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Ib Chorkendorff is Professor in Heterogeneous Catalysis at the Technical University of Denmark. He got his PhD in 1985 in experimental surface science from Odense University, Denmark. After working as a postdoc with Prof. John T. Yates Jr. at University of Pittsburgh, USA, he was employed in 1987 as Associate Professor at DTU to establish an experimental activity investigating fundamental aspects of heterogeneous catalysis. He became full Professor of Heterogeneous Catalysis at Department of Physics and Department of Chemical Engineering in 1999 and was Director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Interdisciplinary Catalysis (ICAT) 1998-2005. From 2005-2016 he was director of Danish National Research Foundation Center for Individual Nanoparticle Functionality (CINF) at Department of physics at DTU. From 2016 he has been Director of The Villum Center for the Science of Sustainable Fuels and Chemicals (V-SUSTAIN). He has authored or co-authored more than 320 scientific papers, 17 patents and a textbook “Concepts of Modern Catalysis and Kinetics”. His research activities focus on investigating fundamental aspects of surface reactions and finding new catalysts for improving energy production/conversion and environmental protection. He is the co-founder of three start-up companies RENCAT APS, HPNOW APS and Spectroinlets APS.

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Kathrin Naumann, born 1996 in Germany, completed her binational, intercultural chemistry studies “Regio Chimica” at Université de Haute-Alsace (Mulhouse) and Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg in 2017. During her graduate studies in Freiburg, she focused on bioinorganic chemistry and electro-catalysis, uniting these specializations in her Master’s thesis under the supervision of Prof. Philipp Kurz on chlorine evolution in artificial photosynthetic systems.  
Solar2Chem appears to her as ideal opportunity for pursuing research on the idea of exclusively using sunlight as energy source for the production of sustainable fuels. The corporation stimulated within the PhD network creates scientific exchange and diversity of perspectives, resulting in higher quality of the research outcomes.  
Furthermore, she is driven by the vision of enhancing the outreach and understanding of science in public. Her aim is to draw public attention to the necessity of change in perspective on the global energy supply. Engaging in the scientific communication strategy of the Solar2Chem project is therefore ideal for her.  
Out of these reasons, she chose to continue research on artificial photosynthesis as ESR4 of the Solar2Chem project at Technical University of Denmark. There, she works towards direct photo-electrochemical CO2  conversion to multicarbon-products using multi-junction solar cells. She started the project under the supervision of Peter Vesborg and Ib Chorkendorff in September 2020.