Energy2Devices takes off, a new group led by Miguel Muñoz Rojo aiming to advance energy management and conversion

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The Madrid Institute of Materials Science (ICMM CSIC), part of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), has launched a new research group called Energy2Devices, led by Miguel Muñoz Rojo. The CSIC scientist, previously part of the ICMM’s 2DFoundry group, is now driving his own research line together with Javier Pérez Carvajal, Ramón y Cajal researcher at the ICMM. The group includes a broad team of pre  and post doctoral researchers, management staff, interns, and collaborators.

The work of this new group aligns with a major global challenge: the pursuit of clean and affordable energy. Their ambition, they state, is to "develop methods, advanced materials, and devices to enhance our energy management and conversion capabilities." More specifically, the group aims to develop a "new generation of devices with integrated electronic and thermal control” that will contribute to “the development of efficient energy technologies."

Research Lines

Energy2Devices develops the following synergistic research lines:

• Low dimensional materials with modulated transport properties to improve the efficiency of advanced semiconductor devices.
• Development of solid state devices for the management, control, storage, and recovery of energy in electro thermal systems such as batteries or power electronics.
• Porous materials, two dimensional composites, and their hybrids, integrable into devices and systems for energy transformations.

Alongside material development, the group also focuses on advanced characterization of thermal and electrical properties and on improving the efficiency of electro thermal and electro diffusive devices.

With this new team, Muñoz Rojo will continue the work he has been carrying out since joining the ICMM, centered on heat management and on making energy storage and recovery processes more efficient.

In 2023, the researcher received one of the prestigious ERC Consolidator Grants, awarded by the European Research Council (ERC), with a funding amount of two million euros. He is also a collaborator at the University of Twente (Netherlands), where he was a professor before joining the ICMM, and currently works on projects with leading companies such as Philips, Thales, ASML, and VDL. Finally, he is one of the founders of the start up Thermaflux, dedicated to the development of advanced thermal management technology.