How the Nano World Shapes the Future of Sustainable Energy: Insights from Microscopy, Quantification, and AI
Date and Time: October 24, 2025 | 1 p.m. PST
Location: CHBE 102
Refreshments will be served at 12:50 p.m.
Abstract
The global transition to sustainable energy is accelerating, reshaping economies and supply chains worldwide. Yet this shift comes with geopolitical uncertainties, resource constraints, and competitive pressures that make resilience and scale-up as critical as efficiency. Meeting global demand requires not only deploying technologies at unprecedented scales, but also ensuring their efficiency, durability, affordability, and independence from fragile supply lines. Here, materials science and accelerated discovery through artificial intelligence (AI) play a central role: enabling the development of new, more efficient and affordable materials; deepening our understanding of performance and durability; and guiding the design and fabrication of systems from the nanoscale to the gigawatt scale.
In this talk, the audience will be introduced to both conventional and emerging approaches for fabricating materials for fuel cells and electrolyzers, followed by a deep dive into their microstructural characterization. Advances in microscopy, spectroscopy, and structural parameter quantification—integrated with AI and automation—will be presented as powerful approaches for describing materials across length scales with the speed necessary to accelerate deployment. Using examples from both laboratory studies and industrial practice, correlations between microstructural parameters and performance and durability will be demonstrated, revealing how insights from the nano-world of these systems can shape their future design and fabrication. The presentation will conclude with a brief overview of other ongoing research directions and major global initiatives within the speaker’s team.
Biography
Dr. Jasna Jankovic is an Associate Professor and the Director of Undergraduate Studies at the Materials Science and Engineering Department at the University of Connecticut (UConn). She is also a founder and a leader of an international scientific network of networks in hydrogen field: Research and Education Accelerated by Connections in Clean Hydrogen (REACH2). Prior to joining UConn in 2018, she completed her Ph.D. at the University of British Columbia, Department of Chemical Engineering, under the supervision of Dr. David Wilkinson, followed by a 7 year employment as a Senior Research Scientist at the Automotive Fuel Cell Cooperation in Burnaby, Canada, a joint venture between Ford Motor Company and Daimler.
Dr. Jankovic’s research focus is in advanced characterization of fuel cells, electrolyzers and batteries using microscopy and spectroscopy techniques, fabrication of novel electrodes for electrochemical devices, as well as Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and clean energy education. She has more than 30 years of experience in clean energy sector, extensive list of publications, 2 patents and 2 provisional patents. Dr. Jankovic is a recipient of several Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) awards in Canada, a number of National Science Foundation (NSF) awards (including NSF CAREER and PFI awards), and Department of Energy (DOE) sub-awards in the US. Most recently, in 2024, Dr. Jankovic received a prestigious Alexander von Humboldt Award to conduct research in Germany, at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy, Hydrogen Department. Dr. Jankovic serves on numerous review and conference organizing committees in Canada, US and Europe.