Yongkang Wang has been a Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research (MPIP) since 2024, where he applies nonlinear vibrational spectroscopic techniques to probe water and ion behavior at electrified, nanoconfined interfaces. He obtained his Ph.D. in 2024 from the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands and was appointed Group Leader at MPIP in Germany in the same year. His research focuses on molecular-level insights into interfacial water structure, ion-specific effects, and electrostatics at nanoconfined interfaces using surface-specific sum-frequency generation vibrational spectroscopy, with applications in electrochemistry, nanofluidics, and materials science. His interdisciplinary work has resulted in more than 40 peer-reviewed publications, including first- or corresponding-author articles in Nature, Nat. Commun., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., J. Am. Chem. Soc., and Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., reflecting interdisciplinary contributions across chemistry, physics, and engineering.
Water at interfaces governs charge transfer, ion transport, and chemical reactivity, yet its structure and electrostatics can differ dramatically from the bulk, especially under nanoconfinement and electrification. In this talk, I will discuss how surface-specific vibrational sum-frequency generation (SFG) spectroscopy, including phase-resolved approaches, provides direct molecular-level access to interfacial water: its hydrogen-bond network, orientation, and the electric fields that ……
