Jillian Buriak


Jillian M. Buriak Fellow of the [Royal Society of Chemistry|FRSC] is a Canadian chemist, formerly a Canada Research Chair in nanomaterials at University of Alberta. She is known for her work developing flexible, lightweight solar cells made from nanoparticles.

Education and career

Buriak completed an A.B. degree at Harvard University and a Ph.D. at Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, working on organometallic chemistry and catalysis. She held a postdoctoral appointment at the Scripps Research Institute at La Jolla, California, working on self-assembly of nanostructures on surfaces.
Buriak started her independent faculty career at Purdue University in 1997, was promoted to associate professor, with tenure, in 2001. In 2003, she joined the University of Alberta as a full professor.
From 2003 to 2008, Buriak was on the Board of Reviewing Editors at Science. She was an associate editor at ACS Nano from 2009 to 2013. In 2014, she was appointed as the editor-in-chief of Chemistry of Materials, handling ~5000 papers per year.

Research interests

Buriak is interested in materials for energy, nanomaterials synthesis, silicon surface chemistry, and block copolymer self assembly.
By spraying a plastic surface with nanomaterials, her work showed the ability to fabricate a transparent layer of electrode that acts as solar cells. Due to their flexibility, they could be incorporated onto different surfaces.

Selected honors