3D in vitro models for neural progenitor cell differentiation and network formation 

    Pereira, Inês Sousa (Date of defense: 2023-10-17)

    [eng] Conventional 2D in vitro and animal models have been found inadequate to fully uncover the intricate mechanisms happening in the brain and its diseases. Engineering-based models emerge as promising alternatives to ...

    Advanced Characterization of Interfaces of the Chalcogenide-Based Absorbers for the Thin Film Photovoltaic Technologies 

    Fonoll i Rubio, Robert (Date of defense: 2023-03-06)

    [eng] The thesis Advanced Characterization of Interfaces of the Chalcogenide-Based Absorbers for the Thin Film Photovoltaic Technologies is based on six articles that are published in high impact factor peer-reviewed ...

    Algorithmic strategies for seizing quantum computing 

    Pérez Salinas, Adrián (Date of defense: 2021-12-17)

    Quantum computing is an emergent technology with prospects to solve problems nowadays intractable. For this purpose it is a requirement to build computers capable to store and control quantum systems without losing ...

    Algorithms for light applications: from theoretical simulations to prototyping 

    Huguet Ferran, Adrià (Date of defense: 2023-01-20)

    [eng] Although the first LED dates to the middle of the 20th century, it has not been until the last decade that the market has been flooded with high efficiency and high durability LED solutions compared to previous ...

    Alternative Substrates for Sustainable and Earth-abundant Thin Film Photovoltaics 

    Becerril Romero, Ignacio (Date of defense: 2019-10-28)

    The development of sustainable energy sources with a high energy return on energy investment (EROI) that can substitute fossil fuels is a must in order to avoid the collapse of our current civilization. In this context, ...

    Analysis and design of heating systems for advanced automotive Radomes 

    Torres Sacristan, Marc (Date of defense: 2021-07-20)

    The main purpose of this thesis is to study how we could obtain a transparent heating system for a Radome. In the context of this thesis, transparent have two different meanings that are tied due to the objective of our ...

    Cobalt-based Nanocatalysts for Electrochemical Energy Conversion 

    Wang, Xiang (Date of defense: 2022-07-11)

    Cobalt-based nanomaterials are an important class of electrocatalysts that own abundant and diverse d-orbital electronic structures, and can exhibit excellent HER, OER, EOR catalytic activity and stability in energy ...

    Design and Engineering of Advanced Cathode Hosts for Lithium-Sulfur Batteries 

    Zhang, Chaoqi (Date of defense: 2022-07-04)

    Lithium-sulfur batteries (LSBs) are regarded as the most promising candidate to replace Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) in next-generation energy storage systems. Compared with LIBs, LSBs are characterized by a sixfold higher ...

    Development & Implementation of an Electron Diffraction Approach for Crystal Structure Analysis 

    Plana Ruiz, Sergi (Date of defense: 2021-01-27)

    The application of electron diffraction to crystallographically characterize all kinds of materials has experienced new developments that have attracted some attention in recent years. A large number of structural analyses ...

    Development of novel EELS methods to unveil nanoparticle properties 

    Torruella Besa, Pau (Date of defense: 2019-04-26)

    [eng] The aim of this thesis has been two-fold. First, to develop new processing and analysis tools and strategies for extracting information from EELS data, and second, to apply the methods to different nanoparticle systems ...

    Electrohydrodynamic jet printing: stability and reproducibility 

    Ramón Ferrer, Alberto (Date of defense: 2023-01-16)

    [eng] Additive manufacturing, also referred as 3D printing, is a layer-by-layer technique that allows producing three-dimensional objects directly from a digital model. It has enabled the fabrication of innovative products ...

    Energy Harvesting Solutions for Self-Powered Devices: From Structural Health Monitoring to Biomedical Applications 

    Álvarez-Carulla, Albert (Date of defense: 2021-01-29)

    The thesis reflects the research carried out on the development of truly self-powered devices. The development of devices for the scopes of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) and Point-of-Care devices (PoC) is shown. New ...

    Fire Detectors Based on Chemical Sensor Arrays and Machine Learning Algorithms: Calibration and Test 

    Solorzano Soria, Ana Maria (Date of defense: 2020-03-05)

    In some types of fire, namely, smoldering fires or involving polymers without flame, gases and volatiles appear before smoke is released. Most of the fatalities registered for fires, are caused due to the intoxication of ...

    Functional design of nanocomposites and their applications in energy conversion and storage 

    Du, Ruifeng (Date of defense: 2022-06-30)

    [eng] This thesis focuses on the functional design and preparation of different kind of nanocomposites and their applications in energy conversion and storage technologies, particular in OER, HER, H2O2ER and LSBs. For the ...

    Highly active and efficient metal-decorated silicon-based nanostructured photoelectrodes for water splitting solar cells 

    Han, Tingting (Date of defense: 2020-12-11)

    With the burning of large amounts of traditional fossil fuels, global environmental pollution is getting worse and worse, and energy crisis is becoming more serious for meeting human’s life demand. In ...

    Hybrid bio-robotics: from the nanoscale to the macroscale 

    Mestre Castillo, Rafael (Date of defense: 2020-11-26)

    Hybrid bio-robotics is a discipline that aims at integrating biological entities with synthetic materials to incorporate features from biological systems that have been optimized through millions of years of evolution and ...

    Hydrogel co-networks of gelatin methacryloyl and poly(ethylene glycol)diacrylate sustain 3D functional in vitro models of intestinal mucosa 

    Vila Giraut, Anna (Date of defense: 2020-12-10)

    Conventional in vitro cell culture models do not possess the complexity that the native tissues offer. Because of this, the functional properties of the tissues are not properly mimicked, which causes poorly predictive ...

    Laser-induced forward transfer for printed electronics applications 

    Sopeña i Martínez, Pol (Date of defense: 2020-12-16)

    Printed electronics appeared in the 1980s as a cost-effective alternative to silicon-based electronics. Employing the techniques from the graphics industry, such as rotogravure or screen printing, it was possible to print ...

    Making the most of imaging and spectroscopy in TEM: computer simulations for materials science problems 

    Coll Benejam, Catalina (Date of defense: 2022-10-26)

    [eng] Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), since its first implementation by Ernst August Friedrich Ruska and Max Knoll in 1931, has been an essential technique in the nanoscience and nanotechnology field. In the ...

    Metal selenide-based cathodes for high-performance lithium-sulfur batteries 

    Yang, Dawei (Date of defense: 2022-07-01)

    Lithium-sulfur batteries (LSBs) have attracted extensive research interest for the development of advanced energy storage technology. However, the practical implementation of LSBs still suffers from several intractable ...