Bulletin No. 2, 2016

42 Chinese University Bulletin No. 2, 2016 reseArcH Breakthroughs in Smart Solar Energy Research Under the leadership of Prof. Wong Ching-ping, Dean of Engineering, cross-institutional research team has been conducting a five-year research project entitled ‘Smart Solar Energy Harvesting, Storage and Utilization’ since 2014 and recorded a number of breakthroughs. The team developed the nanostructured metal oxide-carbon composites for asymmetric supercapacitors to increase its energy and power density to as high as 98.0 W h kg –1 and 22,826 W kg –1 , respectively, making them the best performing supercapacitors to date. The research team led by Prof. Lu Yi-chun of the Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering developed catholyte flow batteries with the highest volumetric capacity reported to date. By combining liquid phase, lithium iodide and solid phase sulphur flow cathodes, the volumetric capacity of flow batteries could reach 550 Ah L –1 . Professor Lu had obtained a patent on the technology and planned to apply it to electric cars. Another research team comprises Prof. Yan Keyou (1st left), Prof. Xu Jianbin (2nd left) and doctoral students discovered nonstoichiometric acid–base reaction (NABR) as reliable synthetic route to highly stable CH 3 NH 3 PbI 3 perovskite film for the production solar cells. The NABR perovskite film is stable for two months with negligible PbI 2 -impurity under 65% humidity, whereas other perovskites prepared by traditional methods degrade distinctly after two weeks. The result was published in the November issue of Nature Communications . Revealing the Mystery of Maternal Inheritance of Mitochondrial DNA Prof. Kang Byung-ho, Associate Professor of the School of Life Sciences, uncovered with researchers from the University of Colorado the mechanism explaining why fathers’ mitochondrial DNA is not inherited to their offspring. DNA resides in both the nuclei and mitochondria of human cells. In most animal species, mitochondrial DNA is inherited solely from the mother, unlike the nuclear DNA that is inherited from both parents. The research team examined the roundworm C. elegans and found that the sperm mitochondrion starts to undergo self-degradation once it penetrates an egg. If this cleaning job becomes aberrant in human, one can suffer from neurodegenerative diseases and reduced rates of embryo survival. The discovery provides new insights into devising cures for diseases stemming from problems in autophagy and supports the improvement of vitro fertilization techniques. (From left) Prof. Zhao Ni, Assistant Professor of the Department of Electronic Engineering, Prof. Wong Ching-ping, Dean of Engineering and Prof. Lu Yi-chun, Assistant Professor of the Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering