Education

Dr. Irune Villaluenga earned her BS in Chemistry from the University of the Basque Country (2005) and her PhD was developed at Tecnalia Research & Innovation (Spain) and at the University of the Basque Country (2010). During the mentioned PhD, she spent 2 months at Stockholm University (Sweden) under the supervision of Prof. Lennart Bergstrom and 3 months at Institute for Environmental Management Technology (National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, AIST, Japan) under the supervision of Dr. Nobuaki Negishi. Her thesis work was focused on design of new hybrid coatings based on polymers and inorganic nanoparticles for photocatalytic applications. In 2011, she moved to CIC Energigune (Spain) as Postdoctoral Researcher to develop new hybrid electrolytes for battery applications under the supervision of Prof. Michel Armand. In 2013, she moved to Berkeley (CA, USA) to work at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and at the University of California, Berkeley as Postdoctoral Researcher under the supervision of Prof. Nitash P. Balsara. She developed new single-ion hybrid block copolymer electrolytes for lithium-metal batteries. In 2017, she was promoted to Project Scientist at LBNL. In 2018, she joined at Blue Current (a start-up in California, USA) as Senior Battery Materials Scientist where her work was focused on design and development of new electrolytes, battery assembly and testing, and scaling prototype devices for solid-state lithium-ion batteries and lithium-metal batteries. Currently, she works at POLYMAT-UPV/EHU as an Emakiker and Ikerbasque Research Fellow, and besides, she works as a Solid-State Battery Consultant in California (USA).

Honors and awards

2020. Gipuzkoa Fellow

2020. Ikerbasque Research Fellow

2018. EMAKIKER Fellowship POLYMAT

2015. Best Paper Prize in Science and Technology of Advanced Materials
(STAM)

2006. Fundacion Iñaki Goenaga Fellowship

Research

Her main research line is focused on the design of innovative solid nanostructured hybrid macromolecular battery materials. She is interested in the creation of new processes of assembly that enable the formation of 100% dense membranes where the distribution of inorganic and organic phases presents nanoscale homogeneity in order to improve battery performance. She is also interested in electrochemical and safety studies for battery applications.

Inorganic-polymer hybrid and nanostructured materials

Publications