The La Pierre Group

Kai was born in a small village near the beautiful Yellow Mountains (黄山) in Anhui Province, China. After finished the bachelor’s degree in Material Science and Engineering at China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), he entered the School of Chemistry at Fudan University to study rare earth metal phosphinidene complexes with Prof. Lixin Zhang and Prof. Xigen Zhou. After earning his master's degree, he joined Prof. Polly Arnold’s group (Edinburgh) to explore more about lanthanides, especially on NHC complexes and cerium/praseodymium phenolate complexes. After completing his Ph.D. in Chemistry, he visited Dr. Stefan Minasian’s group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) to explore neptunium chemistry and joined the La Pierre group thereafter. His research interests are focused on f-elements complexes and their physical properties as well as their applications in small molecule activation.