This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
The Division of Chemistry supports Susan Odom of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) as an American Competitiveness in Chemistry Fellow. Dr. Odom will investigate the feasibility of encapsulating chemical species into lithium ion batteries to give them self-repairing abilities. Dr. Walter will work in collaboration with scientists at UIUC as well as at Argonne National Laboratory. In her plan for broadening participation, Dr. Odom will work to develop educational materials in chemistry for a number of ongoing projects at the Orpheum Science Museum, including their Girls Do Science Club.
Research like that of Dr. Odom is aimed at developing new materials for better, more robust lithium ion batteries. The ultimate goal of research like this is to develop batteries with improved performance and longer lifetimes, which will help meeting goals for energy independence and sustainability. The efforts at broadening participation being pursued by Dr. Odom are aimed at increasing the participation of young people from underrepresented groups in the sciences.
