Dr. Jay Switzer

A Missouri S&T chemistry professor will spend May in Japan, where he will conduct collaborative research and present a series of lectures as a Fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS).

Dr. Jay Switzer, Donald L. Castleman/FCR Endowed Professor of Discovery in Chemistry at S&T, will conduct research with Dr. Shuji Nakanishi and his team of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows at Osaka University. The researchers are investigating the use of solar energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The process may lead to a new approach for creating hydrogen energy.

Nakanishi nominated Switzer for the fellowship and submitted a proposal to JSPS related to their proposed collaborative research. The fellowship was awarded on Jan. 10. Switzer’s travel and living expenses will be covered by the fellowship.

The JSPS fellowship also provides funding for Switzer to present a series of lectures at the 2017 International Workshop on Electrified Interfaces for Energy Conversion in Kanagawa and the Workshop on Electrochemistry at Osaka University, as well as departmental seminars at Waseda University, the

(NIMS) in Tsukuba, Kyoto University and Osaka University.

A member of the S&T faculty since 1990, Switzer was named Curators’ Professor in 1996 and the Castleman/FCR Endowed Professor of Discovery in 1999. He also is a senior investigator for the Graduate Center for Materials Research at S&T.

Switzer was principal editor of the Journal of Materials Research from 2002 until 2015. He is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the Materials Research Society (MRS).