Martti Kaempgen

Background
I was born in Germany and I grew up in Hann-Münden, a cute little town in the middle of Germany, famous for its historic center of fachwerkhauses, surrounded by forests and rivers. I finished high school there before I studied chemistry at the University of Kassel, Germany. I received my diploma degree in chemistry in Summer 2000. For PhD, I went to Stuttgart to join the group of Siegmar Roth at the Max-Planck-Institute for Solid State Research where I mainly worked on thin networks of carbon nanotubes (CNTs). After my PhD exam in the summer of 2006, I joined the group of Prof. George Gruner as a postdoctoral fellow. Besides that, I enjoy long distance running (track, field, marathon), swimming, or relaxing at the beach and eating sushi.

Current Research
My interest involves the chemistry and electrochemistry of carbon nanotubes including their applications in devices such as biosensors and chemical sensors, network transistors, fuel cells, solar cells, ultra microelectrodes, and super capacitors. Here, the platforms for all of our research are networks of carbon nanotubes. Challenges in general CNT research, which overlap with our interests, are e.g. purifying CNT raw material from impurities, separating metallic from semiconducting CNTs, chemical functionalization of CNTs and functional coatings onto CNT networks. New devices based on carbon nanotube networks are our main goal but we are open for all new ideas. At UCLA, you can find me in Knudsen Hall room B-158. Welcome!