American Chemical Society Spring 2019 National Meeting Symposium: ?Structure-Property Correlations in Functional Inorganic Materials?

University Of Maryland, College Park, College Park MD

Investigators

Abstract

Non-Technical Summary Advanced materials make modern life possible and the future sustainable. Our handheld electronic devices, for example, are made portable by the solid state components that can store energy. Many of the materials in those components are inorganic solids, which can be defined as solid materials that typically contain a wide range of elements including metals combined with nonmetals such as oxygen or metalloids such as silicon. Materials chemists constantly work to arrange the atoms of these solids to optimize their functional properties. Researchers in this field study the fundamental scientific problems that address the relationships between structure, or how those atoms are arranged, and properties such as the ability to store energy. At the 2019 Spring National Meeting of the American Chemical Society, leading experts in the field will hold a symposium to better understand these relationships in the solid state. Hosted by the ACS Division of Inorganic Chemistry, the symposium titled 'Structure-Property Correlations in Functional Inorganic Materials' consists of four half-day sessions that include a mixture of invited and contributed oral presentations. For the invited talks, the symposium brings in fresh, new ideas by inviting scientists early in their career such as faculty at the Assistant Professor level. The symposium also includes a poster session where PhD students and post-doctoral research associates will present their work on these functional materials. Therefore, this symposium, which is supported in part by the Solid State and Materials Chemistry program in NSF's Division of Materials Research, not only moves this field forward by presenting the latest findings in inorganic solids but also plays a large educational role by integrating young students and post-docs with the larger research community. Technical Summary Fundamental to designing and synthesizing new materials is the elucidation of structure-property correlations and relationships in solid state materials. To encourage the exchange of knowledge in this area of research, the Solid State and Materials Chemistry program in the Division of Materials Research supports the symposium titled 'Structure-Property Correlations in the Functional Inorganic Materials' at the 2019 Spring National Meeting of the American Society. The symposium includes four half-day oral presentation sessions and one poster presentation session. The topics are divided around five themes based on the invited speakers and contributed talks. These themes include: 1) the synthesis and crystal structure elucidations of new intermetallic phases; 2) chemical properties and structures of quantum materials such as superconductors, magnetic materials, and topological insulators; 3) luminescent and optical properties of novel semiconductors such as the halide-based perovskites; 4) innovative approaches towards solid state synthesis and crystal growth, such as use of the PARADIM user facility; and 5) investigating how various length scales, from the local to average, affect bulk properties in transition metal oxides. The session has a mixture of invited and contributed talks. The majority of the invited talks is given by early-career scientists rather than senior scientists. The former group includes post-doctoral research associates and young faculty. The latter group includes faculty who are current or past editors of relevant journals such as Chemistry of Materials and Science Advances. The contributed only session features several mid-career (post-tenure) scientists and the poster session graduate students in the field. Therefore, the session promises to mix several generations of workers in this field and to present diverse themes in materials and solid state chemistry. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.