On October 9, the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion (MPI CEC) had the great pleasure of welcoming Prof. Dr. Yonas Chebude, professor in the Chemistry Department of the Addis Ababa University (AAU) in Ethiopia.
The scientific collaboration between Prof. Chebude’s research group and the Molecular Catalysis Department of the MPI CEC (Prof. Walter Leitner and Dr. Alexis Bordet) was initiated in 2019 on the topic of “green chemistry”, with the objective to produce sustainable chemical products from waste biomass. This collaboration was initially supported by a generous private donation, and was fostered by several exchanges and visits through the years. See below for a brief history of past visits as well as future interactions.
As a further development of this collaboration, Dr. Yaregal Awoke Genet (assistant professor at AAU) and the MPI CEC were recently successful in their application for a Max-Planck-Africa Mobility Grant. The program, focused on the catalytic conversion of bamboo wastes into platform chemicals, will cover research stays for Dr. Yaregal Awoke Genet at the MPI-CEC for a duration of three years (minimum of one month per year).
The entire team is delighted with the successes to date and the continuation of the project and collaboration.
Key steps in the collaboration:
- August 2019: visit of Prof. Chebude’s group at the MPI CEC
- July/August 2019: research stay of Yaregal Awoke Genet (PhD student from AAU) at the MPI CEC
- December 2019: visit of Dr. Alexis Bordet at AAU
- July 2023: visit of Prof. Chebude at the MPI CEC
- October 2024: visit of Prof. Chebude at the MPI CEC
- from 2025 on: regular visits of Dr. Yaregal Awoke Genet at the MPI CEC (Max-Planck-Africa Mobility Grant)