FACULTY RESEARCHERS

 

Chair

Michael Timko

Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

Conversion of renewable feedstocks into liquid fuels; Real-time monitoring of cellulose decomposition; Butanol fermentation; Crude oil upgrading.

 

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Vice-Chair

Aaron Deskins

Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

Molecular modeling; Sustainable energy production; Pollution abatement.

 

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ERG Faculty

Ravi Datta

Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

Director of the WPI Fuel Cell Center; Reaction engineering of fuel cells, hydrogen, and renewable fuels.

 

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Ron Grimm

Assistant Professor of Chemistry

 

Surface characterization; Photoelectrochemistry; Non-traditional, Earth-abundant materials; Surface passivation; Chemical Modification of semiconductors.

 

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Jianyu Liang

Associate Professor of Mechanical and Chemical Engineering

 

Nanomaterials for batteries and fuel cells; Cold spray of nanostructured metallic materials; Green manufacturing from industrial wastes; Electrochemistry.

 

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Sneha Narra

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

 

Metal additive manufacturing (AM), alternate feedstocks, reusability of powders, AM for advanced energy system designs.

 

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John Orr

Director of Sustainability, Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering

 

Systems and control aspects of modern power systems; Electronic navigation systems; Engineering education; Sustainability.

Doug Petkie

Department Head & Professor of Physics

 

Millimeter-wave and terahertz sensing; optics and electromagnetic scattering; photonic integrated circuits

 

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Adam Powell

Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering

 

Sustainable metal processing for clean energy supply chains; low-cost solar silicon; magnesium for light-weight vehicles

 

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Pratap Rao

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

 

Nanostructured thin-film solar cells; Earth-abundant elements; Economical synthesis of structured nanomaterials.

 

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Reeta Rao

Associate Professor of Biology & Biotechnology

 

Xylose fermentation; Microbial fuel cells.

 

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Izabela Stroe

Associate Teaching Professor of Physics, Director MPED

 

MDielectric spectroscopy of energy materials; undergraduate education in renewable energy

 

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Andrew Teixeira

Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

Microreaction engineering; heterogeneous catalysis; continuous crystallization

 

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Lyubov Titova

Assistant Professor of Physics

 

Terahertz spectroscopy; Ultrafast optical spectroscopy; photoconductivity of materials; dynamics of photocatalytic and electrocatalytic reactions.

 

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Burt Tilley

Associate Professor of Mathematical Sciences

 

Mathematical Modeling; Geothermal energy harnessing; Energy and species transport through porous media.

 

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Yan Wang

Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Chemical Engineering

 

Electrochemistry; Electrolysis; Lithium-ion batteries; Solid electrolytes; Battery recycling.

 

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Jennifer Wilcox

Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

CO2 capture; Sorbent design; Trace metal reduction; Clean coal technology.

 

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Eric Young

Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering

 

Biomass conversion to valuable chemicals; Metabolic engineering; Synthetic biology.

 

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Yu (Michael) Zhong

Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering

 

Defect chemistry; Long-term degradation of fuel cells; Computational Thermodynamics; Ab-initio calculations.

 

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