Yang Song

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Contact Information

Title: Professor
Office: ChB 22,
Labs: ChB 4 & 5
Phone (Office): ext 86310
E-mail: yang.song@uwo.ca

Physical & Analytical Teaching Division

Materials: Design, Function, and Characterization

Physical and Materials Chemistry, Chemical Physics, Chemistry under Extreme Conditions, Development and Application of Spectroscopy and Synchrotron Radiation

Education

B.Sc., Peking University; Ph.D., Iowa State University; PDF, Harvard and Carnegie Institution of Washington

AWARDS

  • Petro-Canada Young Innovator Award
  • Ontario Early Researcher Award

RESEARCH

 is specialized the development and characterization of novel functional materials utilizing extremely high pressure as a unique tool. Pressure can substantially alter the interatomic distances and thus the nature of intermolecular interactions, chemical bonding, molecular configurations and crystal structures of materials. As a result, pressure constitutes a new dimension in materials synthesis by creating novel materials with unprecedented electronic structures and a range of tunable chemical and physical properties. Our lab houses a suite of state-of-the-art analytical probes dedicated to static high-pressure research, including diamond anvil cells that allow variations in a broad pressure and temperature range, a highly versatile customized FTIR microspectroscopy system, an ultrasensitive multi-source Raman microspectroscopy system, as well as other spectroscopic tools for photoluminescence and UV-visible absorption measurements. The high-brilliance 3rd generation synchrotron radiation light sources provide tremendous advantages for researchers to study the structures and properties of materials under high pressures in situ with unparalleled accuracy and efficiency. Our group extensively employs synchrotron-based techniques such as far-Infrared microspectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and X-ray spectroscopy using the most advanced synchrotron facilities in Canadian Light Source, US national labs and worldwide.

Supported by these experimental tools as well as first principle computations, our recent research thrusts are placed on the following main themes with promising practical applications:

  1. pressure tuning of functional materials for energy devices that include battery materials and photovoltaic materials such as hybrid perovskites.
  2. development of chemical energy storage materials, such hydrogen storage materials and high energy density materials at high pressures.
  3. structural tuning, gas adsorption/storage, and guest-host interactions in nanoporous materials especially metalorganic frameworks (MOFs) under high pressures and high temperatures.
  4. high-pressure photochemical reactions/synthesis, kinetics and reaction mechanisms. 

TEACHING

  • 1301 - Discovering Chemical Structures
  • 1302 - Discovering Chemical Energetics
  • 2214 - Physical Chemistry for Life Sciences
  • 2272 - Introductory Analytical Chemistry
  • 3300 - Computer Methods in Chemistry
  • 3384 - Kinetics and Transport Processes
  • 9754 - Structural Chemistry of Solid Materials
  • 9754 - Powder Diffraction
  • 9702 - Materials under Extreme Conditions
  • 9824 - Material Analysis using Synchrotron Radiation II

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

  • J. Ratté, M. Machintosh, L. DiLoreto, J. Liu, W. Mihalyi-Koch, M. Hautzinger, I. Guzei, Z. Dong, S. Jin, and Y. Song, “Spacer Dependent and Pressure Tuned Structures and Optoelectronic Properties of 2D Hybrid Halide Perovskite”, J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 2023 14, 403-412. 
  • J. Guan, P. Wang and Y. Song, “Mechanistic Insights of Multiplexed Effects of Pressure, Physical-States and Laser on Polymerization Kinetics of Phenylacetylene Probed by in situ FTIR Spectroscopy”, J. Phys. Chem. B, 2021, 125, 4169−4177. (Invited, featured on front cover)
  • H. Xiang, Y. Nie, H. Zheng, X. Sun, X. Sun and Y. Song, “The Mechanism of structural changes and crystallization kinetics of amorphous red phosphorus to black phosphorus under high pressure”, Chem. Commun., 2019, 55, 8094-8097.
  • S. Jiang, Y. Hu, S. Chen, Y. Huang, and Y. Song, “Elucidation of the structural origins and contrasting guest host interactions in CO2 adsorbed CdSDB and PbSDB MOFs at high pressures”, Chem. Eur. J., 2018, 24, 19280-19288.
  • P. Wang, J. Guan, D. T. K. Galeschuk, Y. Yao, C. F. He, S. Jiang, S. Zhang, Y. Liu, M. Jin, C. Jin and Y. Song, “Pressure Induced Polymorphic, Optical and Electronic Transitions of Formamidinium Lead Iodide Perovskite”, J. Phys. Chem. Lett., 2017, 8, 2119−2125.