Page 17 - Periodic ISSUE 8

for several months. It’s kept me basically at home, and “I think my lab was a little bit infamous in the Inorganic
I would have been on the road 60–70% of my time Chemistry Laboratory. I still remember dismantling part
during March to June.” He is curious whether Oxford of a hood in there: to generate the draught under the
C hemistry Nobel Laureate
will be opening up to students in October, and it seems hood you had to light gas that caused the flow up the
the academic struggles related to the virus are similarly exit pipe. So, if we had organics then they burnt up the
Professor M. Stanley Whittingham felt all over the world. Whittingham states the problem exit pipe too.”
simply: “chemistry has to have labs”.
Other students were looking at reactions of chlorine
Whittingham has been based at Binghampton atoms. “There was always a slight sniff of chlorine in the
Thomas Player (Keble 2013), DPhil student in Even at that time, University in New York state for the last 31 years. air. In the three years I was there I think no-one caught
the Hore group, interviews 2019 Nobel Laureate the development and Before emigrating to the US he studied for both his BA a cold.”
Professor M. Stanley Whittingham manufacturing teams (1964) and DPhil (1968) in the Chemistry department “I was doing microbalance studies on reactions of
at Exxon had goals at Oxford. He remembers that tutorials with Peter
Has Stanley Whittingham had enough of being that remain familiar Dickens took place in his house on Sunday mornings, hydrogen with these tungsten bronzes, so I had to
congratulated for his Nobel Prize in Chemistry, awarded today. Developing complete with tea and biscuits. Dickens – New College build all the electrical systems to control it. We built
last December? His simple reply: it comes and goes. an automatic liquid nitrogen refilling system, you
electric vehicles, still a tutor in Chemistry at the time, and later Whittingham’s learnt how to be an electrician, glassblower – you did
Whittingham shares the prize with John Goodenough major concern for the Part II and DPhil supervisor – died in October 2019, everything yourself. The glass blowers … would help
and Akira Yoshino for research that began in the late automotive industry, was just two weeks before it was announced that his former train you, but they only did specialised stuff, so you
1960s and led to the development of lithium-ion one. “Back at some of the student had been awarded the Nobel prize. had to become almost a jack of all trades.” Data was
batteries. Commonly used for portable electronics, as old talks I gave we even measured using chart recorders rather than computers,
well as electric vehicles and other applications, they are talked about smoothing Professor M. Stanley so if an experiment was running for a long time you
Whittingham.
a type of high energy-density rechargeable battery that the [national] grid using might be in the lab for 24 hours or longer, dozing off
relies on lithium ions moving between the electrodes. It is large batteries – I think when possible to get a bit of sleep.
perhaps surprising that such a ubiquitous invention – you people were thinking along the same lines [as we do
likely have one in your pocket – had until now remained today]”. Whittingham sees a distinction between the custom
unacknowledged by the Nobel committee. setups he used in his doctoral studies, which involved a
“There’s a huge push here, particularly in New York lot of forethought and design, and current approaches.
Whittingham’s early work at US energy company Exxon State and California … to install solar and wind power “You’ve got the opportunity of thinking now. In those
in the 1970s, developing intercalated materials where and combine them with batteries”. One advantage days you couldn’t do what most students tend to do
molecules or ions are incorporated into a layered solid, of this is that you can quickly turn the batteries on to now, which is to try everything.”
preceded that of both of his Nobel co-recipients. meet peaks in electricity demand – faster than pumped The Whittingham Battery. © Johan Jarnestad/The
Goodenough was at Oxford in the late 1970s and early hydro-electric generators, and greener than fossil fuel Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Outside of the lab there was still time for leisure, with
1980s when he expanded on Whittingham’s work, using stations. “It’s very clear now: I don’t think anyone’s fond memories of living in Oxford in the 1960s. “In
lithium cobalt oxide as a material for battery cathodes, going to build new coal power plants, they’re just too the summer, if you got bored you’d go and watch
and this was later developed and commercialised at expensive compared with wind and solar. [Renewables] During his Part II year, Whittingham’s research was the cricket; in those days Oxford played international
Sony by Yoshino. Nowadays lithium batteries are vital in may be a bit more expensive in the beginning, but the funded by the office of the US Air Force in London. tourists and most of the county teams. If you were in
a multitude of settings, from smartphones and laptops fuel is free and it needs almost zero maintenance.” It was the peak of the space race and they were Chemistry you’d just walk, almost out the back door,
to electric cars and national grids. “It’s very gratifying. I Battery technology is similarly low-maintenance – particularly interested in topics such as the reactions and into the field.”
think everybody in the field is happy because it [lithium Whittingham cites a battery facility that he visited of oxygen atoms with rocket nose cones, leading to “[When I was] an undergraduate it snowed between
battery technology] is being used.” where they proudly informed him that their biggest Whittingham’s early work on tungsten bronzes. His Christmas and New Year once, and the traffic just
maintenance task is mowing the grass. DPhil, funded by the British Gas Council, was supposed
In the early days investigating the fundamental to focus on catalysts for converting coal gas into packed it down … the snow was still there until the
properties of lithium electrode materials, did Whittingham is unsure that receiving the award has had natural gas. “They gave me the fellowship, and then I beginning of March. If anybody says climate warming
Whittingham have an inkling of how widespread this a large impact on his research, although the associated think it was early August when they struck natural gas isn’t happening then they haven’t lived long enough to
technology would become? “We were working on all publicity has certainly raised the profile of lithium-ion in the North Sea and said ‘we’re not interested in that see it.”
kinds of energy problems at Exxon, and I think they batteries and their importance. But if the Nobel Prize anymore – you can do whatever you like, send us a For Whittingham, science is certainly an international
recognised that oil was going to run out.” This led to has not had much impact on his work over the last few report at the end, and don’t bother us with anything in business. “In solid-state chemistry people move from
lots of work on batteries, with Whittingham pitching his months, something that certainly has is the COVID-19 the interim’.” They honoured the funding, and this gave country to country, with collaborators in all different
lithium project to the board of directors in “what they pandemic. Whittingham the freedom to follow his interests during countries. Some of my colleagues use the light beam
call an elevator speech these days”. his doctoral studies. just outside Oxford rather than ones in the US.”
“Obviously we’ve stopped all experimental research

16 17
Periodic The Magazine of the Department of Chemistry The Magazine of the Department of Chemistry Periodic