Hi Reddit! I am a Professor of Chemistry at Virginia Tech. I was hired as an Energy chemist and my research focuses of solar energy harvesting and storage. At Virginia Tech, I am affiliated with the Center for Energy Harvesting Materials (link), the Sustainable Energy Thrust of the Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science (link), and the Macromolecules and Interfaces Institute (link). With the American Chemical Society, I serve as an ACS Expert in the field of sustainable energy. In one and a half hours enough solar energy hits the earth surface to power human civilization for an entire year. Remaining challenges that limit the wide-spread use of solar energy are the development of economical solar harvesting materials and advances in energy storage. Along those lines, my research group focuses on two next generation solar cell architectures – quantum dot sensitized solar cells and hybrid bulk heterojunction solar cells. Both of these architectures use inexpensive, nanocrystalline titanium dioxide as the bulk of the solar cell. Therefore, these cells can theoretically be made for a fraction of the cost of a silicon solar cell. Even if the cost of the solar module is reduced, there is still the issue of the intermittent nature of the sun. So in addition to research on photovoltaics, my research group explores methods to store solar energy in chemical bonds. Nature’s photosynthetic system — a complex assembly of light harvesting arrays, electron transfer relays, and catalytic centers — achieves just that using energy from the sun to convert water and carbon dioxide into sugars (our stored fuel!). In our lab, we try to mimic the photosynthetic system with metal organic framework arrays. Metal organic frameworks are porous networks of inorganic clusters and organic ligands. The function of the framework (light harvesting, catalytic, etc) can be tuned by the type of clusters and organic molecules incorporated. We are interested in the guiding principles behind efficient light harvesting, energy transfer, electron transport, and catalysis in these arrays. Check out our recent publications in the areas discussed above: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja410684q http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jacs.5b03071 http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/am500101u So feel free to ask me anything about next generation solar cells including dye-sensitized solar cells, quantum dot sensitized solar cells, bulk heterojunction solar cells, and hybrid bulk heterojunctions solar cells, artificial photosynthesis, water oxidation, carbon dioxide reduction, metal organic frameworks, and chemistry. I would welcome discuss around the economic outlook for solar energy. Additionally, I would be happy to answer steps we all can take to reduce our carbon footprint and the role solar energy can play in our own households. Lastly, I am open to discussions around academic career paths and diversity in science. I will return at 11 am ET to answer your questions. [EDIT] I am here with members of my team (Dr. William Maza, Spencer Ahrenholtz (PhD Candidate), Andrew Haring (PhD Candidate). We are ready to answer your questions! AMA! [EDIT] Signing off now (12:15 PM ET). I will try to return to continue the discussions that have started. Thank you for participating! [EDIT] Back on (3:30 PM ET) to try to answer some more questions! Glad to see the discussions kept going! [EDIT] Signing off again (5:18 PM ET). I hope to come back again to answer the remaining questions! [EDIT] I will keep returning to answer any more questions that pop up! Thank you for a stimulating discussion! Signing off (11:30 PM ET)