Meet the people on the WISE Board

Anders Palmqvist is the Vice President for Research at Chalmers University of Technology and has recently been appointed Vice Chair of the WISE board. Anders is Professor in Materials Chemistry at the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Chalmers. Over the years his research group has focused on the development of nanostructured materials and synthesis methods for applications in environmental and energy technologies, such as emission catalysts, thermoelectrics, photocatalysts, enzymatic CO2 reduction, battery electrodes and fuel cell electrocatalysts.

Can you tell us a bit more about your role in WISE?

I was part of the small team that wrote the original proposal that was submitted to the Knut and Alice Wallenberg foundation to create WISE, and I am now vice-chair of the WISE board.

In your opinion, how can WISE contribute to transitioning into a sustainable society? 

WISE can contribute in so many ways.  For example:

1.  Recruiting and educating high quality researchers on all levels in this field, who can be part of developing new materials and technologies of relevance for sustainable industries and society.
2. Establishing state-of-the-art infrastructure for analyzing and testing new materials is of critical importance in this fast developing and highly competitive field.
3. When developing new knowledge and new materials I anticipate we will see breakthroughs in important areas that will push technological boundaries and keep Sweden at the international forefront.
4. I see that there are several exciting start-ups already involved in WISE and there will likely appear more within the program that will hopefully lead to new innovations and jobs.

As a researcher yourself, what is the materials science challenge that is closer to your heart? 

I am an experimental Materials Chemist with a Chemical Engineering perspective, so I like developing new materials that have a function for improving energy conversion processes or solving environmental problems. Currently, my main focus is to develop noble metal-free electrocatalysts for fuel cells and electrolysers with the target of contributing to broadening the hydrogen economy by providing sustainable, low-cost complements without critical raw materials. We have made significant progress and founded the start-up Celcibus AB that is now part of the WISE community.