The research in our group is multi-disciplinary and primarily focuses on the following topics:

Developing Polymer Semiconductors for Solar Energy Conversion

The sun provides the Earth with a striking amount of energy-enough to support the entire Earth for billions of years. However, if solar energy is to become a practical alternative to fossil fuels, we MUST develop viable approach to convert photons into electricity, fuels, and heat. In our group, we are interested in developing various 2D polymer nanosheets and other polymer materials with suitable band gaps and band edge positions to convert solar energy into chemical fuels either by direct photocatalytic water splitting or photocatalytic CO2 reduction/N2 fixation. To achieve this goal, we focus on synthesizing or assembling ultrathin conjugated polymers which provide a tunable platform for controlling electronic structures and loading co-catalysts. Meanwhile, we also devote to elucidating fundamental mechanisms responsible for efficient energy transfer process.