Principal Investigator:
Assist. Prof. Dr. Maria Ibáñez
Maria Ibáñez was born in La Sénia (Spain). She graduated in physics at the University of Barcelona, where she also obtained her PhD in 2013. Her PhD thesis was qualified Excellent Cum Laude and awarded with the Honors Doctorate by the University of Barcelona. Her PhD research was funded by a Spanish competitive grant (FPU) which supported her to conduct short-term research stays in cutting-edge laboratories. In particular, she worked at CEA Grenoble (2009), the University of Chicago (2010), the California Institute of Technology (2011), the Cornell University (2012) and the Northwestern University (2013). In 2014, she joined the group of Prof. Dr. Kovalenko at ETH Zürich and EMPA as a research fellow where in 2017 she received the Ružička Prize. In September 2018 she became an Assistant Professor (tenure-track) at IST Austria and started the Functional Nanomaterials group.
Office: I23.O2.012
E-mail: mibanez@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 664 7935557
Research Technician:
Magali was born in France. She first studied Chemical Engineering at the École Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Lille in her native France. She received her PhD in Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry in 2007. She then worked as a postdoctoral research associate in the group of Nicholas J. Westwood at St. Andrews University, U. K. then at the Institute of Organic and Analytical Chemistry at the University of Orléans, France. She has experience in heterocyclic and medicinal chemistry as well as in multistep synthesis. She then joined, in 2016, the company Greenpharma in Orléans, France as a medicinal chemistry manager to develop hemisynthesis and bioisosteres of natural compounds scaffolds. She joined the Ibáñez group in November 2020 as a project technician.
Office: I23.O2.036
E-mail: magali.lorion@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Jeonghyun Park
Jeonghyun Park was born in South Korea. She studied Chemical Engineering at Yeungnam University, South Korea. She received her PhD in Energy Science and Engineering from Daegu Kyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST) in 2018. She then worked as a Postdoctoral researcher at the Smart Textile Convergence Research Group, DGIST, South Korea. She joined the Ibáñez group in March 2024 as a research technician.
Office: I23.O2.007
E-mail: jeonghyun.park@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
PostDocs:
E-mail: sharona.horta@ist.ac.at
Shengduo Xu was born in China. He received his BE degree and Master degree in Energy Science and Engineering from Harbin Institute of Technology. He went to the University of Queensland in Australia and joined Zhigang Chen’s group in October 2017 as a Ph.D. student, and received his Ph.D. degree in November 2021. In April 2022 he joined the Ibáñez group as a postdoc. He is currently working on flexible thermoelectric materials and devices, and miniaturization of thermoelectric coolers.
E-mail: shengduo.xu@ist.ac.at
Dr. Andreu Bonet Navarro
Andreu Bonet Navarro was born in 1995 in Deltebre, Spain. He obtained a B.AS in Chemistry at Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV) in Tarragona, where he developed a project focused on crystallography. Then he pursued an M.SC in Nanotechnology at the same university in 2017-2018, in collaboration with FiCMA research group, where he kept working on material science and nanotechnology. Afterwards, he started to be interested in renewable energies and embarked on a doctoral thesis in Eurecat Technological center of Catalonia in collaboration with MEMTEC group in URV where he was working on electroreduction of atmospheric CO2 for fuel cell batteries applications from 2018 to 2021. During his PhD studies he automatized his experiments to increase data production, repeatability, and quality. While doing that, he got passionate about automatization and realized that we would need that tool to increase work efficiency and production, particularly in science, but also in many other fields, to accelerate the green transition. After his PhD, he remained one extra year in Eurecat, collaborating with people from different fields to automatize chemical processes. Finally, in 2022 he joined the Ibáñez group, where he will be building a high-throughput setup for the discovery of thermoelectric materials.
Office: I23.O2.005
E-mail: andreu.bonetnavarro@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Igor Echevarría
Igor Echevarría was born in Spain. He made his PhD at the University of Burgos under the supervision of the Profs. Gustavo Espino and Roberto Quesada and completed it in September 2022. He joined the Ibáñez group in October 2022 as a postdoc for working on the synthesis of Prussian Blue Analogs for electrochemical applications.
Office: I23.O2.005
E-mail: igor.echevarrla@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Mario Palacios
Mario was born in Valencia (Spain) and received his PhD in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology from the University of Valencia in 2021. His thesis was focused on the synthesis and characterization of molecular magnetic materials for spintronic applications. Before completing his thesis, in 2019, Mario carried out a 3-month research internship at ETH Zürich under the supervision of Prof. Salvador Pané, where he learned to combine porous coordination polymers with small-scale robotic platforms. After completing the PhD thesis, Mario moved to the Czech Republic to conduct his postdoctoral research under the supervision of Prof. Martin Pumera. There, he developed hot topics such as light-propelled micromotors, 3D-Printing, and surface functionalization of 2D materials. In January 2022, Mario joined Ibañez group as a postdoctoral researcher and is involved in preparing new Prussian Blue Analogs to be applied in sustainable, efficient, and low-cost batteries.
Office: I23.O2.005
E-mail: mario.palacios@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Saurabh Singh
Office: I23.O2.007
E-mail: Saurabh.Singh@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Navita
Navita was born in India where she received her Ph.D. degree in Physics from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Pune in October 2023 under the guidance of Prof. Surjeet Singh. Her research is dedicated to synthesizing and optimizing the thermoelectric performance of inorganic chalcogenides. She joined the group as a Predoctoral visiting scientist in November 2023.
Office: I23.O2.007
E-mail: navita@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Dr. Krishnendu Maji
Krishnendu was born in India. He received his Master’s degree in Chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur. Later, he joined Prof. Kanishka Biswas’s group at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), Bangalore, as a research assistant, where he explored various metal halides and chalcogenides for thermoelectric applications. He then moved to France, where he pursued his Ph.D. degree at the University of Caen Normandy in the Laboratory of Crystallography and Materials Sciences (CRISMAT). Under the guidance of Dr. Emmanuel Guilmeau, his research focus was on bismuth-based sulfides for low-cost, non-toxic thermoelectric materials, focusing on the relationship between crystal structure and transport properties. In January 2024, Krishnendu joined the Ibáñez group as a predoctoral visiting scientist. His current focus is on developing new copper-bismuth-based chalcogenides for thermoelectric applications.
Office: I23.O2.008
E-mail: Krishnendu.Maji@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
PhD Students:
Tobias Kleinhanns
Tobias Kleinhanns was born in Nuremberg, Germany. He graduated in Materials Science from the University of Stuttgart, Germany. In 2019, he received a master’s degree also in Materials Science from the University of Stuttgart. During his Master’s thesis he worked on the synthesis and characterization of heterostructured nanowires. Subsequently, he joined the graduate school of the Institute of Science and Technology (IST) Austria as a Ph.D candidate and affiliated with the Ibañez group in June 2020.
Office: I23.O2.008
E-mail: tobias.kleinhanns@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Seungho Lee
Seungho Lee was born in South Korea. He graduated in Material Science and Engineering from Kookmin University. He received a master’s degree in Energy Science and Engineering from Daegu Kyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST) in 2016. The topic was the synthesis and characterization of nanocrystals for energy devices. In April 2019 he joined the Ibáñez group. His research focuses on the synthesis and characterisation of colloidal heteronanostructures.
Office: I23.O2.008
E-mail: seungho.lee@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Christine Fiedler
Christine Fiedler was born in Barbados and is also Austrian. She graduated in 2016 from the University of the West Indies Cave Hill, Barbados, with First Class Honours in Chemistry with Biochemistry. She received her master’s degree in 2020 from the Johannes Kepler University in Linz Austria in Polymer Chemistry. Her work focused on the synthesis and engineering of Janus micro/nanomotors and nanoparticle synthesis. Christine started her PhD studies in September 2020 and joined the Ibañez group to work on the processing of thermoelectric materials by solution methods.
Office: I23.O2.007
E-mail: christine.fiedler@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Aiswarya Rayaroth Puthiyaveettil
Aiswarya was born in India. She received her Master’s degree in Nanoscience and Technology from Bangalore University. Her thesis was titled “Flexible UV sensors based on MoS2 nanostructures”. Further, she completed her Post Graduate Diploma in Material Science from Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR) in India where she worked on developing organic-inorganic phosphorescent hybrids via a supramolecular approach. She started as a graduate student at ISTA in the fall of 2022 and she is currently affiliated with the Ibáñez group. Her work focuses on colloidal nanocrystal synthesis and their structural characterization and electronic transport studies.
Office: I23.O2.007
E-mail: Aiswarya.RayarothPuthiyaveettil@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Abayomi Lawal
Abayomi was born in Lagos, Nigeria. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Lagos. His thesis was titled “Constructal design of combined heat sink with various microchannel shapes”. His research focused on the numerical investigation into the thermal performance of combined heat sinks for the thermal management of microelectronic devices. Abayomi joined the Ibáñez group in October 2022 as a scientific intern. He recently joined the Graduate School and he just started a rotation in our group. He will help to develop our setup for the high throughput discovery of thermoelectric materials.
Office: I23.O2.008
E-mail: abayomi.lawal@ist.ac.at
Phone: +43 (0)2243 9000-2117
Former members:
| Name | Year | Position in the group | Current position |
| Marian Janik | 2019 | Rotation Student | PhD student in Katsaros Group (IST) |
| Yu Zhang | 2019 | Visiting Student | PhD student at IREC |
| Wei Tan | 2019 | Summer Intern | Bachelor student at Imperial College |
| Guillem Montaña Mora | 2019 | Visiting Student | PhD student in IREC |
| Doğukan Hazar Apaydın | 2019-2020 | Postdoc | Postdoc TU Wien |
| Juan Carlos Sobarzo Ponce |
2019 |
Rotation Student | PhD student in Waitukaitis Group (IST) |
| Maximilian Ritter | 2020 | Summer Intern | PhD student at ETH Zurich |
| Anna-Maria Fuchsberger | 2020 | Summer Intern | Student at TU Wien |
| Christoph Bartmann | 2020 | Summer Intern | Student at TU Wien |
|
Alwin Meledeth |
2020 | Master student | OMV company |
| Sajal Naduvile Thadathil | 2021 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
|
Shiva Safari |
2021 | Rotation Student | PhD student in Modic Group (IST) |
|
Soumyadip Mondal |
2021 | Rotation Student | PhD student in Freunberger Group (IST) |
|
Kemal Yorulmaz |
2021 | Intern | |
| Guillem Montaña Mora | 2021 | Visiting Student | PhD student in IREC |
| Anna Smirnova | 2021 | Scientific Intern | Bachelor student Duke University |
| Tanmoy Ghosh | 2021 | Postdoc | Postdoc at RWTH Aachen University |
| Yu Liu | 2019-2021 | Postdoc | PI at the Hefei University of Technology |
| Sergi Sànchez Ribot | 2021 | Scientific Intern | |
| Maryna Dryhailo | 2021 | Scientific Intern | Master (Italy) |
| Lorena Layana | 2021 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Bhargavi Pant | 2021 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Daniel Balazs | 2020-2022 | Postdoc | Staff Scientist (IST) |
| Marios Triantafyllou | 2021-2022 | Scientific intern | PhD student at the University of Crete |
| Prathamesh Patil | 2021-2022 | Scientific intern | Scientific intern (IST) |
| Cheng Chang | 2019-2022 | Postdoc | Associate Professor at the Beihang University |
| Maria Garcia Ramon | 2021-2022 | Scientific intern | Master at the Universidad del País Vasco |
| Vladyslav Kovtunovych | 2022 | Scientific intern | Bachelor in Czech Republic |
| Aiswarya Rayaroth Puthiyaveettil | 2022 | Scientific intern | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Ke Xiao | 2022 | PhD student | PhD student at the University of Barcelona |
| Aiswarya Rayaroth Puthiyaveettil | 2023 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Samuel Hajek | 2023 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Mateja Hrast | 2023 | Visiting Student | Predoctoral Visiting Scientist (IST) |
| Angelina Castro Trujillo | 2023 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |
| Abid Raza | 2022 | Postdoc | |
| Francesco Milillo | 2023 | Visiting Student | Master (Italy) |
| Anna | 2023 | Scientific intern | |
| Mariano | 2019-2023 | PhD student | 4L Impact Strategies (Germany) |
| Rhys Bunting | 2023-2024 | Postdoc | |
| Fernando Nodal | 2024 | Rotation Student | Rotation Student (IST) |