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Green Chemistry Creative Competition, Macronix Science Awards, MOFs, catalyst
NEHS Students Advised by the NSRRC Scientist Awarded in Green Chemistry Creative Competition and Macronix Science Award Competition
2021/07/26
NEHS Students Ching-Jung Lai, Li-Hsi Chen and Chun-Che Lin participated in an internship program at the NSRRC. Their research project was recognized as an honorable mention for Green Chemistry Creative Competition and Macronix Science Award Competition.
Students from National Experimental High School at Hsinchu Science Park (NEHS) participated in the recent science competitions and were honored with prizes. Their research project was co-advised by the NSRRC Scientist Dr. Yan-Gu Lin and NEHS teacher Yu-Chen Chou. The collaborative work of Ching-Jung Lai, Li-Hsi Chen and Chun-Che Lin was recognized as an honorable mention for Green Chemistry Creative Competition 2020 (Group of General Senior High School); and the work of Ching-Jung Lai has won an honorable mention in the other competition for Macronix Science Awards 2020 (Area of Chemistry).
 
The initiatives of “green chemistry” were the prevention of pollution and hazards when chemicals are applied in research, which lead to the evolution of alternative materials and methods for the goal of safety operation for experiment and environmental protection. The final for Green Chemistry Creative Competition 2020 was held on February 27th, 2021 by the Ministry of Education. In total 44 teams were selected from 242 registered teams, which is made up of 528 senior high school students, to compete for the prizes. Lai, Chen and Lin’s work on “Bimetallic phosphide catalysts made of Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) for electrocatalytic water splitting” was recognized as an honorable mention at the final competition. They conducted this research project while they participated in an internship program at the Green Energy Lab of the NSRRC, which is led by Dr. Lin. The students have tried several ways to make different kinds of MOFs, and tested their activities. They used synchrotron X-ray (i.e., X-ray Diffraction, X-ray absorption spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy) to look into the microstructures of the catalyst materials in an attempt to optimize the proportion of the metallic materials. It is found that the best phosphide has the lowest overpotential 120 mV, which is much lower than the current literature, and thus it could be regarded as an excellent catalyst.
 
Besides, Lai used the same research project to compete for Macronix Science Awards 2020. Macronix Science Award Competition was organized by Macronix Education Foundation with the purpose of provoking high school students' interest in fundamental and applied science, of encouraging them to explore the creative and inventive spirit of science, and in the meantime of expanding their thinking flexibility and interdisciplinary learning. In the 2020 competition, 662 teams registered for the competition in eight areas. Lai’s work was selected for the preliminaries in the area of chemistry and was recognized as an honorable mention.

Green Chemistry Creative Competition 2020 Winners
Honorable Mentions for Macronix Science Awards 2020