Birgit Esser

Birgit Esser is a German chemist who is a Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Ulm. Her research considers molecular electronics and hoop-shaped π-systems. In 2023, Esser was awarded a European Research Council Consolidator Grant focused on the development of organic materials for batteries.

Early life and education
Esser was born and raised in Heidelberg. She studied chemistry at Heidelberg University, where she became interested in organic synthesis. She spent 2002 as an Erasmus scholar at the University of Bristol, then returned to Germany to complete her doctoral research, where she worked alongside Rolf Gleiter. Her doctorate explored a cyclic π system. Her doctoral research was supported by a Studienstiftung fellowship. After graduating, she was awarded a German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina fellowship and moved to Massachusetts Institute of Technology to work alongside Timothy M. Swager, where she developed ethylene gas sensors based on carbon nanotubes and conjugated polymers.

Research and career
In 2012, Esser returned to Germany, which she established her own research group at the University of Bonn. She was made a Emmy Noether Program Group Leader, with a focus on the development of organic electronic materials for batteries and optoelectronics. She believes that redox-active organic electronic materials hold promise for sustainable, non-toxic battery electrodes. Typically these materials have poor porosity, which makes it difficult for ions to undergo redox processes.

Esser is also interested in the development of cyclic conjugated molecules called nanobelts. These nanobelts have radial π-conjugation, which affords them unique optical and electronic properties. Nanobelts can exist in planar or zigzag forms. In 2023, she was awarded a European Research Council Consolidator Grant for Next-Generation Batteries. She believes that her conjugated hoop shaped molecules could be used to improve the porosity of organic electronic electrode materials, as well as increasing the capacity and making them lighter.