In September, our PhD student Xuezhi Feng attended the International Symposium on Feedstock Recycling of Polymeric Materials (ISFR 2026), held in Karlsruhe, Germany. During the conference, Xuezhi delivered an oral presentation titled “Waste-derived amides for reversible CO2 capture”. His presentation highlighted an integrated chemical upcycling strategy that converts PET waste into functional amides to yield novel liquid sorbents. These low-transition-temperature mixtures demonstrated efficient and reversible CO2 capture under mild conditions, addressing both the accumulation of plastic waste and the energy intensity associated with conventional liquid sorbents.
Congratulations to our PhD students Serena Reale and Mariano De Cristofaro for their oral presentations at the prestigious ISC2026 (International Symposium on Chromatography) in Prague! Serena presented her talk titled "Combining GC-HRMS and GC×GC-HRMS for comprehensive analysis of breast skin volatiles during pregnancy". She showcased a novel, non-invasive workflow using thin-film microextraction to profile maternal body odors, opening exciting new perspectives in the study of motherinfant chemical communication.
During the summer, our PhD student Alessia Cinci had the opportunity to present her PhD project at two major scientific conferences: the International Conference on Hydrogenases and other Redox Metalloenzymes (ICH2026), held in Leicester, UK, and INORG51, the national conference of the Inorganic Chemistry Division of the Italian Chemical Society (SCI). At both conferences, Alessia delivered oral presentations focusing on her PhD research about non-classic biomimetic systems inspired by [FeFe]-hydrogenases for molecular hydrogen electrocatalysis.
Congratulations to our PhD student Elena Betti for her publication entitled "Energy Transfer Pathways in Plant Photosystem I from First-Principles Modeling" in the Journal JACS Au. Photosystem I–light harvesting complex I (PSI–LHCI) captures and funnels solar energy toward its reaction center with remarkable efficiency. This occurs despite the presence of low-lying energy states located far from the reaction center—the so-called red forms—which would be expected to act as traps, hindering energy concentration at the reaction center.
