Lea R. Winter

Website:

Winter Lab
Assistant Professor of Chemical & Environmental Engineering
Room / Office: Room 433
Office Address:
17 Hillhouse Avenue
New Haven, CT 06520
Mailing Address:
P.O. Box 208286
New Haven, CT 06520
Phone: (203) 432-6094
Email: lea.winter@yale.edu
Degrees:
  • Ph.D., Columbia University
  • B.S., Yale University

Interests:

  • Electrified processes at the food, energy, water, and climate nexus
  • Sustainable and circularized conversion of CO2 into chemicals and fuels
  • Green nitrogen fixation to fertilizers and nitrogen-based fuels
  • Transformation of wastewater into useful products and fit-for-purpose water
  • Plasma chemistry, electrochemistry, heterogeneous catalysis

Selected Awards & Honors:

  • Beckman Young Investigator Award (2024)
  • Department of Energy Early Career Award (2024)
  • Caltech Young Investigators Lecture Series Award (2022)
  • Nanotechnology-Enabled Water Treatment (NEWT) Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship (2020)
  • National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (2015)
  • AIChE Catalysis and Reaction Engineering Division Travel Award (2019)
  • North American Catalysis Society NAM26 Kokes Award (2019)
  • TA Excellence Award in Chemical Engineering, Columbia University (2018) 
  • NSF Participant Award, Gordon Research Conference: Plasma Processing Science (2018) 
  • Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York Annual Symposium First Place Poster Award (2018)
  • Fu Foundation SEAS Grossman Scholar, Columbia University (2018)
  • Pesco Award, Columbia University (2015)
  • Journal of International Affairs Andrew Wellington Cordier Essay Winner, Columbia University (2015) 

Selected Publications:

     For a full list, visit Prof. Winter's Google Scholar profile.

 

  • Xiaoxiong Wang, Xuanhao Wu, Wen Ma, Xuechen Zhou, Shuo Zhang , Dahong Huang, Lea R. Winter*, Jae-Hong Kim*, Menachem Elimelech*. “Free-standing membrane incorporating single-atom catalysts for ultrafast electro-reduction of low-concentration nitrate.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 120 (11): e2217703120 (2023). 
  • Neal Biswas a, Lea R. Winter a, Zhenhua Xie a, and Jingguang G. Chen*. “Utilizing CO2 as a reactant for C3 oxygenate production via tandem reactions.” Journal of the American Chemical Society Au 3 (2): 293–305 (2023). 
  • Boreum Lee, Lea R. Winter, Hyunjun Lee, Dongjun Lim, Menachem Elimelech*, Hankwon Lim*. “Pathways to a green ammonia future.” ACS Energy Letters 7: 3032–3038 (2022).  
    Among most read articles in ACS Energy Letters (August and September 2022). 
  • Lea R. Winter a,*, Nathanial J. Cooper a, Boreum Lee, Sohum K. Patel, Li Wang, Menachem Elimelech. “Mining nontraditional water sources for a distributed hydrogen economy.” Environmental Science & Technology 56 (15): 10577–10585 (2022). 
    In the top 5% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric (Score 66); reported in 7 news outlets.  

    Research Highlight: Yanhua Chen. “Mining wastewater for hydrogen.” Nature Reviews Earth & Environment 3: 551 (2022).  

  • Zhengyang Huo, Lea R. Winter, Xiaoxiong Wang*, Ye Du, Yinhu Wu, Uwe Hübner, Hong-Ying Hu, Menachem Elimelech. “Synergistic nanowire-enhanced electroporation and electro-chlorination for highly efficient water disinfection.” Environmental Science & Technology 56 (15): 10925–10934 (2022). 
  • Ying-Jie Zhang a, Gui-Xiang Huang a, Lea R. Winter, Jie-Jie Chen, Lili Tian, Shu-Chuan Mei, Ze Zhang, Fei Chen, Zhi-Yan Guo, Rong Ji, Ye-Zi You, Wen-Wei Li, Han-Qing Yu*, Menachem Elimelech*. “Simultaneous nanocatalytic surface activation of pollutants and oxidants for highly efficient water decontamination.” Nature Communications 13: 1–13 (2022).  
    99th percentile (ranked 1st) of the tracked articles of a similar age in Nature Communications. 
    Chosen for Editors’ Highlights in Nature Communications.  
  • Yumeng Zhao*, Meng Sun*, Lea R. Winter, Shihong Lin, Zhiwei Wang, John C. Crittenden, and Jun Ma. “Emerging challenges and opportunities for electrified membranes to enhance water treatment.” Environmental Science & Technology 56: 3832–3835 (2022).  
  • Akash Neal Biswas a, Lea R. Winter a,*, Björn Loenders, Zhenhua Xie, Annemie Bogaerts*, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Oxygenate production from plasma-activated reaction of CO2 and ethane.” ACS Energy Letters7: 236–241 (2022). 
  • Ji-Soo Jang a, Lea R. Winter a, Changwoo Kim, John D. Fortner*, Menachem Elimelech*. “High precision separation membranes for selective environmental gas sensors.” Trends in Chemistry 3: 547–560 (2021). 
  • Meng Sun a, Xiaoxiong Wang a, Lea R. Winter, Yumeng Zhao, Wen Ma, Tayler Hedtke, Jae-Hong Kim, Menachem Elimelech*. “Electrified membranes for water treatment applications.” ACS Environmental Science & Technology: Engineering 1: 725–752 (2021). 
  • Lea R. Winter, Jingguang G. Chen*. “N2 fixation by plasma-activated processes.” Joule 5: 300–315 (2021). 
  • Zhenhua Xie, Lea R. Winter, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Bimetallic-derived catalysts and their application in simultaneous upgrading of CO2 and ethane.” Matter4: 408–440 (2021). 
  • Yaning Wang, Lea R. Winter, Jingguang G. Chen*, Binhang Yan*. “CO2 hydrogenation over heterogeneous catalysts at atmospheric pressure: from electronic properties to product selectivity.” Green Chemistry23: 249–267 (2020). 
  • Lea R. Winter, Bryony Ashford, Jungmi Hong, Anthony B. Murphy*, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Identifying surface reaction intermediates in plasma catalytic ammonia synthesis.” ACS Catalysis 10: 14763–14774 (2020).  
  • Shuang Liu*, Lea R. Winter, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Review of plasma-assisted catalysis for selective generation of oxygenates from CO2 and CH4.” ACS Catalysis 10: 2855–2871 (2020). 
  • Lea R. Winter, Rui Chen, Xin Chen, Kuan Chang, Zongyuan Liu, Sanjaya D. Senanayake, Amani Ebrahim, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Elucidating the roles of metallic Ni and oxygen vacancies in CO2 hydrogenation over Ni/CeO2 using isotope exchange and in situ measurements.” Applied Catalysis B: Environmental 245: 360–366 (2019). 
  • Lea R. Winter, Elaine Gomez, Binhang Yan, Siyu Yao, Jingguang G. Chen*. “Tuning Ni-catalyzed CO2 hydrogenation selectivity via Ni-ceria support interactions and Ni-Fe bimetallic formation.” Applied Catalysis B: Environmental 224: 442–450 (2018).