Chapter 334 Chemistry Needs My Model!

Brother Qian is very efficient at work.

On the second day after Yang Xu reported to work, Lu Zhou received an email from Jinling Institute of Computing Materials. Attached to the email attachment is an experiment report, which summarizes all the experimental data collected during this period in detail.

With reliable data as support, Lu Zhou can continue to improve his theory on this basis.

Thanks to these things, he can finally start the next step.

In the early morning of the next day, Lu Zhou called Jericho to his office and talked to him.

"I remember you told me last time that you plan to follow me in the direction of computing materials. Let me ask you again now, are you ready?"

Hearing this, Jericho immediately said excitedly: "Of course! Professor, I'm ready!"

When he was an undergraduate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, after completing a degree in applied mathematics, he also completed a major in applied chemistry. Among Lu Zhou's five apprentices, he is the only one who has both mathematics and chemistry foundations.

Sitting at the desk next door, Wei Wen, who was concentrating on his work, looked at him enviously.

Jericho, who was enrolled in the same batch as himself, has already determined his research direction.

However, half a year has passed now, and he is still doing some learning work, and has not participated in formal research at all.

Sensing the envy in Wei Wen's eyes, Lu Zhou said.

"You don't have to envy him. The current accumulation is to fly higher. If you plan to develop in the direction of mathematics and physics, you must devote more time and sweat than him."

Mathematical physics is different from computational chemistry. The latter is still growing slowly in its infancy, trying to explain the phenomena in experiments with new theories. However, the former has gone far beyond the current experimental level and entered an unknown field.

In an immature field and a mature field, the sweat required to make a breakthrough based on previous research is completely different.

Wei Wen obviously knew this too, so he was just envious.

Nodding his head, he simply replied.

"I see."

Jericho raised his hand and said energetically, "Professor, what do you need me to do?"

Lu Zhou didn't answer the question directly, but just smiled and said.

"That's a good question. Follow me to a good place in a while. You'll know when you get there."

...

The first step in any research work is to start with literature reading.

This applies to both theoretical and applied research.

After getting the experimental data, Lu Zhou did not rush to start calculations, but plunged into the Flint Library.

This work was originally done by Lu Zhou alone, but now he has two helpers, one is Jericho who is interested in developing computing materials, and the other is Connie who is a postdoctoral fellow here.

Sitting next to Lu Zhou, Jericho, who was flipping through the literature, suddenly asked, "Professor, how did you come up with the idea of ​​using hollow carbon spheres to solve the shuttle effect of lithium-sulfur batteries?"

"Scientific intuition? Coupled with inspiration from other places," Lu Zhou answered the question in a chatty tone while flipping through the literature in his hand. There are only relatively suitable choices.”

"A relatively suitable choice..." Chewing on this sentence repeatedly, looking at the documents in his hand, Jericho nodded thoughtfully.

With the help of two assistants, the document collection did not take too long for Lu Zhou,

After that, a series of work such as literature review was completed within one week.

But the next job is not so easy.

Things related to calculations can only be done by Lu Zhou himself.

On the last day of March, Lu Zhou didn't go to the office of the Institute for Advanced Study. After getting up, he turned and walked into the study next to the master bedroom on the second floor.

Sitting in a room less than ten square meters, he made himself a cup of coffee, then opened the drawer, and took out a pen and paper.

On the clean and tidy thesis paper, after Lu Zhou conceived for a while, he wrote a line of title——

"Theoretical Models of Electrochemical Interface Structures"

Electrochemical interface theory is an important pillar of modern electrochemistry and one of the classic problems in theoretical chemistry. To make an inappropriate analogy, its status is like the twin prime number conjecture in mathematics, which occupies a core position in a certain type of problem.

This concept can be traced back to the early 1980s, when the real interface molecular model was proposed.

It was also since then that the classical electrostatics concept of the electrochemical interface began to transition to the modern concept of condensed matter physics.

With the development of technology, computer simulation methods such as molecular dynamics simulation and Monte Carlo simulation were born, which made the theoretical model of the electrochemical interface closer to reality.

However, even so, no one can provide a reliable theoretical model for the microscopic essence of various electrochemical processes occurring on the interface to explain the changes reasonably.

Just to give two examples, how to explain the differential capacitance curve of polycrystalline metal electrode? How to explain the origin of the capacitance peak in the differential capacitance curve of the Hg electrode in the electrolyte solution of different solvents?

These seemingly simple problems are not mentioned in books.

If these questions are answered one by one, there is no problem at all in winning two or three Nobel Prizes in Chemistry. The Nobel Committee always pays more attention to theory than application.

After all, if these questions get an effective answer, although it may not be intuitively reflected in a certain company's bank card account or a certain country's economic data, the impact on the progress of civilization is far greater than that of "modified PDMS" The significance of a single invention such as "material" is much more important.

However, even Lu Zhou couldn't solve all the problems.

However, as the method of group construction does for additive number theory.

If we can use mathematical methods to describe the interface properties, and build a theoretical model of the electrochemical interface structure on this basis. He can build a theoretical tool that can answer all these questions!

After writing the title of the thesis on the draft paper, Lu Zhou closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

When he opened his eyes again, there was only an unprecedented focus on calm in his eyes.

All the preparatory work has been completed in the past six months.

For this moment, he has collected a lot of data.

And now, it's time to finish all the work!

...

As time went by, the wastebasket in the corner of the study gradually filled up, and was gradually buried by the thrown paper balls.

Whenever Lu Zhou was tired, he turned around and went back to the bedroom to sleep, and when he woke up, he went back to the study to continue thinking.

He didn't even go down the stairs unless it was eating and drinking.

As for going out, from the moment he started to retreat, he never did it again.

I didn't know how many pen refills were empty, and I didn't know how many draft papers were filled. When Lu Zhou wrote the last line of calculation on the A4 paper, he suddenly stopped.

Sitting there in silence for about an hour, Lu Zhou suddenly grabbed his hair irritably, dropped the ballpoint pen in his hand and stood up.

Pacing back and forth in the study, he kept chanting, repeating the same sentence.

"Chemistry needs my theoretical models..."

Suddenly, Lu Zhou seemed to think of something suddenly, and his eyes became brighter and brighter.

Stopping in his tracks, he looked at the pile of manuscript paper on the table and said to himself.

"And I need a supercomputer..."

"A supercomputer for computational chemistry!"