German Sastre is Research Scientist at Instituto de Tecnología Quimica. He studied Physics and Chemistry at the University of Valencia where he graduated in Chemistry in 1990 and later completed a PhD in Chemistry. He did a postdoc at Davy-Faraday Research Laboratory (London) in the group of Prof. Richard Catlow. His scientific background includes physical chemistry, catalysis, quantum chemistry, atomistic methods, programming languajes, operating systems, and parallel computing.
What was your original motivation to become a researcher/project manager?
When I was 14 years old, as Christmas gift (typically known in Spain as ‘Reyes Magos’) I requested a game of chemistry and a microscope. I was afraid to tell my classmates just in case they would mock at me. By then I had already read a biography of Isaac Newton and a book narrating the mathematical and scientific achievements of the Greek philosophers.
What is your (main) research area today?
Solid state computational chemistry. It is, in a sense, a continuation of the legacy of Linus Pauling, who became a master in unveiling (using quantum chemistry) the properties of molecules and materials through a detailed characterisation of its structure. To ‘unveil’ I would also add ‘rationalise’. My role, and my dream, is to offer my grain of sand to understand why things, in the chemical world, happen the way they do.
What is the main focus of your team in REDHy?
Redox mediators will be designed, modified to achieve target performance, and synthesised in order to decouple in time and space the O2 and H2 production from the electrochemical cell designed in the project for water electrolysis.
Could you describe your favourite moment/satisfaction when working for the project and – more in general – for your organisation?
In project: two special moments, one is the obtained correlation between experimental and theoretically calculated redox potentials of designed molecules, and the other is the warm support from other partners to achieve this goal. It is the multipartner project with the highest level of internal collaboration that I have ever met. In general: discovery, or at least proposal, of elementary mechanisms for hydroamination reactions catalyzed by mxenes and zeolites.
How do you expect REDHy results will affect your organisation and the energy storage sector?
I ‘landed’ in this beautiful project after it was written but I praise how the REDHy proposal was written in what I believe is a design capable of integrating disruptive concepts from various fields and leading to an innovative cell design with high overall efficiency through optimized heat and simplified safety management. I hold high hopes that this will make it into the market some day.
