The À¶Ý®ÊÓƵ Institute for Nanotechnology (WIN) is pleased to present a Distinguished Lecture by Prof. Dr. Stefanie Dehnen, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Executive Director of the Institute of Nanotechnology.Ìý
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Please join us on Thursday, May 1 at 9:10 a.m.Ìýto hear Professor Dehnen's lecture titled "Multinary Cluster Compounds: From Molecular Aesthetics to Macroscopic Functionality."
Where: QNC 0101Ìý
When: Thursday, May 1, 2025Ìý| 9:10 a.m. - 10 a.m.
Please note: This lecture is part of WIN Day 2025. Register for WIN Day 2025Ìýto secure your spot. Walk-ins may be accepted.ÌýÌý
About the lecture
The properties of materials based on cluster compounds is largely affected by the diverse compositions and uncommon structural motifs of these nanoobjects, which result in functionalities with great potential for practical use.[1-3] We control the elemental composition by starting out from p-block element precursors that are reacted with further metal complexes or organic compounds. Depending on the chosen elemental combination, the products represent clusters of the metallide or metalate type. Some of the molecular architectures remain unsubstituted, like [An@Bi12]±ç– (An/q = U/3, Th/4),[4,5] and serve to understand fundamental aspects like electronic properties, cluster formation, and bonding. The aggregation of cluster molecules, such as in [Cs@Ge4(Ge4Se10)4]7–,[6] and the attachment of organic substituents, as in [{CpRu}3Bi6]–,[7] [{IMesCo}2Bi5],[8] or [Sn10O4S16(SBu)4]4–,[9] additionally influence the chemical and physical properties. This leads to unique features, like extreme nonlinear optical response found in materials based on [(StySn)4S6] and related clusters.[10]
References:
[1] Zhang, J.; Bu, X.; Feng, P.; Wu, T. Acc. Chem. Res. 2020, 53, 2261.
[2] McGrady, J. E.; Weigend, F.; Dehnen, S. Chem. Soc. Rev. 2022, 51, 628.
[3] Wilson, R. J.; Lichtenberger, N.; Weinert, B.; Dehnen, S. Chem. Rev. 2019, 119, 8506.
[4] N. Lichtenberger, R. J. Wilson, A. R. Eulenstein, W. Massa, R. Clérac, F. Weigend, S. Dehnen, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2016, 138, 9033.
[5] Eulenstein, A. R.; Franzke, Y. J.; Lichtenberger, N.; Wilson, R. J.; Deubner, L.; Kraus, F.; Clérac, R.; Weigend, F.; Dehnen, S. Nat. Chem. 2021, 13, 149.
[6] Wu, Z.; Weigend, F.; Fenske, D.; Naumann, T.; Gottfried, J. M.; Dehnen, S. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2023, 145, 3802.
[7] Peerless, B.; Schmidt, A.; Franzke, Y. J.; Dehnen, S. Nat. Chem. 2023, 15, 347.
[8] Rienmüller, J., Peerless, B., Paul, S.; Bruder F.; Wernsdorfer, W.; Weigend. F.; Dehnen S. Nat. Chem. 2025, DOI: 10.1038/s41557-024-01713-8.
[9] Peters, B.; Stuhrmann, G.; Mack, F.; Weigend, F.; Dehnen, S. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60, 17622.
[10] Rosemann, N. W.; Eußner, J. P.; Beyer, A.; Koch, S. W.; Volz, K.; Dehnen, S.; Chatterjee, S. Science, 2016, 352, 1301.
About the speaker
Stefanie Dehnen received her diploma in 1993 and her doctoral degree in 1996 from the University of Karlsruhe (now KIT). After a postdoctoral stay in Theoretical Chemistry (1997), she completed her habilitation in Inorganic Chemistry in 2004. From 2006 to 2022, she has been a Full Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at Philipps University of Marburg. As of 2022, she has been Professor of Information-Based Materials Design and Nanosciences as well as of Inorganic Chemistry at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), where she is the Executive Director of the Institute of Nanotechnology (INT). She is a Full Member of the European Academy of Sciences (EurASc), the Leopoldina German National Academy of Sciences, the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities in LowerSaxony, the Mainz Academy of Sciences and Literature, and the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, and she is also a Corresponding Member Abroad of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OeAW) as well as a Fellow of Chemistry Europe, Honorary Fellow of the Chinese Chemical Society, and Hector Fellow of the Hector Academy. Her research has been recognized with numerous awards, recently including the 2020 Alfred Stock Memorial Prize of the German Chemical Society (GDCh), the 2023 Alexander Todd-Hans Krebs Lectureship in Chemical Sciences from the Royal Chemical Society (RSC), the DFG-Leibniz Lecture and the Hector Science Award by the Hector Academy in 2024, and the IUPAC 2025 Distinguished Women in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering Award. Most importantly, in 2022, Stefanie Dehnen was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize from the German Research Foundation (DFG)—the most prestigious German-based research award—and an ERC Advanced Grant from the European Research Council. From 2017 to 2022, she has been Chair of the Inorganic Chemistry Division of GDCh. From 2020 to 2021, she was Vice President of GDCh, and currently, she is the President of GDCh (2024–2025). Among many other services for the community, Stefanie Dehnen has been an elected member of the Molecular Chemistry Review Board of the DFG for eight years, and she is currently the Editor-in-Chief of Inorganic Chemistry (American Chemical Society, ACS). Her current research focus is the synthesis and experimental as well as quantum chemical investigation of compounds with multinary, in particular multimetallic, molecular nanoarchitectures that have potential as innovative catalysts, white-light emitters or battery materials.