Ali Ansari Hamedani wins the best poster award at NanoTR-12

Our modern lives are dependent on smartphones, tablets, and other portable electronics, all of which constantly consume energy. One of the holy grails in research today is to increase the electrical energy density in batteries. Ali’s award-winning work was the engineering of materials using a novel methodology that exploited nanotechnology—producing hybrid structures of silicon and carbon nanofibers by transforming electrospun fibers of silicon-containing polymers. With this work conducted under the supervision of Dr. Serap Hayat Soytaş, their team is well positioned to tackle their ultimate goal—increasing electrical charge storage capacity by exploiting the high surface area of nanoparticles supported in a carbon nanofiber scaffold.