Born in Ithaca, NY (USA) from French parents, Mathieu Prévot studied at the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon (ENS de Lyon, France), where he obtained his Bachelor Degree (License) in Chemistry in 2010. He then pursued a Master degree at the same institution, which led him to perform a research internship in the research groups of Prof. Curtis Berlinguette and Prof. Simon Trudel at the University of Calgary (UofC, Canada) during which he studied the electrocatalytic properties of amorphous metal oxides thin films for the oxygen evolution reaction.
After obtaining his Master degree in Chemistry in 2012, he joined the research group of Prof. Kevin Sivula at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, Switzerland) where he performed is doctoral research, which consisted primarily in developing and studying metal oxide and metal chalchogenide semiconductors as novel visible-light absorbers. These materials were then tested as photoelectrodes in photoelectrochemical cells for solar hydrogen production. For this work, he succesfully obtained is Ph.D. diploma in 2017.
Mathieu then joined the group of Prof. Omar Yaghi at the University of California, Berkeley (USA), where he studied the electrocatalytic and water harvesting properties of metal-organic frameworks between 2017 and 2019.
After returning to France, he joined the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in 2020. Since then, he has been developing his research activities at the Institute for Research in Catalysis and Environment of Lyon (IRCELYON, France) as a CNRS junior researcher.
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Sunlight is an ubiquitous, renewable and abundant energy source, which is bound to play an increasingly prominent role as the world transitions away from fossil resources and towards carbon-neutral models. Our research team is interested in contributing to this transition by leveraging the energy carried by sunlight photons to drive electrochemical reactions of interest. These reactions are primarily designed to generate value-added products from abundant, low-value substrates, typically generated as waste in the current industrial landscape.
To power these reactions, we develop photoelectrochemical cells, involving light-absorbing semiconductors, capable of converting photons into charge carriers. These carriers are subsequently harvested at an electrode-liquid junction to sustain the desired electrochemical process. As photoelectrochemical processes are complex and involve many physico-chemical steps, we conduct in-situ and operando investigations to understand and elucidate charge behavior in the materials and molecular mechanisms unfolding on electrocatalyst surfaces. The insight provided by these analysis is crucial for the design of optimized and selective systems. Finally, we work on photoelectrochemical device engineering to design lab-scale prototypes capable of solar-assisted chemical valorisation.