滑铁卢大学的一位教授兼研究人员获得了加拿大科学卓越领域的最高荣誉。
A professor and researcher at the University of Waterloo has received the highest recognition in Canada for scientific excellence.
琳达·纳扎尔是滑铁卢大学化学系的杰出大学教授，从事电池材料研究已逾三十年。
Linda Nazar is a distinguished university professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Waterloo and has been studying battery materials for over three decades.
加拿大自然科学与工程研究委员会最近宣布，授予她格哈德·赫兹伯格加拿大科学与工程金质奖章，以表彰她在帮助开发更安全、更可持续电池方面取得的突破性成果。
She was recently announced as the Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal for Science and Engineering by Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada for her break-through work in helping develop batteries that are safer and more sustainable.
“我深感荣幸能获得此奖。坦白说，能加入此前获此殊荣的那些杰出科学家和工程师的行列，我倍感谦卑，”她对加拿大广播公司新闻表示。
"I'm deeply honoured to win this award. And I'm also quite honestly humbled to join the remarkable scientists and engineers who have received this distinction before me," she told CBC News.
据加拿大自然科学与工程研究委员会的新闻稿称，纳扎尔的“世界领先发现改变了电化学储能科学，为更安全、更高效的电池奠定了基础，正帮助加速全球向清洁交通和可再生能源的转型。”该奖项还附带为期五年、共计100万加元的资助。
According to a news release from Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Nazar's "world-leading discoveries have transformed the science of electrochemical energy storage, laying the foundation for safer, more efficient batteries that are helping accelerate the global shift to clean transportation and renewable energy." The award also comes with $1 million in funding over five years.
纳扎尔主导了关于锂硫电池的突破性研究，最近则专注于固态电池。她表示，固态电池比液态电池提供“安全性好得多”，而液态电池是日常生活中最常见的类型。
Nazar has led breakthrough research surrounding lithium-sulfur batteries and more recently, on solid-state batteries. She says solid-state batteries offer "much better safety" than liquid-state batteries, which are most common in every-day life.
液态电池，即锂离子电池，用于手机、笔记本电脑、电动工具和其他日常设备。纳扎尔说，锂离子电池正达到其成功的顶峰，她正与团队致力于研发新一代电池来接替。
Liquid-state batteries, or lithium-ion batteries, are used in cell phones, laptops, power tools and other everyday devices. Nazar says lithium-ion batteries are reaching the pinnacle of their success, and she is working with her team to make a new generation of batteries to take over.
这包括固态电池，它使用固态电解质而非液态电解质。她说，固态更安全，因为液态电解质易燃并可能爆燃。纳扎尔表示，固态电池拥有更宽的工作温度范围。
This includes solid-state batteries, which use solid electrolytes rather than liquid electrolytes. She says the solid state is safer because liquid electrolytes are flammable and can burst into flames. Nazar says the solid state has a wider temperature operation.
“例如，它们可以用于在高海拔、极寒环境下飞行的无人机。它们在北极地区的使用效率更高。它们可以用于军事领域，因为它们更安全，”纳扎尔说。
"They can be used, for example, in drones which are flying at higher elevations where it's really cold. They can be used in the Arctic more efficiently. They can be used in the military because they're safer," said Nazar.
固态电池还能储存更多能量。“你可以从这种电池结构中获得更高的能量密度，因为你可以更有效地堆叠电芯，这被称为双极堆叠，”纳扎尔说。
Solid-state batteries can also hold more energy. "You can get a higher energy density out of that configuration of the battery because you can pack the the cells more effectively with, it's called a bipolar stacking," said Nazar.
纳扎尔在电池领域的突破性工作 在过去三十年里，纳扎尔主导了不同种类电池材料的开创性研究，包括锂硫电池和磷酸铁锂电池。
Nazar's break-through work with batteries Over the past three decades, Nazar has led pioneering work on different kinds of battery material, including lithium-sulfur batteries and lithium-ion phosphate.
她说，她的团队促进了对磷酸铁锂电池材料的早期理解，这种材料现在“在汽车行业被大量使用，是最受欢迎的电池材料之一。”在整个职业生涯中，她研究过镁、钠离子和锂离子电池。
She says her team contributed to the early understanding of lithium-ion phosphate battery materials, and it's now "used in the automobile industry heavily, it's one of the most popular battery materials." Throughout her career, she's worked on magnesium, sodium-ion and lithium-ion batteries.
现在，她正在从事一个涉及水系电池的新项目，这种电池以水为电解质，与能源部下属的一个位于斯坦福的中心合作。
Now, she's working on a new project involving aqueous batteries, which use water as an electrolyte, with the Department of Energy out of a hub out of Stanford.
纳扎尔说，她在多伦多大学攻读研究生时对研究电池产生了兴趣。她说，她之所以对电池着迷，是因为她是一名材料化学家、电化学家，在某种程度上也是一名无机化学家和物理化学家。
Nazar says she became interested in studying batteries when she was a graduate student at the University of Toronto. She says the reason she's fascinated in batteries is because she's a materials chemist, an electrochemist and to some degree, an inorganic chemist and a physical chemist.
“电池在这些领域都提供了……一个研究的乐园。所以它们听起来可能很简单，但实际上非常、非常复杂。因此，它们提供了将所有这些不同课题结合在一起的能力，”纳扎尔说。
"Batteries offer ... a playground in all of those areas. So they may sound simple to people, but they're really quite, quite complicated. And so they offer the ability to bring all these different topics together," said Nazar.