. Since we are running out of traditional fuels like oil, petrol, gas and coal is too polluting, we need to find different ways of powering the planet.
My research is focussed on energy storage (new batteries) and transmitting energy. I look at making hydrogen from water, which is used to power buses or space rockets using fuel cells, and how to turn waste carbon dioxide from burning petrol or gas back into fuels. These should be done using solar energy from the sun so that there is little cost and no waste.
The materials we design are targeted to take in sunlight to make hydrogen from water or natural gas from carbon dioxide. With this approach we can quickly check which materials work well and our colleagues can make them and test if they work. This work will free us from being tied to oil and allow Ireland to generate its own energy into the future.
My days are spent building models and determining their properties on computer, deciding if these particular materials systems would be useful. We use Ireland’s largest computer (at ICHEC) and some of Europe’s largest computers to do this work and with the Internet we can do this work from anywhere.
I supervise a small team of researchers and I spend a lot of time directing, discussing and writing up the team’s work. I love working in materials because my work has the potential to make a real difference – if we can move away from our dependence on oil to using solar, then this will bring huge benefits to Ireland. But to do this, we have to work hard, carefully examining the properties of our materials and test them using experiments. There is a great satisfaction when the two work well together.
