During his PhD, Mostapha’s research tackled the amount of energy and resources wasted in separating chemicals in industrial processes by developing next-generation membranes to replace current energy-intensive technologies.
As a Schmidt Science Fellow, Mostapha plans to pivot from engineering to chemistry. He plans to study the effects of solvent confinement around metal active sites confined between two-dimensional nanosheets and aims to increase chemical reaction rates by tuning the mismatch in polarity between solvents, reactants, and reaction intermediates within hydrophobic/hydrophilic nanosheets.
By increasing chemical reaction rates, Mostapha aims to lower the production cost of commodities and allow their access to a larger slice of the world’s population.