Open Science Conversations: An Interview With Maria Lukatskaya, ETH Zurich

As part of an ongoing series here on ACS Axial, we’re interviewing authors and librarians from around the world to find out more about their research, their published work, and the impact that open science is having on a changing landscape of research communication. This time, we talked to Professor Maria Lukatskaya, Assistant Professor at Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering (D-MAVT), ETH Zürich, Switzerland, and Associate Editor of ACS Nano.

Could you tell me about your team’s current research focus?

My group is interested in understanding how we can modify local chemical environments to improve various energy systems. In particular, we are interested in controlling and enhancing the reactivity, efficiency and stability of different energy systems. Our main research directions are electrochemical energy storage and CO₂ capture and conversion. Together, this represents a combined vision of a cyclical system where we capture CO₂ and convert it into value-added products.

How would you describe the work covered in your article ("Solvation-tuned Photoacid as Stable Light-Driven pH Switch for CO₂ Capture and Release") for an audience that isn’t familiar with the subject?

The work described in our article, Solvation-Tuned Photoacid as a Stable Light-Driven pH Switch for CO2 Capture and Release, is a proof-of-concept study where we introduced a different approach towards CO₂ capture. There's still a long way to go for carbon capture to be economically viable, because the technologies that currently exist for CO₂ sorbent regeneration are very energy intensive, typically using heat. That got us looking at using light to handle this regenerative step. We thought about different possible solutions, and one of the ideas was to utilize photoacids which are very interesting molecules. When you shine light onto a photoacid molecule, it transitions into activated state and releases protons into the environment, lowering the acidity (i.e. pH) of the solution. This principle can be utilized to release CO₂ from the liquid sorbent, much like adding vinegar to soda leads to release of CO₂ bubbles.

For example, if we have a carbon capture system, we would start at a higher, more alkaline pH, capturing CO₂ from the atmosphere or from flue gas, and hold it within a liquid sorbent. To regenerate the sorbent, we would shine light onto the solution, which would cause the photoacids to release protons into the environment, acidifying the solution. Then we would be able to release the CO₂ into a stream where we can concentrate it, and later on use it in related processes such as electrochemical CO₂ conversion.

That was the initial concept. However, when we started working with photoacids, their low stability became an obstacle—they're susceptible to degradation, and within 24 hours you basically lose the molecule if it's dissolved in water. However, in certain other solvents, the photoacid molecules can stay stable for much longer, but in order to acidify solution reversibly a protic solvent such as water is required. We then explored the solvent mixtures, and found that adding 5 to 15% of DMSO into the water dramatically improves stability and solubility of these molecules. This approach allowed us to target one of the key bottlenecks limiting their utilization in carbon capture.

How was the experience of publishing in Chemistry of Materials?

It was very positive and constructive. After we submitted, we received helpful input from the reviewers, and then the article was published quickly after this round of reviews.

What kind of impact do you think your article has had since its publication?

The article got a lot of media attention and was covered by more than 30 different news outlets. We received interest from both the general public and fellow researchers, as well as investors who were interested in this approach of using light to regenerate sorbents for carbon capture. Overall, the community reception was strong, and it has already been cited frequently in a relatively short time.

The article was published open access under your institution’s open access agreement with ACS—how did you discover this was available?

ETH Zurich’s libraries have open access agreements with several publishers, including ACS, which cover a limited number of articles per year. When our article was accepted, we were directed through the ACS submission system to request coverage of the article processing charge (APC) under ETH’s institutional agreement. Fortunately, funding was still available at the time, which allowed us to publish the article open access. That’s how we became aware that this option was available to us.

What are your thoughts on the concept of open access?

I think it's very necessary to have your scientific findings available to fellow researchers without a paywall, though there are some caveats.

Not all institutions are able to cover open access charges like ETH Zurich, so there is a risk that researchers from less-resourced institutions may be disadvantaged if they can’t publish under open access. Because of this, it's great that most journals currently allow authors to post preprints of their articles. Having this option where you can post preprints and also publish the final version in a subscription journal offers a greater flexibility and helps researchers share their findings openly regardless of institutional funding/subscription coverage.

What are your thoughts on open science more generally?

For quite some time, my group has been posting preprints of our articles onto ChemRxiv before submission to the journal. For example, before this article was submitted for publication, we posted an earlier draft on ChemRxiv and received very helpful feedback from colleagues, even before it went through peer review, allowing to improve the work at an early stage.

What do you think are the biggest recent developments in open science and open access?

It's now much more common, well-known, and acceptable to post your article to a preprint server—although I know some fellow researchers who are still cautious and unsure if journals permit authors posting preprints. If one checks, you will see that most journals are totally fine with it.

Another positive movement is the possibility to link openly available datasets within a publication.

There is also a push toward greater peer review transparency. Some journals are now publishing the peer review comments and author responses online as supplementary materials, so you can see how the peer review process shaped the final article.

Where do you see OA in 10 years' time?

Now that it is more accepted to put preprints online, I hope it will also become more accepted to put datasets online too. It may take some time, because it's not yet part of the publishing workflow for every research group.

I believe moving towards more open science is important because many published articles lack enough details to easily reproduce the results. Related to this, it would be greatly beneficial to also see videos with the procedures alongside articles, showing how authors achieved their results—especially if it's some sort of special process that is foundational in the success of the methodology. I think that could be a very helpful next step.

What do you think you'd be doing if you weren't a researcher?

Before I decided to go down the path of chemistry/materials science for my undergraduate studies, I was actually debating two alternative career paths: architect or photographer. That kind of creative expression always excited me.