Title Abstract "Weighted Laplacians on locally doubling manifolds" "A measure on a metric space is said to be doubling if the measure of any ball, of whatever size, is comparable to the measure of the ball of same center and half radius. This is one of the fundamental properties of the Lebesgue measure. If a measure is do" "Electron tomography combined with state-of-the-art electrochemistry to gain better insight into the role of the different components of the active layer in a CO2 electrolyzer." "Nick Daems" "Applied Electrochemistry & Catalysis (ELCAT)" "Renewable energy sources can offer a solution for excessive emissions of greenhouse gases and to the expected decrease in availability of fossil fuels in the near future. Both problems would find a common solution if we were able to develop energy-efficient processes to convert (low concentrated) CO2 streams into fuels and useful chemical products, ensuring a positive economic and environmental balance. One possible strategy is to use H2O and CO2 as renewable feedstock for electrochemical production of fuels and chemicals (e.g. carbon monoxide, formic acid or methanol), employing excess electricity generated by renewable power sources (like wind or solar) to drive the reactions. At the moment, the electrochemical reduction of CO2 is not yet industrially viable, mainly due to the lack of a good electrocatalyst. While a wide range of electrocatalysts is currently being investigated in an attempt to improve the overall performance this was currently without success. Here we propose the combination of state-of-the-art electrochemistry with an advanced TEM characterization as a route towards the discovery of new high-performance CO2 reduction electrocatalysts. A key aspect to achieve this goal can be found in the interaction between the gas diffusion electrode (morphology and composition) and the novel electrocatalysts. Finally, also a more engineering aspect of the overall process, i.e. the coating of the electrode with the active material will be optimized." "Silicone Devices: electronic devices that stretch & adapt like rubber bands" "Wim DEFERME" "Applied Computer Science Lab, Engineering Materials and Applications" "We currently prototype Silicone Devices - highly stretchable yet robust and compliant electronic circuits - via a proprietary Do-It-Yourself (DIY) fabrication workflow using a CO2 laser cutter. Silicone Devices embed components for input, output, processing, and power; and thus are self contained. Our approach thereby scales to arbitrary complex devices as it supports techniques to make multi-layered stretchable circuits and buried VIAs. By further tailoring the underlying materials system and developing the DIY approach to industrially viable fabrication steps, the process behind Silicone Devices can be further refined to match the performance of conventional rigid circuit production. Furthermore, these circuits are flexible, stretchable and soft. In practise this corresponds to being water tight, impact resilient and imperceptibly integrated. Due to its disruptive nature, performance of early proof-of-concepts, and interest shown from industry, an opportunity to commercialization was concluded. The principal challenge for this project, Silicone Devices, lies with the reformation of its current proof-of-concept status to a materials system and production process both in line with industrial quantity as well as quality. Scalability, repeatability and reliability are the three main pillars in this research." "Porphyrinoid-based molecular semiconductors for organic photovoltaics and photodetectors" "Wouter MAES" "Organic and Bio-polymer Chemistry, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata" "The Research Council of Hasselt University approved the stay of dr. Ruchika Mishra (Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Bhopal, India). During this stay, dr. Ruchika Mishra will perform research in cooperation with your research group IMOOBPC." "Circopack: Safe and efficient food packaging within the circular economy" "Materials and Packaging Research &Services" "This project aims to develop a scan for companies that makes it possible to make well-considered decisions regarding the selection of raw materials (bio-based, recycled, …) for food packaging. This should give the companies the required baggage and tools to adapt their packaging policy as optimally as possible to the circular economy while maintaining the required functionality and safety for their packaging. After all, food packaging still faces a number of major challenges in the coming years. On the one hand, they are crucial in maintaining the quality of packaged products and can thus contribute to reducing food losses. On the other hand, companies are increasingly confronted with questions from different angles concerning the type of packaging with regard to environmental friendliness (e.g. migration from recycled material). The latter cannot be separated from the strongly increasing attention for circular economy in food packaging with very ambitious objectives within Europe: • Recycling of 65% of household waste by 2030 • Recycling of 75% of packaging waste by 2030 • Reducing landfill of domestic waste of 10%. Next to the above target that by 2030 all plastic packaging on the EU market should be either reusable or recyclable. All of this means that a company will increasingly be confronted with the question of which type of raw material is the most optimal for the packaging of its specific food. This decision-making process will also have to consider the required functions of the packaging, the possible sorting and recycling functions of the packaging and how this will ultimately affect the sustainability of the packaged product." "Growth of phosphorus doped diamond for quantum information processing applications" "Ken HAENEN" "Materials Physics, Oxford University" "The Research Council of Hasselt University approved the stay of dr. Shannon Nicley (University of Oxford, VK). During this stay, dr. Shannon Nicley will perform research in cooperation with your research group IMOMAF." Electronic structure of n­type nanocrystalline diamond: An x­-ray spectroscopic study "Sankaran KAMATCHI JOTHIRAMALINGAM" "Materials Physics" "Doping nitrogen or lithium into nanocrystalline diamond (NCD) films improves the electrical conductivity that  promote an enormous improvement in the field electron emission (FEE) and electrochemical (EC) properties of  NCD films. In order to elucidate the FEE and EC properties, it is important to understand the nature of chemical  bonding and the electronic structure of the doped NCD films. To this aim, X­ray absorption spectroscopy and  Resonant Inelastic X­ray Scattering will be performed at the C K edge and N K edge to study the chemical  bonding and electronic structure of the NCD films. In addition, Photoemission spectroscopy will be used to probe the C1s, N1s and Li1s core levels and the Fermi edge of the NCD films. Understanding the nature of chemical  bonding and the electronic structure will be crucial for explaining the electron conduction mechanism in the  doped NCD films." "Low cost multisensory paper & packaging applications" "Engineering Materials and Applications, Materials and Packaging Research &Services" "Printed electronics started to develop a megatrend for packaging, food and pharmaceutical industries because it is an enabling technology and accelerator for the other megatrends such as the internet of things, consumer interaction via mobile phones, traceability and safety during online retail by surveillance of storage and transport conditions, etc. SMEs are highly interested to serve this increasing market but they face several challenges. The research landscape and possible SME supply industry for printed electronics is fragmented. In addition, many technologies are stand-alone solutions, which are often costly. Therefore, PAPERONICS will bring together research centres and companies active in the areas of paper, labels, cardboard, ink and printing technology, sensors, RFID tags, scavenger and encapsulation technology, software applications (apps, social media), cloud solutions & design, and end users of packaging, with the aim to foster innovation by mutual cooperation. PAPERONICS aims to develop a platform for smart systems based on existing technologies such as sensors for touch (printed), temperature, humidity; light-emitting devices; RFIDS tags; data processing with internal data transfer and external communication; printed batteries or organic solar cells as energy sources; actuators; and encapsulation materials/processing. The integration of selected components on paper based substrates will lead to smart applications on labels and packaging. PAPERONICS will reveal design and production ways for 3 application scenarios that demonstrate specific possibilities such as a customer relationship product; an anti-counterfeiting tag; and a temperature logger. Paper will be used as substrate because it is temperature stable, stiff and printable and suitable for efficient roll-to-roll processes. Furthermore, it has the potential to deliver low cost, innovative applications that can serve many purposes as intelligent packaging. Encapsulation materials to protect water vapour and oxygen sensitive electronic components (solar cells, printed wires, antennas, OLEDs) will be developed to allow processing and encapsulation in air, instead of in nitrogen/argon glove boxes, at much lower processing cost. Fully integrable energy sources will be studied to activate sensors, logic components and displays. In addition, PAPERONICS will target sustainability from the start of the material selection till the investigation of the recyclability of the final demonstrators." "2D hexagonal boron nitride nanostructures for water cleaning application" "Ken HAENEN" "Materials Physics, Ton Duc Thang University" "The Research Council of Hasselt University approved the stay of dr. Duc-Quang Hoang (Ton Duc Thang University, Vietnam). During this stay, dr. Duc-Quang Hoang will perform research in cooperation with your research group IMOMAF." "Development of industrially viable nanotechnology for thin film solar cells" "Bart VERMANG" "Engineering Materials and Applications, International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory" "Development of industrially relevant nanolithography techniques, especially nano-imprint lithography (NIL), for the integration of nanostructures in thin film solar cells. These nanostructures will be used for passivation and texturing the rear and front of these solar cells. The grantee will have the possibility to collaborate with a NIL tool manufacturer via an Horizon 2020 Project, i.e. ARCIGS-M."