Chaired by Professor Qiang Sun in Department of Materials Science and Engineering, the International Symposium on Nanostructures and their Applications in Renewable Energy was recently held in Beijing, attracting 128 researchers from the United States, Canada, Sweden, Singapore, South Korea, India, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, mainland China and other countries and regions.

The conference is co-sponsored by Peking University, Jinan University, Lanzhou University, China University of Mining (Beijing), Beijing Jiaotong University, with a main focus on further discussing ways to improve the efficiency of nanoclusters, nanotubes, nanowires, two-dimensional layered materials and nanoporous materials in conversions of electricity from mechanic, thermo and light resources, which is a major challenge in today’s renewable energy science.

As traditional fossil fuels diminish and the demand for energy continues to increase, it has become an objective for the global energy scientists to seek efficient energy storage and conversion materials in order to achieve better utilization of new energy. The emergence of new nanostructures, nanomaterial syntheses and utilization has provided new vitality for this challenging field. Therefore, it is of great significance to have in-depth studies on nanostructures and nanomaterials for their application in fuel cell catalysts, lithium-ion batteries, solar cells and other energy conversion and storage fields.

“The international symposium has strengthened international communication in the field, summarized the current research progresses, and discussed future research directions. I think it has played a positive role in the further progress of the field,” said Professor Sun.