Dr. Curtis P. Berlinguette

Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry

Research Homepage

Email: cberling@ucalgary.ca

Telephone: (403)220-3856

Education: 

Research Interests

Solar Energy Conversion

A survey of the renewable and nuclear options available for meeting future energy demand - which is projected to double by mid-century - indicates that the sun is the only viable non-carbonaceous energy source in sufficient supply.  It will be impossible to produce the amount of carbon-free energy needed over the next half-century with all other renewables combined; unfortunately, less than 0.1% of our energy needs are currently met through the direct conversion of sunlight.  The gigawatt global solar market needs to be expanded by 1000-fold in the near future - a goal that can only be achieved with fundamental breakthroughs in technologies. This involves making stable and cost-effective materials that can replace conventional silicon wafers and improving technologies for storing sunlight during non-peak periods of insolation.

The goals of our inorganic chemistry research program aim to increase the contribution of solar energy to the global energy mix. 

1. Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells: With overall efficiencies approaching 12%, the most efficient next-generation photovoltaic (PV) device is the dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC). Despite the intense interest this cell has recieved over the past 15 years, little progress has been made in driving up the efficiency of this device since its initial report by Gratzel. The vast majority of DSSC chromophores in the literature are Ru-polypyridyl complexes, due to their intense metal-to-ligand charge-transfer band in the visible region. While the conventional approach to improving the properties of these dyes involves the decoration of the perpiphery of the polypyridyl ligands with improved light-harvesting properties, our interests lie in the direct perturbation of the electronic structure of the metal complexes by exploring different coordination modes at the metal site. Our approach has led to robust dyes that are more efficient at harvesting low-energy photons- - an important step for making cost-effective PV technologies.
2. Solar Fuels: The efficient conversion of sunlight into electricity is not the complete answer to the impending energy crisis - we need to be able to store and transport energy. In this regard, many have championed the hydrogen economy as a clean fuel, but hydrogen is currently derived from methane and other petroleum-based products. The sights of our program are set on designing electrocatalysts that efficiently extract hydrogen from water - an abundant and sustainable supply of protons.  To date, there are few molecular compounds capable of driving this reaction catalytically, and the essential design elements remain ambiguous.  Our research is devoted to understanding and implementing this process to ultimately develop efficient and robust water-oxidation catalysts.  Building on the allosteric effect found in numerous enzymatic active sites in biological systems, our focus involves the installation of multiple metal centres within flexible organic ligand frameworks to facilitate an optimal binding environment for water and dioxygen.