Title: Multinary Clusters: Atomically Precise Nanoobjects with Uncommon Properties

Time:    2025-10-14 09:00

Lecturer: Stefanie Dehnen

Karlsruhe Institute of Technology

Venue:    Chemistry lecture hall

Abstract：

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. 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 [K₂Zn₂₀Bi₁₆]^6– or [An@Bi₁₂]^q– (An/q = U/3, Th/4), 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–, and the presence of of organic substituents, like in [{CpRu}₃Bi₆]^–, [{(Me₃Si)₂NZn}₂Bi₆]^2–, [{(IMes)Co}₂Bi₅], or [Sn₁₀O₄S₁₆(SBu)₄]^4–, 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.

Bio of Stefanie Dehnen：

Stefanie Dehnen, born 1969 in Gelnhausen, Germany, studied chemistry at the University of Karlsruhe (today’s KIT), Germany, where she received her Ph.D. in 1996. After postdoctoral research in theoretical chemistry at the same university, she completed her habilitation in inorganic chemistry there in 2004. From 2006 to 2022, she held the position of Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at Philipps-Universität Marburg, Germany, and served as the Director at the Scientific Center for Materials Science. Since 2022, she has been a Professor of Information-Based Material Design and Nanosciences and currently serves as the Managing Director of the Institute of Nanotechnology at KIT.

Stefanie Dehnen is a member of the European Academy of Sciences, the German National Academy of Sciences (Leopoldina), the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities. She is an internationally renowned top inorganic chemist who has received numerous honors of her scientific achievements, including the Alfred-Stock Memorial Award from GDCh in 2020, and the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize from DFG – the most prestigious German-based research award in 2022. Her current research is focused on the synthesis and experimental as well as quantum chemical investigation of compounds with multinary, in particular multimetallic, molecular nanoarchitectures, which possess potential as innovative catalysts, white-light emitters, or battery materials.