Energy and Optoelectronic Related Nanomaterials and Applications

Prof. Yoshio Bando has been leading the communities of nanomaterials and electron microscopy for many years. On this moment of his 70th birthday, to honor his significant contribution to science and technology, we have organized this special issue on “Energy and Optoelectronic Related Nanomaterials and Applications” to highlight the research achievements of Prof. Yoshio Bando. Holding a PhD degree from Osaka University, Prof. Yoshio Bando joined the National Institute for Research in Inorganic Materials (NIRIM) as a researcher in 1975. He was a visiting scientist at the Arizona State University, USA (1979–1981), and in 1992, he became an adjunct professor at the University of Tsukuba. He was promoted to be a supervising researcher of Advanced Beam Analysis Station of NIRIM in 1996. In 2001, NIRIM was merged with the National Research Institute for Metals to form the National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), and he was appointed as Director of the Advanced Beam Analysis Group, followed by being appointed Director-General of International Center for Young Scientist (ICYS), NIMS. He became a NIMS Fellow in 2004 and Deputy-Director General of International Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics (MANA), one of the nine research centers sponsored by Japan's Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) for the World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI)) in 2007. From 2008 to March 2017, he was responsible for the operation of MANA with the appointed position of Chief Operating Officer (COO). In addition, he was adjunct professor of University of Tokyo (2009–2012) and visiting professor of Waseda University (2008–2015). He is currently an Executive Advisor of WPI-MANA at NIMS, and an Invited Distinguished Professor at the University of Wollongong, Australia. Please refer to Table 1 for more information about his career. Director, Integrated Strategy Office, NIMS (∼2003) Group Leader/Director, NIMS (∼2016) Prof. Yoshio Bando has received many prestigious awards and fellowships, including the 3rd Thomson Reuters Research Front Award in 2012, the Tsukuba Prize in 2005, Academician, World Academy of Ceramics in 2004, Commendation Award by the Minister of State for Science and Technology in 1998, Academic Award of the Ceramic Society of Japan in 1997, Seto Award of Electron Microscopy Society of Japan in 1994, and Science and Technology Accomplishment Award by the Minister of State for Science and Technology in 1994. In 2002, he was chosen as one of the “Top Thirty Key Persons in Nanotechnology” in Japan by the scientific journal, “Nikkei Science”. He was appointed as adjunct member of the Science Council of Japan in 2006. He is also a Fellow of the American Ceramic Society and the Royal Society of Chemistry. He served as Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Electron Microscopy from 2008–2012, and was an Editorial Board Member of Small. He was selected as one of the ISI Highly Cited Researchers in Materials Science in 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. To date, he has authored more than 750 original research papers that have been cited more than 36,000 times, resulting in an h-index of 101. Prof. Yoshio Bando's scientific and technological excellence is also reflected by the outstanding mentorship he has provided to the numerous students, postdoctoral researchers and colleagues he has worked together with over the years. Many of his previous student and postdoctoral researchers have gone on to become prestigious Professors in Universities all over the world. Studying and doing research in Prof. Yoshio Bando's group greatly benefit their career development. Prof. Yoshio with colleagues in 1981 (Figure 1), and in 1988 with Professor Kexin Guo (Figure 2). Energy and optoelectronic application of nanomaterials are two of the most dynamic areas in materials studies. Rapid developments in these fields are taking place by taking advantage of the unique properties of various materials at the nanoscale. The recent achievements obtained have greatly extended our scientific understanding of applied nanomaterials and the engineering aspects on nanomaterials' tunable features. We are also witnessing a number of new nanomaterials, especially 2D materials that are gaining more and more attention in the fields of supercapacitors, batteries, sensors and electrocatalysis, with their excellent energy storage performances and optoelectronic efficiencies. Advanced technologies, including in situ transmission electron microscopy have been widely used to probe the mechanism of electrochemical and optoelectronic processes. New concepts, such as self-powering and ultimate integration have been proposed to substantially modify the structure of conventional energy/optoelectronic devices to gain new features. This Special Issue of Small was organized around the topic “Energy and Optoelectronic Related Nanomaterials and Applications”. We invited many of the top researchers, mainly former members of Prof. Yoshio Bando's group, to join us in this effort, contributing to the collection of Review articles and Concept papers. These articles summarize the state-of-art progresses in the field of applications of nanomaterials for energy and optoelectronics, including supercapacitors, lithium ion batteries, light-emitting diode, sensors, catalysts for oxygen evolution reactions, photodetectors and thermoelectrics. We would like to thank our friends and colleagues who have contributed to the special issue and present cutting-edge perspectives on energy and optoelectronic applications of nanomaterials. We also would like to express our appreciation to the editorial team of Small, especially Dr. Guangchen Xu, Jodie Haigh and Dr. José Oliveira. The team has provided very professional support in creating this special issue. We hope that you will join us in celebrating Prof. Yoshio Bando's 70th birthday (Figure 3) by reading the special issue. Chunyi Zhi obtained his PhD degree in physics from the Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Then, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) in Japan. He then worked as a research fellow at the International Center for Young Scientists in NIMS, followed by a permanent position at NIMS as a senior researcher. He is currently an associate professor in Department of Materials Science & Engineering, City University of Hong Kong. His research is currently focused on flexible/wearable energy storage/conversion devices, etc. He has published more than 190 papers with citations of >10000 and a h-index of 53 (ISI).