Sefik Suzer, Bikent University, Turkey,
“For pioneering development of AC/Pulsed biasing during XPS measurements to extract local charge dynamics in solids and at solid/solid and solid/liquid interfaces”
Prof. Sefik Suzer, is a faculty member of the Chemistry Department of Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey. He received his Ph.D. degree from UC Berkeley in 1976, under the supervision of the late David A. Shirley, followed by postdoctoral research in Sydney University, Australia, and as an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow in Freiburg, Germany. He returned to Turkey in 1979, as a faculty member in Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara, and later started the new Chemistry Department in Bilkent University in 1992 and established the first Surface Science research facility in Turkey.
During his Ph.D. years, he had investigated electronic structure of atoms and molecules using electron spectroscopic techniques in the gas phase, which he resumed using for solids and liquids after almost two decades in 1996. He has focused on applying DC and/or AC Bias directly to the sample and also to devices under XPS investigation. Over the last decade, his interest has switched to investigation of ionic liquids and their interfaces in Operando. His group has published more than 150 papers to expand the information available from XPS, normally considered a mature technique. His extensions of XPS enable one to extract dynamic, spatial and time-resolved information about the electrical and chemical nature of electrochemical systems including thin layers, such as graphene, and properties such as polarization and double layer formation at solid/liquid interfaces. The AC measurements offer novel opportunities to examine local potential variations as a function of time/frequency in test specimens and functional devices. This developmental work demonstrated applications such as opening portals to new ways to extract information about functioning systems using XPS. These unique measurements provide information otherwise not available, both fundamental and of relevance to energy and technological systems.
During 1980-90 he joined the Editorial Board of the Journal of Electron Spectroscopy, to which he returned in 2008. During 2010-2013, he also served as an Editor of the Applied Surface Science and the Surface Science Reports journals. Since 2002, he has been a member of the AVS and he was named Fellow in 2010. Two of his former Ph.D. students were also recipients of the AVS-Student Awards. He has also been very active in organizing several local meetings in Turkey, as well as European Surface Science meetings like ECASIA’09 and ECOSS-30, also in Turkey.