MSC03 2060
300 Terrace St. NE
Albuquerque, NM 87131-0001
Physical Location:
Clark Hall
Phone: 505-277-6655
chemistry@unm.edu
Profile: Dr. Pyun received a B.A. from Northwestern University in 1997. He received his Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University in 2002. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow from 2002 to 2004 at the IBM Almaden Research Center at UC Berkeley. Dr. Pyun focused on the synthesis and characterization of novel polymeric and composite materials, with an emphasis on the control of nanoscale structure. Recent developments in polymer and colloid chemistry offer the synthetic chemist a wide range of tools to prepare well-defined, highly functional building blocks. We seek to synthesize complex materials from a "bottom up" approach via the organization of molecules, polymers and nanoparticles into ordered assemblies.
Abstract: We will present our recent efforts in the polymerization of unconventional monomers to prepare novel polymeric and nanocomposite materials. We will discuss the polymerization of a novel class of polymer-nanoparticle hybrid materials on dipolar cobalt nanoparticles, which were used as “colloidal monomers” in a process termed Colloidal Polymerization. From this process, we have been able to synthesize electroactive cobalt oxide nanowires and heterostructured nanocomposites with either noble metal, or semiconductor inclusions. We will also present our recent work on novel sulfur utilization chemistry for polymeric materials. Elemental sulfur is manufactured at a level of 70 million tons every year, which is primarily produced via hydrodesulfurization of crude petroleum. These types of polymeric materials exhibit very high charge capacity again Li-insertion and have tremendous potential as inexpensive, high performance cathodes for Li-S batteries. Furthermore, these sulfurrich copolymers exhibit unusually high refractive indices (n = 2.0) and can be easily processed in thin films, or molded objects.
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