(4ek) Materials for Energy, Mass and Information Transport

Developing advanced materials for energy, mass and information transport are critical to current global issues, such as energy management, water & gas purification and computer science. A molecular level of understanding the fundamental structure-property relationships is important to developing advanced materials and devices. My research area includes thermal transport in polymers and across hard-soft interfaces, water and gas transport in porous media, data storage and processing in nanoparticle networks. Three topics will be associated: (1) Polymer thermal conductivity and its relationship with the chain conformation. (2) Water transport in nanotube is related to the structure of the nanotube. (3) Nanoparticle networks are able to record data and process information. In the future, my research will focus on transport process involving polymers, composite materials, water & gas, nanoparticles and different interfaces.

Teaching Interests

My education background in both Aerospace & Mechanical Engineering and Chemical Engineering qualifies me to teach courses in both departments, such as Thermodynamics, Heat Transfer, Separation Process, Physical Chemistry at undergraduate level, and Materials Modeling, Nanoscale Heat & Mass Transfer, Statistical Mechanics, at graduate level. To inspire students’ active learning, I will develop courses using in-class discussion, demonstration and practicing, and out-of-class group project and individual project. I want to make sure students are all engaged in my class. I would also like to develop a new course for both graduates and senior undergraduates. The course will include fundamentals about Computational Chemistry, Programming, Data Science and Materials Science, and using simulation skills to solve material problems. Students will learn how to make assumptions and build simulation models, to solve a research problem. My teaching philosophy is using active teaching to maximize students’ involvement in class through discussion, demonstration and practicing.