Chemistry Scholarships

Scholarships

The School of Chemistry is offering scholarships to suitable applicants to work on the following projects:

Postgraduate Scholarships

Honours Scholarships

Requirements

  • Applicants should possess a minimum qualification of a BSc degree with Honours Grade H2A or equivalent. 
  • Overseas students must meet the English requirements for both Visa entry and Monash University (preferably IELTS).
  • Applicants who are not Australian/New Zealand citizens or Australian permanent residents will need to pay tuition fees.
  • Applications including an up-to-date CV with details of academic record, two contactable referees and any information pertaining to research record or ability must be sent to:-

    Mrs Monika Walker
    School of Chemistry
    PO Box 23
    Monash University
    Victoria Australia 3800

Postgraduate Scholarship

Transport properties of phosphonium IL electrolytes for lithium-ion batteries using quantum chemical and NMR methods

Nowadays lithium ion batteries are frequently used in low power applications such as mobile phones, laptops, cameras and other portable consumer electronic products. These batteries are also ideal for high power battery applications, especially in the automotive, military and aerospace industries. Among the existing technologies rechargeable lithium-ion batteries are preferred due to high power density as well as energy density and are considered strong candidates hybrid and battery-powered electric vehicles.1 Compromised safety of these devices arising from the use of volatile and corrosive in nature organic-based electrolytes such as ethylene carbonate2 represents an outstanding issue that needs to be addressed. Ionic liquid (IL) electrolytes represent a promising alternative to currently used electrolytes due to their superior properties in thermal and electrochemical stability, non-volatility and relatively inert nature. Phosphonium-based ionic liquids have pioneered the field due to their wide electrochemical window and improved lithium transport.

The PhD scholarship will be supported by the Linkage project entitled "Phosphonium Ionic Liquids for Advanced Lithium Energy Storage Systems". A successful PhD student will be co-supervised by Dr Katya Pas (Monash University) and Prof. Maria Forsyth (Deakin University). The project will combine both quantum chemical methods such as the Fragment Molecular Orbital approach in combination with the MP2 level of theory3 and experimental methods such as NMR to understand trends in lithium ion transport and speciation mechanisms in phosphonium-based ionic liquids. The outcomes of this project will establish important design parameters for novel ionic liquids with enhanced lithium transport properties. The calculations will be run on the computational facilities at the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) and the Monash eResearch Centre. Experimental work will be conducted on the NMR facilities at Deakin University.

Interested candidates should directly contact Dr Katya Pas by e-mail: katya.pas@monash.edu.

References

  1. S. T. M. Lowe, T. Trigg, G. Gereffi, www.cggc.duke.edu/pdfs/Lithium-Ion_Batteries_10-5-10.pdf, Center on Globalization, Governance and Competitiveness, Duke University, 2010, accessed 24 Oct 2011
  2. A. K. Shukla, T. Prem Kumar, Current Science 2008, 94, 314.
  3. E. I. Izgorodina, J. Rigby, D. R. MacFarlane, Chemical Communications 2012, DOI: 10.1039/C1CC15056A, part of 'Emerging Inverstigators 2012' themed issue.

Honours Scholarship

Synthesis of nanocatalysts for electrocatalytic conversion of carbon dioxide (a joint project between Monash and CSIRO)

Prospective Honours students with strong academic background and research experience are welcome to apply for a scholarship of $5,000 for undertaking an Honours project at the School of Chemistry in 2013. In this project, new multifunctional nanocatalysts will be synthesized for the electrocatalytic/ photoelectrocatalytic reduction of CO2 in suitable reaction media at room temperature. Highly sophisticated voltammetric techniques and the corresponding quantitative theories will be developed for sample characterization and better understanding of the fundamental processes occurring at new nano-interfaces. Students will also have a chance to have hands on experience on a range of contemporary analytical Instrumentations which are available at both Moansh University and CSIRO, including electron microscopes, XRD, NMR, GC-MS etc, for sample characterization/product analysis.

Please contact Dr Jie Zhang (jie.zhang@monash.edu) if you would like to know more details about this project.