University of Groningen
Nanostructured graphene
Lu, Liqiang
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Publication date: 2018
Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database
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Lu, L. (2018). Nanostructured graphene: Forms, synthesis, properties and applications. Rijksuniversiteit Groningen.
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Acknowledgement
Time flies, when I look back the four years in Groningen, all the stories come to my minds, the life here is full of happiness, endeavors, and gratitude.
First and foremost, I must give my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor Prof. Yutao Pei. Yutao, thank you so much for providing me the precious opportunity to pursue my PhD degree in APE group at University of Groningen. With your constant supervision, trust, encouragement and freedom, I can do so nice research topics. Because of your plenty of valuable and intelligent suggestions and guidance without conservation, my projects can be conducted so smoothly and successful. I deeply impressed and inspired by your serious scientific attitude and rigorous thinking, I see the qualities of being a leader from you, which I really should learn and practice in the future.
Secondly, I am grateful to my second promoter Prof. Jeff Th. M. De Hosson. Jeff, thank you for your supervision and so many valuable suggestions and discussions on my projects. Your dedicated time and support on my experimental design, analysis, and writing promotes my projects to undergo more smoothly. I am so impressed by your passion on science, which is so inspiring to me.
Then, I would like to give my gratitude to many colleges from other groups for numerous supports that speed up my researches. Prof. Wesley R. Browne, I am grateful to the supportive helps and valuable discussions to the Raman analysis. Prof. Thorben Cordes and Yichen, thank you so much for the valuable supports on quantum yield measurements and analysis. Dr. Roland Schmidt at Hitachi High-Technologies Europe GmbH (Krefeld, Germany) made high-resolution SEM observations for me; I also sincerely thank you for the high-quality results. Prof. Katja Loos and Mr. Albert Woortman, I sincerely thank you for using your lab and other equipment. Prof. Beatriz Noheda and Mr. Jacob Baas, I express my gratitude to you for the trainings and supports on access to many equipment such as XRD analyzer, four-point probe station and furnaces. I also really thank Prof. Andreas Herrmann for providing me access to their equipment and labs. Léon, I am very grateful to you for providing me so many trainings and helps on BET and TGA measurements and analyzing. Without your precious support and suggestions, I cannot finish the project presented in the thesis. In addition, I would like to give my gratitude to Selvaraj for the helps and discussion on electrochemical impedance spectroscopy analysis.
I am very grateful to colleagues from APE and MK groups who gave such a lot of professional trainings and helps during my projects. This thesis could never be done without the trainings, helps, and supports from all of you. David, thank you so
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much for the frequent helps and suggestions such as on TEM measurements, vacuum heating, ordering chemicals and gases, etc. Mikhail, my former colleague, thank you for numerous trainings on SEM, TEM, AFM, vacuum furnaces to me, and offering lots of helps on building up testing equipment, ordering chemicals. Jiancun, an expert in TEM, thank you very much for TEM training that fully facilitates my research. Emad, I am very grateful to you for the training and helps on ions sputtering and milling machines, purchasing chemicals, building testing system, maintaining equipment etc. Thank you so much for your patience and dedicated time on my projects.
I sincerely thank the assessment committee members, Prof. Guido Janssen, Prof. Hero Jan Heeres and Prof. Meike Stöhr for carefully assessing my thesis and providing me lots of valuable comments and suggestions.
I also would like to thank our group secretary Johanna, and our former secretary Frederika and Inge. All of your helps and supports really make my working more convenient and happier. Besides, I am grateful to Fei for invaluable helps on the patent applications. The writing and processing are so crucial that the application cannot be successfully achieved without your suggestions and advices. I also thank you for writing the summary of this thesis in Dutch. I wish you all the best in the future.
Next, I would like to express my acknowledgments to the IEM master students I supervised: Nick, Frank, Paul, and Thom. All of you are so smart and made excellent outcomes during your master research. I am really happy working with you. I wish all of you find desired jobs and have wonderful careers. My gratitude is also given to my bachelor students from IEM: Menno, Ralf, Thijs, Julie, Stephan and Hielke. Although every one of you worked with me for only around 3 months, many memories are kept in my minds. I am really appreciating all of you, and wish you have a wonderful future.
I sincerely thank my paranymphs. Huatang, who joined our group in the same time with me, I appreciate for your lots of precious helps and discussions with me during researching. There are so many cheerful times with you in Groningen and travels such as the trip to Milan for Expo 2015, which is so wonderful and amazing. Ali, my dear roommate, I am grateful to you for all the nice, pleasant and helpful discussions. There are so many memorable moments in the PhD life, for example, the trip to Keukenhof, Paris and game of Go-kart together with you were so joyful. As I know both of you are also busy with your dissertation, I very appreciate for your precious time and support. I also wish both of you are the best in your PhD defences and future careers.
Moreover, I would like to thank all the other APE group members, Jan, Feng, Antonis, Ajay, Soheil (Solhjoo), Amar, Soheil (Sabooni) and Zahra, Yanji, Zhen, Redek, Jing, Taraneh, Ranko, Masoud, Debarun, and Ruoqi. I learned a lot of knowledge and skills from all of you in our group meetings and in daily life. I am
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also grateful to having so many valuable suggestions and encouragement during working. Besides, there are also so many happy times and impressive memories during working, travelling and group activities. Working with you is so lucky for me. I wish all of you have great success and wonderful life in the future.
I also acknowledge my colleagues from MK group, Paul, Václave, Jintao, Enne, Gerrit, Diego, Herman, Indranil, Leo and Ondřej. Thank you for the helps during my research.
What is more, I thank all the Chinese friends in Groningen: Jiacong, Si (Crystal), Fangfang and Quan, Lianjia, Kaiyun, Yiyi, Zhiyuan, Wanxuan, Yi (W), Yifan, Jun, Xiang, Qi (C) and Jiajia, Bing and Haoxiao, Yi (J) and Ting, Qiuyan, Yuanze and Jingjing, Siqi and Tiantian, Zhijun, Xiaohong, Xiaojing, Nini, Qihui and Yingruo, Changsen and Yingying, Xu, Jielin, Suriguga, Jing (S) and Jiaying, Qingkai and Yuhan, Xiaoming, Hongyan, Jing (W), Kai, Shuai, Chao, Zhenchen and Shilin, Yanan, Yifei and Yihui, Cong, Qihong, Jin, Yingfen, Honghua and Yangjie, Lei and Juan, Lijuan and Peiliang, Jing (L), Ling, Xiaoshan, Keni, Yizhou, Bin, Yehan, Xiaoying, Tian, Hong, Pengkun, Xiaotian, Zhiwen, Xukai, Chongnan, Qi, Junjie, Wangli’s family, Xiaodong’s family, Jiquan’s family, Ying’s family, Rui’s family, and many other friends not mentioned here. We enjoyed the food and music together, shared our stores and daily living skills, talked about the life and dreams... All of you gave me lots of helps, happiness and memorable moments, which are so precious to me. In addition, I deliver my gratitude to my high-school classmate Cong (W), who pursued his PhD in Eindhoven University of Technology. I wish you have a wonderful life in Japan.
Lastly and importantly, I sincerely give my great gratitude to my family. Dear Dad and Mom, thank you for your always understanding and support. Your love to me is infinite and beyond word. Dear brothers and sisters, thank you for taking care of our parents when I live abroad. Dear my little nephew and niece, wish you grow up healthy and happy every day. I gratefully acknowledge my parents-in-law, thank you for your love and understanding. Dear Yuanpeng, my brother-in-law, hope you to be admitted to a dream graduate school. In particular, I express my gratitude to my deeply loved wife, Yuanyuan. Thank you for your understanding, support and encouragement all the time, and bringing our family the precious gift−our baby. You are the most beautiful angel in my heart. Meeting with you and fall in love with you in Groningen are the most beautiful poems to me.
Finally, I would like invoke the following lines from "Li Sao" written by the great ancient Chinese poet Qu Yuan (c. 340–278 BC) as the end of this thesis: “The way ahead is long; I see no ending, yet high and low I'll search with my will unbending (路漫漫其修远兮，吾将上下而求索−屈原)”.
