The Director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart is honoured for her development of new materials
The Leibniz Prize, awarded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), is Germany’s most prestigious research funding award, accompanied by prize money of 2.5 million euros. This year, the prize will honour 10 scientists, six men and four women, granting them seven years of research freedom with minimal bureaucratic constraints. The award ceremony is scheduled to take place on 15 March 2023 in Berlin.
A portrait of Bettina Lotsch, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, looking at the camera and smiling. She has shoulder-length white hair and is wearning a T-shirt with white and blue stripes.
A portrait of Bettina Lotsch, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, looking at the camera and smiling. She has shoulder-length white hair and is wearning a T-shirt with white and blue stripes.
The light converters: The Sun sends more energy to Earth than humanity needs. Researchers led by Bettina Lotsch, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, are working on materials that can help us put this abundant supply to use for a whole host of purposes – even beyond the energy revolution
© Wolfram Scheible for the MPG
The light converters: The Sun sends more energy to Earth than humanity needs. Researchers led by Bettina Lotsch, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, are working on materials that can help us put this abundant supply to use for a whole host of purposes – even beyond the energy revolution
© Wolfram Scheible for the MPG
The chemist Bettina Valeska Lotsch focuses her research on innovative materials for sustainable energy solutions. Specialising in fundamental material synthesis, she has achieved ground-breaking progress in developing a new generation of photocatalysts capable of generating hydrogen and reducing CO2 under light exposure.
A key breakthrough in her research is the creation of a novel light storage concept. By leveraging the interaction of light with specially engineered materials, she has developed a system that allows solar energy to be stored and later released for energy conversion. This enables photocatalytic reactions to occur even in the absence of light, a process she has termed "dark photocatalysis." This breakthrough has significant implications for advancing efficient solar batteries.
Additionally, Lotsch’s contributions to the development of inorganic electrocatalysts, particularly those based on two-dimensional materials for water splitting, have earned widespread recognition.
About the prize winner
Bettina Valeska Lotsch pursued her studies and doctorate at LMU Munich before undertaking a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Toronto, Canada, in 2007, supported by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. After her return to Germany, she was appointed as a tenure-track professor at LMU Munich. In 2011, she also became an independent group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart.
Since 2017, Lotsch has served as the Director of the Nanochemistry Department at the Max Planck Institute, while holding honorary professorships at both LMU Munich and the University of Stuttgart. In recognition of her pioneering contributions, she was awarded an ERC Starting Grant in 2014 and has received numerous accolades, including the EU-40 Materials Prize from the European Materials Research Society in 2017. Her achievements were also honoured by her induction into the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities in 2021.