Each year, the Lassonde Enterprise Institute presents Student Innovation at the U, a celebration of student innovators, entrepreneurs and makers across the University of Utah.
Lassonde is a nationally ranked hub for student entrepreneurship and innovation at the University of Utah and an interdisciplinary division of the David Eccles School of Business. The report highlights students who have connected through that hub, developing products, business ideas, and new technologies with its resources.
Cited for her work on Low Cost Energy Storage, chemical engineering’s Yana Qin is featured in this year’s edition. A graduate research assistant in the lab of Assistant Professor Tao Gao, Qin’s research is developing new types of batteries.
Yana Qin, a Ph.D. student in chemical engineering at the University of Utah, has made innovative contributions to the field of low-cost energy storage technologies, including advancements in flow batteries and sodium-ion batteries.
Among her significant achievements, Qin has invented a magnesium-organic flow battery, a transformative technology designed to provide low-cost and sustainable energy storage for stationary applications. Like traditional redox flow batteries, magnesium-organic flow batteries store energy in liquid electrolytes that flow through an electrochemical cell during charge and discharge cycles.
Changing the charge carrier to magnesium, instead of traditional lithium or vanadium, allows for a more abundant, cost-effective, and non-flammable alternative. Using organic electrolytes eliminates dependence on rare, toxic, and expensive metals like lithium and vanadium.
Gao’s lab has an impressive track record when it comes to student success; another member of the lab, Jing Liu, was cited in Lassonde’s 2023 innovation report.
Read more about Yana Qin’s achievements in a story by Jillian Hall. Read more about Jing Li’s achievements in a story by Zack Zaman.