| Viola Ingrid Birss | |
| Alma Mater: | University of Auckland |
| Workplaces: | University of Ottawa University of Calgary |
| Known For: | Electrochemistry Solid oxide fuel cells |
| Awards: | David C. Grahame Award (2017) |
| Birth Place: | Crowsnest Pass, Alberta |
Viola Ingrid Birss is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Calgary and has been the holder of a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Fuel Cells and Related Clean Energy Systems for two 7-year terms. She works on electrochemical and nanomaterial technologies to advance clean energy and environmental applications. She is a prolific scientist with over 350 refereed scientific publications. She has also supervised over 200 undergraduate, graduate and post-doctoral students and is an avid advocate for EDI, specifically in the attraction and retention of women in science and engineering.
Birss grew up in Crowsnest Pass, Alberta. She moved to Calgary at the age of ten.[1] When she was deciding what to study at college, she felt that physics was "too abstract" and biology "too descriptive", so settled on chemistry. Having grown up with the wilderness close to her home, Birss was always aware of the environment, and interested in identifying clean ways of storing, converting and using energy. This attracted her to materials science and electrochemistry. Birss earned her doctorate at the University of Auckland as a Commonwealth Scholar, where she studied the electrochemistry of metal halide and metal sulfide monolayers and thin films on silver electrodes. Her doctoral thesis was titled Electrochemical studies of anodic films on silver.[2] She was a postdoctoral research scientist at the University of Ottawa, where she worked on the supercapacitive properties of hydrous metal oxides. During this post, she specialized in studies of Ru oxide.
Birss began her independent career at Alcan International, where she helped develop techniques to evaluate the susceptibility of aluminum alloys to stress corrosion and pitting. Her efforts included efforts to understand how to stabilize and protect a high-strength corrosion-resistant alloy: Al-Mg-Si alloy. She moved to the University of Calgary in 1983 where she was an Assistant Professor until 1987, an Associate Professor until 1991, then promoted to Full Professor.
Birss prepares, characterizes and optimizes nanomaterials for a range of different electrochemical applications, including in fuel cells, electrolysis cells, batteries, capacitors and sensors. In her earlier work in Calgary, Birss and her team focused on understanding and modifying the electrochemical, chemical, physical and morphological properties of thin films on electrode surfaces, ranging from conducting polymers to a range of redox-active, hydrous, metal oxides.[3] In 2002, she was a founder and leader of the Western Canada Fuel Cell Initiative, which included over 35 research groups at eight institutions. This was supported by $2 million of funding under Birss' leadership. She subsequently co-founded the pan-Canadian Solid Oxide Fuel Cells Canada NSERC Research Network, an umbrella organization for groups working on solid oxide fuel cells. The focus of this 5 year network, which involved over 16 research groups at 8 universities across Canada, as well as government and industry partners, was focused mostly on the development of anodes that resist both sulfur contaminant poisoning and coking when operated on hydrogen from natural gas.
Birss became a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Fuel Cells at the University of Calgary in 2004, holding the chair for two 7-year terms.[4] [5] The majority of her efforts as a CRC were focused on solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) and proton-exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), carbon nanomaterials, and electrochemical biological sensing.[6] Some of her main contributions have involved determining the kinetics and mechanisms of oxidation and reduction reactions in fuel cells using electrochemical methods, as well as developing new fuel cell materials. Her team improved the performance and lifetime of low temperature PEMFCs through the development of ordered nanoporous carbon powders as well as self-supported, nanoporous carbon scaffolds. For use in high temperature solid oxide cells, Birss has further developed a family o metal oxide perovskite catalysts that can be used as both the anode and cathode in both solid oxide fuel cells and solid oxide electrolysis cells, catalyzing carbon dioxide splitting, water splitting, hydrogen and carbon monoxide oxidation, and oxygen reduction. Other areas of research have included the development of core shell nanoparticles, protective coatings and other novel strategies to combat the corrosion of metals, as well as selective and sensitive electrochemical biosensors for the detection of pathogens.
Birss is currently the Scientific Director of CAESR-Tech (Calgary Advanced Energy Storage and Conversion Research Technologies), a large cluster of scientists and engineers who are focused on electrochemical technologies. This includes electrolysis cells, fuel cells, a variety of batteries and electrochemical capacitors, as well as electricity management and LCA, all at the University of Calgary. The CAESR-Tech cluster then spawned the ME2 NSERC CREATE student training center.[7] Birss currently also serves as the Co-Lead of the Electrolysis Theme of HyPT (Hydrogen Production Technologies), a Global Research Center.[8]
Her awards and honours include;
She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada,[13] the Chemical Institute of Canada and the Electrochemical Society.
Her publications include:
Birss serves as associate editor of the Journal of Materials Chemistry A.[14]