We’re entering a new era of real-world palladium applications
The Palladium Global Science Award is an annual international science competition celebrating cutting-edge research across the theoretical, prototype and development stages that expands prospects for growth in palladium applications. The award highlights new and innovative uses for the metal in order to supercharge palladium’s technological and economic benefits to industry.
The competition includes three nominations, five winners and a total prize fund of $350,000. Applications are open from 6 March to 31 July 2025.
North-West University (NWU) is a leading university located in South Africa with over 56,000 students across its three campuses. Guided by its strategic vision to “discover new frontiers and opportunities that benefit society”, NWU is now evolving into a more research-intensive institution.
This shift prioritises impactful research, global partnerships and innovation that responds to societal needs. NWU is enhancing its research capacity across its eight faculties by attracting best-in-class research and innovation talent and securing greater funding for projects with national and global relevance.
Prof. Francis Verpoort is a distinguished expert in organometallic chemistry and functional materials. He leads the Laboratory of Functional Hybrid Materials at Wuhan University of Technology and is the founder and CEO of SAIS Ltd, a company specializing in chemistry, materials, and engineering solutions.
Prof. Polychronopoulou is an expert in catalysis and advanced materials, focusing on energy transition and alternative fuels. She is the founder and CEO of CeCaS spin-off ‘44Fuels’, dedicated to decarbonization technologies. Before joining Khalifa University, she held postdoctoral positions at Northwestern University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (USA).
Prof. Bessarabov is a recognized expert in hydrogen energy and electrochemical technologies with extensive academic and industrial experience in Canada and South Africa. Since 2010, he has been leading the HySA Infrastructure Center of Competence at NWU and CSIR, focusing on hydrogen and fuel cell technologies.
The main research interests of Professor Chao Chen are hypervalent iodine chemistry and electrophilic cyclisation. He started his independent research as an associate professor at Tsinghua University in May 2011.
Lutz Ackermann studied Chemistry at the Christian Albrecht University of Kiel (Germany), and wrote his PhD with Prof. Alois Fürstner at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlenforschung (Mülheim an der Ruhr, 2001). After a postdoctoral stay at UC Berkeley with Prof. Robert G. Bergman, he initiated his independent research career in 2003 at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. In 2007, he became Full Professor (W3) at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen.
China Precious Metals Industry Committee (CPMIC)
The China Precious Metals Industry Committee (CPMIC) was founded as a subsidiary of the China National Resources Recycling Association in April 2006 following approval from the Ministry of Civic Affairs of the People’s Republic of China. CPMIC is a national social organisation.
The mission of CPMIC is to bring all parties of industry together and strengthen ties with international organisations in the industry and beyond. CPMIC will serve as a platform with member units at its core, fostering the further development of the sector by acting as a fair, transparent and efficient industry organisation with members as the decision makers.
Shanghai Metals Market (SMM)
Shanghai Metals Market (SMM) is an integrated internet platform provider that assists the global metals and mining industry in benchmarking prices and accessing analysis, news, and consulting on nonferrous, ferrous, and EV metal markets. Headquartered in Shanghai with an overseas office in London, SMM serves international customers by offering insights into the real China from a global perspective.
SMM’s flagship portal (www.metal.com) engages the most customers in the industry, with an extensive database covering over 20 years of historical data.
North-West University
Founded in 2004 as the result of a merger between two higher education institutions, North-West University (NWU) is a leading university in Potchefstroom, South Africa. The public research university has an enrolment of 56,000 students at its campus, which dates back to 1869.
Viewed as one of the country’s most successful higher education mergers, NWU has shown strong results in student outcomes, research output and financial indicators. The institution recently featured in the subject-specific QS World University Rankings, which highlighted its agriculture, environmental sciences, physics and medicine programmes.
MDX Research Center for Element Strategy, Institute of Science Tokyo, Japan
The MDX Research Center for Element Strategy (MDXES) was established in October 2022 as the successor to the former Materials Research Center for Element Strategy (MCES). The centre is part of the Institute of Integrated Research (IIR) at the Institute of Science Tokyo. Its main goal is to develop innovative electronic functional materials in order to solve resource and environmental issues.
The MDXES utilises the unique chemical properties and subatomic structures of elements, focusing on abundant and environmentally friendly resources and following a materials design approach. The MXD Core incorporates two entities: the MDX system, which combines computational science and data science to develop new materials, and the Ammonia Core, which develops highly efficient catalysts to produce energy, hydrogen and other chemical products with a reduced environmental load.
