Claudia Felser Connects Topological Materials to Catalysis and Energy Research

Claudia Felser’s research asks how the electronic structure of a solid can shape what that material does. At the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids in Dresden, she studies topological materials, spintronics and chirality, with applications that range from converting heat into electricity to understanding catalysis. Her approach crosses chemistry and physics, pairing the search for new materials with questions about how their properties emerge.

That focus has taken on new dimensions as topology has changed how researchers describe the connection between a material’s structure and its behavior. Felser sees it as a way to make sense of properties that were present but poorly understood, including quantum effects that might prove useful beyond low-temperature settings. Her group is also exploring whether topology can clarify why chirality in a solid does not always produce the electronic behavior chemists might expect.

Building materials by design

Felser studied chemistry and physics at the University of Cologne, where she earned a doctorate in physical chemistry. She later carried out postdoctoral research at the Max Planck Institute in Stuttgart and at CNRS in Nantes, before becoming a professor at the University of Mainz. She now directs the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids. In 2026, she received the Wiley Women in Science Award.

Her career has followed a path between disciplines and between theory and experiment. “Making new materials with super exciting properties is the goal of my life,” she said. Rather than staying within one field, she has worked at the boundary of chemistry, physics and materials science, seeking ways to understand existing compounds and use that knowledge to design new ones.

Superconductivity was an early interest, but Felser also saw potential in magnetic materials. That work led her toward spintronics and compounds whose properties could be studied systematically. The goal was to identify design principles: patterns that could help researchers predict which materials to make, instead of relying only on trial and error.

That materials-first perspective proved valuable as topological science developed. Felser concluded that topological insulator behavior was not confined to a handful of unusual compounds. With broader design rules, she argued, researchers could search across a much larger range of materials. The idea shifted the question from “Which known compounds have this property?” toward “What features can guide us to new ones?”

Topology beyond quantum computing

Public discussion of topology often turns quickly to quantum computing. Felser’s group is interested in a different application: efficient conversion of heat into electricity. She sees practical use as a guiding thread in her work, while also pursuing basic questions about how topology changes the way scientists understand solids.

Topology can connect an electron’s motion with its spin, producing electronic states with chiral behavior. That opens a difficult question: when a crystal has a chiral structure, does its electronic system inherit that chirality? The answer is not automatic. In a molecule, structural chirality and the behavior of its electrons are closely linked. A solid has a more complicated electronic structure, and the relationship between its geometry and its electrons can take less intuitive forms.

Felser is also interested in the reverse possibility: whether a crystal without structural chirality could still host chiral electrons. If electronic chirality can arise from something other than the arrangement of atoms, it could broaden how scientists think about chiral materials and their potential uses.

A chemistry view of chiral catalysis

The distinction matters for catalysis. A chiral molecule used as a catalyst can produce a chiral outcome when the molecular interactions align. A chiral solid, however, may not be chiral at the electronic level. Simply choosing a crystal with a chiral structure may therefore be insufficient to produce the desired catalytic effect.

Felser traces part of her interest in this connection to chemist Roald Hoffmann, whom she describes as a hero. Hoffmann received the Nobel Prize in 1987 and developed influential ways to think about solids from a chemical perspective, including work connected to surfaces and catalysis. Felser sees topology as a concept that can now be brought back into chemistry to help explain behavior in chiral solids.

Her group has published research on transport and catalysis and is studying how molecules are absorbed on both chiral and achiral crystals. Felser is developing a way to explain the relevant physics to chemists using orbital pictures of what happens inside a material and at its surface. The challenge is to make topology understandable in chemical terms while preserving the information that makes the concept useful.

That work depends on collaboration. Different questions require different experiments, and Felser says researchers need colleagues with varied skills to investigate an idea fully. The group’s mix of expertise reflects the work itself: understanding a solid can demand chemical synthesis, physical measurement and theoretical interpretation.

Room-temperature effects and better materials data

For Felser, topology has changed more than the catalog of known materials. It has altered the way researchers connect a solid’s structure to its properties. Earlier teaching often emphasized structure-property relationships; topology offers another framework, one that can account for less familiar and more quantum forms of behavior.

A major challenge is making quantum effects usable at room temperature. Quantum phenomena are often associated with low temperatures, but Felser argues that some can persist at higher temperatures. Finding and bringing those effects into practical conditions remains an important research problem.

Artificial intelligence could help identify materials, but Felser cautions that prediction depends on data that researchers do not yet have in usable form. Much experimental knowledge remains in handwritten lab notebooks. Predicting a material with a genuinely new structure also requires phase diagrams, information about competing phases and the chemical judgment built through solid-state synthesis.

That judgment matters because synthesizing a compound is not simply a matter of combining elements and heating them. Researchers need to understand which structures are stable, what alternatives may form and how preparation conditions affect the result. AI can support that work, but useful predictions will depend on richer, more accessible experimental records and the expertise needed to interpret them.

From electronic chirality to life’s origins

Felser considers chirality a young research area with connections well beyond solid-state physics. The same broad question touches high-energy physics, astrophysics, materials science and biology: why do some systems favor one handed form over its mirror image?

One of the questions driving her current work is the origin of life’s homochirality: why living systems use one kind of amino acid. Her group is examining biological precursors, including RNA precursors, and how they interact with materials whose electronic structure is chiral. The work links the behavior of electrons in solids to a fundamental question about the chemistry associated with life.

Felser’s research suggests that topology may offer a shared set of tools for questions that have usually belonged to separate disciplines. The next step is to test whether those tools can explain chiral interactions at surfaces and in catalytic processes, while helping researchers design materials with useful behavior at accessible temperatures. That combination of fundamental questions and material design remains the defining thread in her work.

The Wiley Women in Science Awards 2026, held in March at the Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, brought together leading scientists and scholars to honor the outstanding contributions of nine exceptional women researchers for their impactful contributions and dedication to innovation. The establishment of the Wiley Women in Science Awards, supported by the journal Advanced Physics Research, aims to inspire the next generation of researchers and support a more inclusive and diverse research community.

Featured Image Credit: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Physics of Solids

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