Tarancón Rubio, Albert
ICREA Research Professor and Head of Group at Institut de Recerca en Energia de Catalunya (IREC).
Engineering Sciences
Short biography
Albert holds M.Sc. and PhD in Physics from the University of Barcelona (2001, 2007) and M. Eng. in Materials Science from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (2007). He worked as research associate at the IMB-CSIC (ES) and as visiting researcher at the University of Oslo (NO), Imperial College London (UK) and Caltech (USA). In 2010, Albert gained a Ramon y Cajal Fellowship and joined the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (IREC) as the Head of Group. Currently, he is ICREA Professor at IREC and leads a group of 25+ people devoted to nanomaterials for alternative energy technologies and their applicability in powering portable devices and hydrogen/synthetic fuels production. He has been PI of 10 EU projects, including one ERC-CoG and three coordinated H2020, attracting a total amount of 20+ M€. He is currently editor of J. Phys. Energy (IoP) and J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. (Elsevier). Albert has been recently included in the 1% top-cited scientists in the field of “Energy”.
Research interests
The research work carried out by Albert is in advanced materials for energy applications. In particular, he has been developing innovative concepts for improving the performance of different solid state energy devices such as Solid Oxide Fuel and Electrolysis Cells (SOFC/SOEC), ThermoElectric Generators (TEGs) or Li-ion batteries for energy storage and portable power applications. In the last years, Albert has been specifically developing new concepts for the unexplored field of Nanoionics and Iontronics. They are called to drive a new revolution similarly to Nanoelectronics, underlining the relevance of size effects and interfaces on mass transfer, transport and storage. Albert's group is pioneer in implementing interface-dominated nanomaterials in devices for radically new applications. In this direction, he was awarded with an ERC CoG to implement disruptive Nanoionics concepts in Si-integrated micro-SOFC technology and two FET Proactive projects on new microenergy technologies.