The Faculty of Chemistry recently welcomed Nick Parak from TU Wien, who joined Professor Krajčovič’s team in the Laboratory of Advanced Materials Synthesis for a three-day research stay in connection with the AKTION project. In his Master’s thesis, Nick focuses on the oxidation of organic substances into formic acid by means of photoelectrocatalysis—formic acid can then serve as a suitable medium for hydrogen storage and transfer.
A highlight of his visit was the opportunity to utilize our new benchtop NMR spectrometer equipped with a unique flow system. This state-of-the-art instrument enables real-time measurement of reaction kinetics, monitoring of reaction efficiency, and detailed investigation of reaction mechanisms (but it can be used in other applications in the frame of quantitative and qualitative analyses). Its capabilities drew the attention of our colleagues from TU Wien, who decided to explore and incorporate this cutting-edge technology into their own research.
Nick’s stay also continued our ongoing collaboration on electrocatalytic and photocatalytic hydrogen evolution using nature-inspired flavin derivatives. The cooperation between our teams is highly effective—we complement and inspire each other on various topics, opening doors to additional joint projects. This certainly won’t be the last visit; rather, it marks the beginning of a series of longer research exchanges that will strengthen both our faculty and our partner university.
