• Saher Bellali, a PhD student from the University of Monastir, Tunisia, has joined the Department of Chemistry at the University of Turku, Finland, for a research visit. During his stay, he will focus on learning how to utilize his materials from his home university in supercapacitor applications as part of our research group. We are pleased to welcome him and hope his time here will be both valuable and enriching, with potential for future collaboration.

(15/05/2025)

    • Louna Guyomard, a Master’s student from the University of Toulon, France, has joined the Department of Chemistry at the University of Turku, Finland, to complete her internship. We warmly welcome her and hope she gains valuable experience during her time with us.

    (15/04/2025)

    • The MSc students of 2025 have officially Finnished their degrees today! Huge congrats on this amazing achievement – congraduations to all of you!


    (30/04/2025)

    • Ashwini Jadhav went into the Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition final and successfully went out with the “People’s Choice” award for the most-voted presentation. Congratulations on your achievement—enjoy your well-earned reward!


    (05/03/2025)

    • Group Excursion to Turun seudun puhdistamo Oy was an eye-opening experience for our group, providing an opportunity to learn about wastewater treatment in the Turku area, as well as new regulations and commitment goals set by the EU for all its member nations. This supports our group’s direction in the “Water Purification” project. A special thanks to Joona Huopalainen for his role in organizing the excursion.
      (11/12/2024)


      • Ronja Bodesheimer, a PhD student from the Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research, Dresden, Germany, has come and worked on her project at the Department of Chemistry, University of Turku, Finland as part of the M.ERA net project “InsBIOration” for one month.


      (15/06/2024)

        • Adefunke Koyejo has triumphantly defended her doctoral thesis on ‘Electrocatalysts for Environmental Mitigation’ on May 10th Huge congratulations on your graduation, Dr. Adefunke!

                              • Prof. Carita Kvarnström has launched a new project in Water Purification, funded by SUSMAT Cooperation and Maa ja Vesitekniikan Tuki. The goal of the project is to remove pharmaceutical waste from water using our innovative materials.
                                  • Sachin Kochrekar (on the right) won the best poster award in RSC-FLS seminar on sustainable solutions in chemical sciences.

                  Source: Royal Society of Chemistry- Finland Local Section

                                  • The “Photo-e-Mat” project, titled “A bio-inspired generator of green electricity using photosynthetic bacteria and sustainable materials,” is being financially supported by the Academy of Finland for the duration of four years (from 2023 – 2027). This collaborative endeavor involves multiple research groups, namely the Photomicrobes Laboratory and the Laboratory of Materials Chemistry from the University of Turku (UTU), as well as the Laboratory of Natural Materials Technology from Åbo Akademi University (ÅAU). The principal investigators involved in this projects are: Prof. Yagut Allahverdiyeva (UTU), Adjunct Prof. Pia Damlin (UTU), and Prof. Chunlin Xu (ÅAU).
                  • Adefunke O. Koyejo was awarded a research grant from Magnus Erhnrooth for the continuation of her research on CO2 conversion to renewable fuel.

                      • Adefunke O. Koyejo talks about her UNICOM industrial place at Comptek Solutions Oy

              Source: Careers in southwest Finland

                      • Adefunke O. Koyejo joins Comptek Solutions Oy for the UNICOM Industry placement
                      • Dr. Pia Damlin was awarded a research grant from Turun Yliopistosäätiö for the continuation of her work on CO2 electrocatalysis.
                      • MCRG Researchers (Dr. Pia Damlin, Prof. Carita Kvarnström, and MSc. Adefunke Koyejo) were awarded funding from the Alfred Kordelin Foundation for the purchase of electrodes for use in MCRGs recent project which aims at the use of economical methods for the quick detection of products from CO2 reduction.
                      • Open position as Doctoral Researcher / Project Researcher in Materials Chemistry. Are you interested in the improvement of sustainable approaches to modern industrial challenges? Do you have a background in materials chemistry and electrochemistry? or hold a master’s degree in chemistry or a related field? Are you research-oriented? If yes! Then this fixed-term position may be for you. The doctoral candidate/project researcher will be working at MCRG on a research project InsBIOration – Bio-inspired interfaces for the development of next-generation degradable multi-phase materials. A project funded by the EU M-ERA-NET which holds amazing opportunities for academic and industrial collaboration. Further information and method of application are on the UTU webpage. Deadline is on the 2nd of May 2022.
                      • Eu M-ERA.Net has sponsored a collaborative project consisting of several research groups from Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung Dresden, Institut Charles Sadron, Institutul National De Cercetare-Dezvoltare Pentru Tehnologii Izotopice Si Moleculare, National Institute of Chemistry (SI), Kunststofftechnik Bernt GmbH and the University of Turku. The project is titled InsBioration (Bio-Inspired interfaces for the development of next-generation degradable multi-phase materials). The aim of the project is to create green/ sustainable materials production processes. The research at the University of Turku is carried out in the Materials Chemistry research group (MCRG) under the supervision of Adjunct Professor Mikko Salomäki.
                      • MCRG visited the School of Chemical Engineering at Aalto University. Special thanks to Prof. Tanja Kallio and Assocoate Prof. Jaana Vapaaavuori of the Department of Chemistry and Materials Science for hosting us. Adefunke O. Koyejo, Ashwini Jadhav and Sachin Kochrekar from MCRG presented their ongoing research. Members of Tanja Kallio”s group also presented their latest findings. We look forward to an exciting collaboration as we contribute our quota towards achieving SDG 13.

                              • Sachin Kochrekar speaks at the Aboagora symposium organised for Doctoral Candidates in sciences, humanities and art.
                              • Sachin Kochrekar won the first-ever Millennium Pitchin Contest. He talks about converting carbon dioxide into fuel using renewable energy sources, which then mitigates climate change and closes the carbon cycle
                              • Adefunke Koyejo and Sachin Kochrekar attended a virtual conference on “Material Advances in CO2 Electrochemsitry”, organized by The Interreg 2 Seas E2C Project
                              • Sachin Kochrekar gave a presentation on “The Electrochemical synthesis of copolymers containing porphyrin derivatives and their activity towards CO2” at the First virtual Bilateral conference on Functional Materials (BiC-FM) (09/10/2020)
                              • Doc. Mikko Salomäki delivered a lecture on “Closing the human induced carbon cycle: How could we use and produce carbon based fuels in a sustainable way” at the Sustainability is ME pop up event organized by the University of Turku. (01/10/2020)
                              • Professor Carita Kvarnström has been chosen as a new member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters 2020.(10/09/2020)
                              • Ashwini Jadhav attended a virtual conference- Mxene 2020, organized by Drexel University, USA. W
                              • Sergio E. Domínguez will defend his doctoral thesis titled “Studies on cationic polythiophenes with hydrogen-bonding donor capabilities” on Friday 8th of November, in Auditorium Pub4 (Publicum, Assistentinkatu 7), at 12 o’clock noon.
                                The opponent is Professor Matti Knaapila, from theTechnical University of Denmark (DTU) and custos Professor Carita Kvarnström from Laboratory of Materials Chemistry and Chemical Analysis (University of Turku).
                                The electronic copy of the thesis is available here:
                                https://www.utupub.fi/handle/10024/148316

                          • Dr. Lokesh Kesavan, visited Prof. Biljana Abramović ‘s group at University of Novi Sad, Serbia, under Erasmus staff training program. MCRG’s working area got expanded to ‘Photo-catalytic degradation of bio/pharmaceutically active compounds’ through this collaboration. UV and Visible Light-Mediated Degradation of Alprazolam Drug by Supported Au, Pd Nanoparticles Catalysts

                            Experiment pictures from Serbia

                            Experiment pictures from Serbia

                            (14/06/2019)

                          • MSc Milla Suominen will defend her doctoral thesis titled “Electrochemical fabrication of nanocomposites towards sustainable energy applications” on Friday 8th of March in Auditorium Arc1 (Arcanum, Vatselankatu 2) at 12 o’clock noon. The opponent is Professor Pedro Gomez-Romero from Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (Barcelona, Spain) and custos Professor Carita Kvarnström from Laboratory of Materials Chemistry and Chemical Analysis (University of Turku). The electronic copy of the thesis is available here. Congratulations Milla!(22/02/2019)

                          • Sachin participated in 3 min pitching competition for Ph.D. students with a theme: “Sell the project you are working on to get more funding” at the SmartBIO annual meeting held on October 4th, 2018. He presented “Carbon dioxide to fuel” and secured second place. Congratulations Sachin!(02/11/2018)

                          • Milla attended the 6th International Conference on Ionic Liquids for Electrochemical Devices held in Rome, Italy, from 9th to 11th September. She contributed to the conference with an oral presentation titled “Fabrication of conducting polymer-graphene oxide composites in ionic liquids for supercapacitor application.” She gratefully acknowledges the Fortum Foundation for the travel grant. Have a look at her selfies in Rome, one at the Colosseum and another in the conference hall. (20/09/2018)
                          • Rahul attended the conference “69th Annual ISE Meeting held in Bologna, Italy, from 2 to 7 September 2018”. He presented a poster titled, “In situ UV-VIS and FTIR studies of vapor phase polymerized PEDOT films.” (20/09/2018)
                          • Dr. Lokesh and M.Sc. Sachin attended the International Symposium on Electrocatalysis, Recent Advances in electrocatalysis and photoelectrocatalysis from 29th August to 1st 2018 in Szczyrk, Poland. Dr. Lokesh kesavan presented an oral presentation on “Electro-oxidation and sensing of Oxalic acid Catalyzed by Supported metal nanoparticles” and Sachin presented a poster on “Electrocatalytic reduction of CO2 using polymerized porphyrin(Zn and Ni) modified electrodes”. Lokesh and Sachin acknowledges Fortum Foundation and Palomaa-Erikoski foundation for travel grants repectively.(20/09/2018)
                          • New Raman imaging microscope reveals structural and compositional variations in materials.
                            Read more: in English / in Finnish                            (21/08/2018)

                          • Madhu has received a scholarship for undergraduate studies (M.Sc.) from the Fortum Foundation. Congrats, Madhu!
                            (27/06/2018)

                          • Milla gave an oral presentation titled ‘Probing the electronic transport of polyazulene-graphene oxide composites in ionic liquids by in situ spectroelectrochemistry’ in the symposium W: Hybrid materials: state of the art and new frontiers at E-MRS Spring Meeting 2018 organized in Strasbourg, France, 18.-22.6.2018.(25/06/2018)
                          • Recently one new student, Jenny Malmi joined our group for an internship. MCRG welcomes a young talent. She is a student at the Turun Ammatti-instituutti. She will be graduated as a laboratory assistant in December 2018. After graduation, Jenny is interested in work and after that, she wants to go for higher studies. She is curious about chemistry and biology.
                            Welcome to the group, Jenny!(29/03/2018)

                          • MCRG welcomes a new master student Felix Osei Sarpong from Ghana. Felix has studied a bachelors degree in Materials Science and Engineering at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. He has been studying his master’s degree at the University of Turku.
                            Welcome to the group, Felix!(28/03/2018)

                          • MCRG welcomes a new Ph.D. student Adefunke Koyejo from Nigeria. She obtained her bachelor’s degree in Industrial Chemistry from Osun State University, Nigeria. She completed her Master’s Degree in the International Masters Degree program for Research Chemists at the University of Eastern Finland.
                            Welcome to the group, Adefunke!(28/03/2018)

                          • MCRG welcomes our new postdoctoral researcher Dr. Lokesh Kesavan from India. He obtained his Master’s degree in Analytical Chemistry (2007) from University of Madras, India and graduated Ph.D. (2012) from Cardiff University, United Kingdom, in the field of heterogeneous catalysis.
                            Welcome to the group, Lokesh!(04/01/2018)

                          • 3 new bachelor students joined our group recently for their short time project work. MCRG welcomes young talents.
                            Welcome, Mia!
                            Welcome, Antti!
                            Welcome, Emma!                            (19/11/2017)

                          • Our group visited Prof. Minna Hakkarainen’s group at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm. The group thanks, Prof. Minna Hakkarainen for invitation and hospitality. It was a very educational visit. Both the groups presented their ongoing research and interests. It was a very nice and encouraging experience for newly entered group members. After lunch, the visit to Nobel museum was very inspiring. We spent some time around the old town in the evening. Overall, it was full of fun, joy as well as very educational.(08/11/2017)
                          • Milla went as a PhD exchange to conduct some part of her research at the University of Warsaw, Poland. She will be working in the group led by Professor Barbara Palys at the Department of Chemistry. Congratulations and all the best Milla!
                          • Rahul received one-year grant from The Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation for doctoral study. Congrats Rahul!
                          • Nianxing presented his research titled “Viologen Based Redox Composite Films: Electrochemical Synthesis and Characterization” at the “68th Annual Meeting of the International Society of Electrochemistry” held in Providence, USA.
                          • Rahul presented a poster titled “Vapor phase polymerized highly conducting PEDOT films as electrode and high capacitance material” at the “14th European Conference on Molecular Electronics” held in Dresden, Germany.
                          • Rahul attended the “4th International Summer School Spectroelectrochemistry” at the Center of Spectroelectrochemistry, Leibniz Institute for Solid State and Materials Research (IFW Dresden), in Dresden, Germany
                          • Milla presented her research titled “Electroactive Composite Materials for Supercapacitors” at “7th International Symposium on Energy” held in Manchester.
                          • Rahul received one-year grant from the Fortum Foundation for doctoral study. Congrats Rahul!
                          • Bhushan won the best Ph.D. thesis prize from Pentti Kosonen’s fund awards. Congrats Bhushan!
                            Pentti Kosonen’s fund awards incentive grants for high-level chemistry subject dissertations and graduate theses with a grade of at least magna cum laude abrobatur. The scholarships are primarily distributed in the field of inorganic and analytical chemistry (material science).

                          • Rahul received one year grant from The Foundation of Real Estates. Congrats Rahul!
                          • MCRG, IMCG and DTG members Christmas celebrations:
                          • PhD dissertation of MSc Nianxing Wang on 14th Oct. Thesis
                          • Nianxing has been granted a Fortum Foundation Scholarship by The Board of Directors of Fortum Foundation. Congrats Nianxing!nianxing-at-fortum
                          • Rahul has been granted a Fortum Foundation Scholarship by The Board of Directors of Fortum Foundation. Congrats Rahul!rahul-at-fortum
                          • Bhushan wins Chemical Spring Innovation Competition. Congrats Bhushan! It is published on the intranet, here is the link: https://intranet.utu.fi/fi/ajankohtaista/uutiset/Sivut/kampusen-kasvot-kemian-kevaan-voittaja-bhushan-gadgil.aspx
                          • Milla has been awarded the Best Poster Prize presented in Symposium 08 at the 67th Annual Meeting of the International Society of Electrochemistry in The Hague, The Netherlands. Congrats Milla!mill-cert
                          • PhD dissertation of MSc Bhushan Gadgil on 20th May. Thesis
                          • MCRG welcomes our new PhD student Rahul Yewale from Pune, India. Welcome to the group Rahul!
                          • Ajit got 10 months postdoctoral grant from Finnish Cultural Foundation (Varsinais-Suomi Regional Fund). Congrats Ajit!
                          • Milla received Finnish Chemical Society Young Researcher Award for her master’s thesis. More details here link .Congrats Milla!
                          • Recent work on supercapacitors is published in Luonnontieteilijä magazine, 6/2015 p. 22, in Finnish: “Sähköautojen ongelma ratkaistaan superkondensaattoreilla”. Congrats to Pia and Milla for promoting MCRG research activities in media.Pia_MillaPia_Milla_(pc: Hannu Aaltonen)
                          • After the lab cleaning, MCRG members went for dinner at Pub Niska. Everyone enjoyed Finnish Style Pizza!Dinner_Pub Niska
                          • PhD student Bhushan Gadgil received Best Poster Award at the sixth international conference on Carbon for Energy Storage/Conversion and Environment Protection held in Poznan Poland.http://www.cesep2015.put.poznan.pl/. CESEP_2015_Best poster award_Bhushan Gadgil. IMG-20151022-WA0074dsc02476
                          • PhD student Milla Suominen received 3 years funded doctoral position from Doctoral Programme in Physical and Chemical Sciences (PCS) for the University of Turku Graduate School (UTUGS). Congratulations Milla! Keep it up!
                          • Dr. Ajit Kalekar, from University of Pune joined our group as a postdoctoral researcher. He will be working on the Pd nanoparticles-reduced graphene oxide composites for catalytic applications, in collaboration with Åbo Akademi University. Welcome Ajit!

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