Departmental homepageDr Virgil Andrei was born in Bucharest, Romania. He obtained his Bachelor and Master of Science degrees in Chemistry from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, where he studied thermoelectric polymer pastes and films in the group of Professor Klaus Rademann. From 2016 he pursued a PhD in Chemistry at the University of Cambridge, where he developed perovskite-based artificial leaves in the group of Professor Erwin Reisner, working closely with the optoelectronics group of Professor Sir Richard Friend at the Cavendish Laboratory. He was a visiting Winton Fellow in the group of Professor Peidong Yang at the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently a Research Fellow at St John’s College, Cambridge.
Dr Andrei is a demonstrator and supervisor in the Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry and St John's College. As a supervisor, he teaches small groups of first-year students for Part IA Chemistry courses including the kinetics of chemical reactions, energetics and equilibria and inorganic and materials Chemistry modules in the Natural Sciences (Physical) Tripos.
Dr Andrei designs ‘artificial leaves’ for light-driven fuel synthesis. These devices interface metal halide perovskite semiconductors to selective catalysts for green hydrogen production or CO2 conversion. Flexible metal and plastic substrates allow lightweight ‘lotus leaves’ to float on water, whereas carbon coatings enable oxide devices to produce hydrogen for weeks. These unconventional concepts allow the benchmarking of large-scale reactors under outdoor conditions, bridging the gap between fundamental studies and real-world applications.
V. Andrei,† G. M. Ucoski,† C. Pornrungroj, C. Uswachoke, Q. Wang, D. S. Achilleos, H. Kasap, K. P. Sokol, R. A. Jagt, H. Lu, T. Lawson, A. Wagner, S. D. Pike, D. S. Wright, R. L. Z. Hoye, J. L. MacManus-Driscoll, H. J. Joyce, R. H. Friend, E. Reisner, 'Floating perovskite-BiVO4 devices for scalable solar fuel production', Nature 608, 518–522 (2022).
K. P. Sokol,*;† V. Andrei,*;† 'Automated synthesis and characterization techniques for solar fuel production', Nature Reviews Materials 7, 251–253 (2022).
V. Andrei, B. Reuillard, E. Reisner, 'Bias-free syngas production by integrating a molecular cobalt catalyst with perovskite-BiVO4 tandems', Nature Materials 19, 189–194 (2020).
V. Andrei, K. Bethke, K. Rademann, 'Thermoelectricity in the context of renewable energy sources: joining forces instead of competing', Energy & Environmental Science 9, 1528-1532 (2016).
