Speakers

École Polytechnique, France

https://www.lpp.polytechnique.fr/-Olivier-Guaitella-

Short CV

Engineering Researcher at Laboratoire de Physique des Plasmas, École Polytechnique, Palaiseau (FR.)

PhD in plasma physics in 2006 by École Polytechnique.

Published 113 articles in scientific journals (WoS).

Works in the area(s) of Plasma Fluids Physics, Applied Physics, Chemical Engineering, Physical Chemistry.

Research interests

CO2 recycling is one of the biggest challenges of our time. Surprisingly, the response that plasma could provide to this challenge raises very similar scientific questions to new polymer deposition processes, biomedical applications or even the study of aerosol evolution in planetary atmospheres!

Non-Thermal Plasma interaction with surfaces at medium and high pressure (from 1 mbar to atmospheric pressure and beyond) is crucial for numerous applications but poorly understood. The system consisting of a plasma and a target (whether dielectric, metal, liquid...) need to be studied as a whole. We are developing advanced diagnostics to study both the plasma phase interacting with surfaces and the target itself under direct exposure, with high time and spatial resolution.

Affiliation

Laboratoire de Physique des Plasmas (UMR 7648), CNRS, Univ. Paris-Saclay,

Sorbonne Université, École Polytechnique, Palaiseau, France

Queen's University, Canada

https://www.chem.queensu.ca/people/jessop-philip

Dr. Philip Jessop is the Head of the Chemistry Department and the Canada Research Chair of Green Chemistry at Queen’s University in Canada, honorary professor of the University of Jordan, adjunct professor at the Hashemite University in Jordan, and the Executive Research Director of Forward Water Technologies Inc. His research interests include green solvents, biomass conversion and CO2-responsive materials. Distinctions include the NSERC Polanyi Award (2008), Canadian Green Chemistry & Engineering Award (2012), the Eni Award (2013), NSERC Brockhouse Prize (2019), and Fellowships in the Royal Society of Canada, the Royal Society of Chemistry, and the American Chemical Society. He served as the Chair of the Editorial Board for the journal Green Chemistry (2017-2022), has chaired three major international conferences including ICCDU IX, and helped create two spin-off companies and GreenCentre Canada, a centre for the commercialization of green chemistry technologies. His Tiktok video series “Jessop’s Which Is Greener?” has reached tens of thousands of viewers.

Heriot-Watt University, UK

https://researchportal.hw.ac.uk/en/persons/m-mercedes-maroto-valer

Professor Mercedes Maroto-Valer (FRSE, FIChemE, FRSC, FRSA, FEI)

-  Champion and Director- UK Industrial Decarbonisation Research and Innovation Centre (IDRIC)

-  Director- EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Green Industrial Futures

-  Deputy Principal (Global Sustainability) and Director of the Research Centre for Carbon Solutions (RCCS) at Heriot-Watt University

Prof Mercedes Maroto-Valer (FRSE, FIChemE, FRSC, FRSA, FEI) is Champion and Director of the UK Industrial Decarbonisation Research and Innovation Centre (IDRIC) focused on accelerating the sustainable transition to net zero of industries. She has recently become Director of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Green Industrial Futures.

Prof Maroto-Valer is Deputy Principal (Global Sustainability) at Heriot-Watt University, leading the sustainability agenda, making a significant impact on achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) across all the campus locations (UK, Dubai and Malaysia).  She is director of the Research Centre for Carbon Solutions (RCCS) at Heriot-Watt University, where she holds the Robert Buchan Chair in Sustainable Energy Engineering. She has held academic appointments at the University of Kentucky, Pennsylvania State University, and University of Nottingham. 

Her internationally recognised track record covers energy systems, CCUS, integration of hydrogen technologies and low carbon fuels. Her research portfolio includes a prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Award. She has over 600 publications and has received numerous international prizes and awards.

Prof Maroto-Valer holds leading positions in professional societies/editorial boards, including the Council of Engineers for the Energy Transition (CEET) under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary-General. She also represents the UK at the global intergovernmental clean energy initiative Mission Innovation – Technical Advisory Group.  

Inha University, South Korea

http://nanogreen.inha.ac.kr

Emeritus Professor Sang-Eon Park of INHA Univ., had been the director of the Lab. of Nano-Green Catalysis and Nano Center. He has PhD (1981) from KAIST and experienced in Chon Engrg. Co. for 6 yrs with post-doc at Texas A. & M., worked as a principal investigator in KRICT for 16 years, and 4yrs as an outside director of S-Oil. Now, he is the Editor-in-Chief of Journal of CO₂ Utilization and also serves as Honorary Professors of several Universities and the editorial boards of several scientific journals, as an advisory member of several leading international conferences including ICCDU, a member of Korean Academy of Science & Technology and a Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry. He published more than 350 scientific articles and 80 patents applied, with 7 industrialized projects. His research on carbon dioxide utilization had focus on uses of CO2 as oxidants coined with Soft Oxidant, Promoter, and Enhancer. Recently, he was awarded the Aresta Award in 2023 during the 20th ICCDU at Bari.

Faculdade de Engenharia Universidade do Porto, Portugal

https://sigarra.up.pt/feup/pt/func_geral.formview?p_codigo=230268

University of Cambridge, UK

http://www-reisner.ch.cam.ac.uk/erwin.html

Erwin Reisner is the Professor of Energy and Sustainability in the Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge, where he also holds a Royal Academy of Engineering Chair in Emerging Technologies. He is also a Fellow of St. John’s College, Cambridge. He is an expert in renewable energy technologies and sustainable chemistry, in particular the sunlight-powered production of sustainable fuels and platform chemicals. His cross-disciplinary research into solar chemistry and circular chemical technologies focuses on the capture and utilisation of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide as well as the valorisation of plastics and biomass waste to produce green fuels and chemicals for a net zero future.

Erwin and his team have developed concepts and approaches for the direct integration of synthetic and biological catalysts with photovoltaic light absorbers to enable efficient and selective solar-driven chemical synthesis. The understanding and assembly of such semiconductor-molecule 'hybrid materials' and 'semi-artificial’ biohybrids has led to the construction of autonomous solar-powered prototype devices for solar fuel production. Their ‘solar fuels devices’ demonstrated artificial photosynthesis by converting carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide, formic acid, multi-carbon alcohols or acetic acid, while oxidising water to co-produce oxygen gas. Erwin’s team also established 'solar reforming’ as a practical approach to upcycle lignocellulosic biomass and plastic waste to platform chemicals and fuels. Their concepts and solar-powered prototype devices demonstrated the performance and economic advantages of oxidising solid waste streams instead of oxidising water, making the lab-to-market transition of solar chemistry a realistic long-term prospect. To accelerate the commercialisation of solar reforming, he and his colleagues have protected the underlying core IP and co-founded the start-up company ‘Protonera’. His team has also made contributions to show the potential of heterogeneous semiconductor photocatalysts for green organic synthesis and has reported solar hybrid technologies to demonstrate the benefits of integrated solar chemistry over conventional photovoltaic-electrolyser technologies.

Erwin’s laboratory on solar chemical technologies has been supported by several fellowships and grants such as an EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowship on bio-inspired solar hydrogen production (2009-2015), the Christian Doppler Laboratory for Sustainable SynGas Chemistry (2012-2019), a European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant on semi-artificial photosynthesis (2016-2023), an ERC/UKRI Advanced Grant on semi-biological domino catalysis (2023-2028) and a Royal Academy of Engineering Chair for tech-transfer of solar reforming (2024-2034). He has received several awards in recognition of his team's scientific achievements, such as the recently awarded Hughes Medal by the Royal Society (2023) and the Tilden Prize by the Royal Society of Chemistry (2024). He has previously acted as the director of the UK Solar Fuels Network, which coordinates the national activities in artificial photosynthesis (2017-2021) and is the principal investigator (academic lead) of the Cambridge Circular Plastics Centre (CirPlas), and co-director of the Centre for Doctoral Training in Integrated Functional Nano (nanoDTC) in Cambridge. Erwin is also a member of the international advisory boards of Angewandte Chemie and Chemical Science. 

Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China

http://hanbx.iccas.ac.cn/

Buxing Han, Professor at Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); Academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS) for the Advancement of Science in Developing Countries; Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry. Director of Carbon Neutral Chemistry, Institute of Chemistry, CAS; Director of Shanghai Key Laboratory of Green Chemistry and Chemical Processes.

His research interests include physicochemical properties of green solvent systems and application of green solvents in green chemistry, especially on transformation of CO2, biomass, and organic wastes into valuable chemicals and fuels.He has published more than 1000 papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals, such as Science, Nat. Chem. Nat Catal., Nat. Commun., Sci. Adv., J. Am. Chem. Soc., Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., Chem. Rev., Acc. Chem. Res. He has also published 80 patents, and has presented more than 300 plenary or invited lectures at different conferences. He received a number of awards, such as 2nd-Class Award of Chinese Government for Development of Natural Science, Outstanding Science and Technology Achievement Prize of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

He is the Chairman of Interdivisional Committee on Green Chemistry for Sustainable Development, International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), Chief Scientist of China Innovation Think Tank; Chairman of Green Chemistry Division, Chinese Chemical Society; President of Beijing Energy and Environment Society; He is an Editor-in-Chiefs of The Innovation, Green Energy and Environment, Carbon & Hydrogen; Associate Editors of Chinese Sci. Bulletin, Acta Physico-Chimica Sinica, Chemical Journal of Chinese Universities, and is serving more than 10 other peer-reviewed scientific journals as Editorial Board Member or Advisory Board Member.  

....

Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

https://larhco.iq.ufrj.br/

Claudio J. A. Mota holds a degree in Chemical Engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), where he also obtained his PhD in Chemistry. He is Full Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, as well as Director of the Institute of Chemistry of the UFRJ. He is a research fellow from CNPq and a State Scientist from FAPERJ. He is member of the Brazilian Chemical Society (SBQ), Brazilian Catalysis Society (SBCat), American Chemical Society (ACS) and fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). He was awarded with the TWAS Prize, given by the Mexican Academy of Science, the Technology Prize from the Brazilian Association of the Chemical Industries (ABIQUIM), the Innovation Prize of SBQ and the Simão Mathias Medal, the highest honor of the SBQ. He is editor of Sustainable Chemistry One World and member of the editorial boards of the Journal of CO2 Utilization, Journal of Catalysis and ACS Omega, having established several international collaborations. His current research interests are focused on biomass transformation, processes of CO2 capture and conversion and H2 production from photocatalysis, targeting applications in the fuel and chemical sectors.

National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), USA

https://research-hub.nrel.gov/en/persons/huyen-dinh

Dr. Huyen N. Dinh (she/her) is the director of HydroGEN Energy Materials Network (https://www.h2awsm.org). HydroGEN is a consortium comprise five U.S. DOE national laboratories (NREL, LBNL, SNL, INL, LLNL) that focuses on accelerating R&D of innovative and advanced water splitting materials and technologies for clean, sustainable, and low-cost hydrogen production. Dr. Dinh is the manager for the Hydrogen Systems and Technologies Advanced Research (HSTAR) Group and the Electrons to Molecules lead for Materials, Chemicals, and Computational Science Directorate at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Huyen has been at NREL for over 17 years and has more than 27 years of experience in renewable hydrogen production and fuel cells at national laboratories and in industry.

ITQB, NOVA University Lisbon, Portugal

https://www.itqb.unl.pt/research/biological-chemistry/bacterial-energy-metabolism

Inês Cardoso Pereira has a degree in Applied Chemistry from FCT, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa and a PhD from University of Oxford. She is Full Professor at ITQB NOVA, and since 2021 Coordinator of the Associated Laboratory LS4FUTURE, the one of the largest in Portugal. She was Vice-Director of ITQB NOVA for 8 years (2014-22) and is Vice-President of the Institute Council since 2022. She was elected member of EMBO (European Molecular Biology Organisation) in 2021 and of the European Academy of Microbiology and of Academia Europaea in 2022. In 2024 she was awarded the Prémio Alberto Romão Dias by the Sociedade Portuguesa de Química for her contributions to the field of Bioinorganic Chemistry.

She works on the microbial physiology of anaerobes, particularly their bioenergetics and evolution, and also on engineering and understanding the mechanism of biotechnologically relevant enzymes and anaerobes for renewable energy and bioremediation. Her work has focused on the bioenergetics of dissimilatory sulfur metabolism, both in environmental model organisms and in sulfidogenic members of the human gut community, and on enzymes with technological interest, such as hydrogenases for H2 production and formate dehydrogenases for CO2 reduction. More recently she is also working on applications of anaerobes in hydrogen production and CO2 reduction. IACP has 156 publications in international journals (>7000 citations) and 9 book chapters.

University of Sheffield, UK

https://www.soci.org/flue2chem

Peter Styring is Professor of Chemical Engineering & Chemistry and Associate Fellow in the Understanding of Politics at the University of Sheffield, UK. Peter is also a Director and Co-Founder of a Spinout Company specialising in low-cost carbon dioxide capture. He is a Fellow of the RSC and IChemE and a Chartered Chemist. His background is in Organic Chemistry and Catalysis and is s former Head of Department in Chemistry at Sheffield. Peter’s team have developed a novel PSA carbon capture which has been deployed to point source emitter sites. The captured carbon dioxide is liquefied and then used as a feedstock in the production of value-added products such as hydrocarbons, alcohols, polymers and inorganics. He has a wide range of publications in chemistry and engineering and a number of edited textbooks and chapters on Carbon Dioxide Utilisation. He has been author of a number of policy white papers and in 2017 was part of the UK Government team and Panel chair that helped draft the Mission Innovation Accelerating CCUS Report. In 2025 he was part of a Royal Society delegation on a Policy Exchange in Japan. Peter is a key member of the Innovate UK-funded Flue2Chem Project with 17 co-partners (https://www.soci.org/flue2chem) which has captured carbon dioxide from biomass combustion plants at papermills and converted this to surfactants for components in low carbon fast-moving consumer goods (FMCGs).

University of Cape Town, South Africa

https://ebe.uct.ac.za/catalysis-institute/research-team

Professor Claeys obtained his PhD (with distinction) in Fischer-Tropsch catalysis at the University of Karlsruhe, Germany, in 1997 and then joined the Catalysis Institute at the University of Cape Town. Here he was instrumental in establishing a large research activity with focus on Fischer-Tropsch catalysis, a technology, which lies at the heart of South Africa’s synthetic fuels and chemicals industry and which is playing an increasingly important role in the production of green future fuels via Power-to-X processes. Other research interests include the preparation and characterisation of nano materials and their use in catalytic applications, as well as the development of catalysts and novel instrumentation for characterisation of catalysts at working conditions. Professor Claeys has published extensively on these topics, he holds a number of patents and he has been awarded an A-rating (‘leading international researcher’) by the National Research Foundation of South Africa. 

 

A large portion of his research is conducted in conjunction with industrial partners, in particular a longstanding industrial collaboration with Sasol R&D. Professor Claeys directed the Director of the DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence in Catalysis, c*change, a large virtual and multidisciplinary Centre, where he also acted as the Manager of the Scientific Synthesis Gas Programme, which includes processes of catalytic valorization of CO2. He is currently involved in various large PTL projects including the BMBF-funded CARE-O-SENE consortium and the South African national CoalCO2-to-X flagship programme. Moreover, he is the founding Chairperson of the Syngas Convention, a triennial international meeting on synthesis gas technologies held in Cape Town.

Osaka Metropolitan University, Japan

https://www.omu.ac.jp/eng/tamura-lab/english.html

Educational background

2003/03   B.S. Kyoto University, School of Science, Department of Chemistry (Thesis Director:

Prof. K. Maruoka)

2005/03   M.S. The University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Engineering, Department of

Applied Chemistry (Thesis Director: Prof. M. Fujita)

2012/03   Ph.D. (Engineering), Nagoya University (Thesis Director: Prof. A. Satsuma)

 

Employment history

2005/04～2012/03　Researcher, Kao corporation

2012/04～2020/03　Assistant Professor, Tohoku University, Graduate School of Engineering

2015/12～2019/03　JST Presto Researcher (concurrent position)

2016/04～2017/03　ICAT Fellow, Hokkaido University, Institute for Catalysis

(concurrent position)

2017/04～2019/03　Research collaborator, Hokkaido University, Institute for Catalysis

(concurrent position)

2019/04～2020/03　ICAT Fellow, Hokkaido University, Institute for Catalysis

(concurrent position)

2020/04～2022/03　Associate Professor, Osaka City University, Research Center for

Artificial Photosynthesis (PI)

2022/04～2022/09　Associate Professor, Osaka Metropolitan University, Research Center

for Artificial Photosynthesis (PI)

2022/10～                Associate Professor, Osaka Metropolitan University, Graduate School

of Engineering (up to the present, PI)

 

Areas of expertise

Catalyst chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Coordination chemistry

 

Affiliations with academic societies

The Chemical Society of Japan (CSJ), Catalysis Society of Japan (CATSJ), The Japan Petroleum Institute (JPI), American Chemical Society (ACS), The Society of Synthetic Organic Chemistry (SSOCJ), Kinka Chemical Society, Japan (KINKA), Research Association For Feedstock Recycling of Plastics Japan (FSRJ)

 

Awards

2015　 Research Award in Aoba Foundation for the Promotion of Engineering (2015)

2017　 Catalysis Society of Japan Award for Young Researchers (2017)

2017　 The Young Scholar Lectures of The Chemical Society of Japan (2017)

2018　The Japan Petroleum Institute Award for Encouragement of Research and Development

2018　 The Young Scientists’ Prize, The Commendation for Science and Technology by the MEXT (2018)

2020　Intelligent Cosmos Research Encouraging Award

2020　Yoichiro Nambu Memorial Young Research Award

2023　President's Award (Osaka Metropolitan University)

2024　President's Award (Osaka Metropolitan University)

 

Main research areas

Development of heterogeneous catalysts for CO2 conversion

Development of heterogeneous catalysts for plastic conversion

Development of heterogeneous catalysts for biomass conversion

Development of catalysts for the synthesis of fine chemicals

Development of heterogeneous/homogeneous hybrid catalysts

 

East China University of Science & Technology

http://chem.ecust.edu.cn/2014/1113/c6655a50164/page.htm

Professor Jun Hu comes from East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, China. Her research interests focus on the design and synthesis of adsorptive and catalytical dual-functional materials, and apply them in CO2 capture and in-situ conversion (iCCC). Early in 2008, she received her first NSFC funding of Adsorptive CO2 Capture, from then on, she involved in many research projects, such as the 863 Program, the 973 Program, EU FP7 project. Recently, she worked as a PI for the Original Exploration Program of NSFC, and a project of the National Key Research and Development Program of MOST. Till now, she has published more than 150 journal papers, including Energ. Environ. Sci., Nat. Commun. Currently, supported by the SINOPEC, one of the biggest global Chemical Companies, she is working on developing a 1000 tCO2/y iCCC demonstration from a high-temperature flue gas to produce syngas.