Principle Investigator
Frank J. Derbyshire Professor of Materials Engineering
Faculty Associate, Power and Energy Institute of Kentucky (PEIK)
Faculty Associate, UK Institute for Sustainable Manufacturing (ISM)
Faculty Member, UK Center for Advanced Materials (CAM)
Participating Faculty, NSF/UK IGERT Program on Engineered Bioactive Interfaces and Devices
Current Group Members
Graduate Students
Ming Wang (PhD in Materials Engineering, 2021 (expected))
Andrew W. Meyer (PhD in Materials Engineering, 2021 (expected))
Ryan Hill (PhD in Chemical Engineering, 2023 (expected))
Jacob Hempel (PhD in Physics)
Bhamiti Sharma (PhD in Physics, 2023 (expected))
Jacob Bonta (PhD in Materials Engineering)
Bayode Dada (PhD in Materials Engineering)
Kubra Uzun (MS in Chemical Engineering)
Previous Group Members
Graduate Students
Rutooj Deshpande (PhD in Chemical Engineering, Nov. 21, 2011; CEO, GoVidyouth Mobility, India)
Juchuan Li (PhD in Materials Engineering, March 28, 2012; Advanced Materials Scientist at Apple)
Ilona Hoffmann (PhD in Materials Engineering and Biomedical Engineering, August 27, 2014)
Brian Ray (PhD in Physics, 2014)
Qinglin Zhang (PhD in Materials Engineering, March 11, 2016; Researcher, General Motors Global R&D Center, Warren, Michigan)
Jia Pan (PhD in Materials Engineering, April 11, 2016; Postdoctoral Researcher at National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
Jiagang Xu (PhD in Materials Engineering, September 29, 2016; Senior Engineer II, Amperex Technology Limited ATL, China)
Tao Chen (PhD in Materials Engineering, April 28, 2017; Associate Senior Engineer (副高级工程师), BAK Battery Co., Ltd. China, Shenzhen China
Mohanad Najah Al-Shroofy (PhD in Materials Engineering, May 4, 2017; Lecturer at the University of Technology in Baghdad, Iraq)
Peizhen Li (PhD in Mechanical Engineering, 2017; Design Engineer-Life Science at AVENTICS)
Long Zhang (MS in Materials Engineering, September 8, 2017; Graduate student, Leibniz Institute for New Materials, Saarbrücken, Germany)
Xiaowen Zhan (PhD in Materials Engineering, October 26, 2018; Post-Doctoral Fellow, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)
Baleegh S. Alobaid (PhD in Materials Engineering, November 7, 2018; Lecturer at the University of Al-Muthanna, Almutanna, Iraq)
Shuang Gao (PhD in Materials Engineering, April 15, 2019; Research Scientist, Pacific Industrial Development Corp, Ann Arbor, Michigan)
Yikai Wang (PhD in Materials Engineering, April 29, 2019; Post-Doctoral Fellow, University of Colorado – Boulder)
Jiazhi Hu (PhD in Materials Engineering, July 17, 2019; Researcher, General Motors Global R&D Center)
Dingying Dang (PhD in Materials Engineering, 2020)
Postdoctoral Scholars
Yan Jin (PhD in Materials Engineering at the University of Kentucky, 2016-2017)
Lin Yang (PhD in Materials Engineering at the University of Kentucky, 2016-2017)
Visiting Scholars
Dawei Li (Graduate student at the Shanghai University, China, 2016-2018)
Yan Sun (Graduate student at the Anhui University, China, 2017-2018)
Undergraduate Students
Lena Loewenau (exchange student from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 2009-2010)
Ilona Hoffmann (diploma thesis student from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 2009-2010)
Nisha Kishor (political science major, summer 2010)
Alison Carter (high school student, summer 2010)
Dwight Nagel (Materials Engineering, 2010 -2011)
Yunchao Li (Materials Engineering, 2011-2012)
Zhi Liang (Materials Engineering, 2011-2013)
Jie Li (Materials Engineering, 2012-2013)
Leonard Franke (exchange BS student from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, fall 2013)
Ahmed Louati (exchange MS student from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, fall 2013)
Lukas Rossel (exchange BS student from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, fall 2014)
Yue Yu (Chemical Engineering, 2012-2014)
Ming Wang (Materials Engineering, 2014-2015)
Chengxi Zhao (Materials Engineering, 2014-2015)
Boniface Oseiamankona (Kentucky State University, summer 2015)
Aaron Wilson (Kentucky State University, summer 2015)
Laura Grueneberg (Chemical Engineering, summer 2016)
Ben Dixon (Materials Engineering, 2016-2017)
Corey Mattic (Kentucky State University, summer 2017)
Vincent Kelly (Kentucky State University, summer 2018)
Megan Reinhart (Mechanical Engineering, summer 2018)
Gabriel Garcia (Materials Engineering, summer 2018)
Stephen M. Schaninger (Chemical Engineering, summer 2019)