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UCLA MSE Newsletter - Winter 2025

Dear colleagues,

I hope this note finds you safe and well. So many in our community have suffered devastating losses from the fires that tore through Los Angeles County over the past few weeks. My heart goes out to those who were affected by this tragedy, which serves as a stark reminder of the urgent need for innovation in climate solutions and resilience. As one of Southern California’s leading research institutions, UCLA is committed to taking a leadership role in helping our community recover and rebuild. All of us at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) stand ready to offer our expertise in sustainability, transportation, and climate change mitigation; including clean fuel production, efficient cooling, solar technologies, energy storage, recycling and much more.

Having dedicated 28 years of my professional career to the MSE Department at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering as an advisor, professor and researcher, I am honored to now serve as its Chair. Our department may be small in size, but I'd like to think our impact is anything but.

Consider this: 20% of our core faculty members are recognized as highly cited researchers on the Clarivate list. In the last few months, our faculty have secured several major center grants, published a number of papers in leading journals, and reinforced our leadership in cutting-edge research. We recently expanded our research efforts into emerging fields such as AI/ML-driven materials science, quantum materials, and sustainable materials and processes. In 2025, we are building on this momentum by recruiting three new faculty members in AI for materials, semiconductor manufacturing, and clean energy materials — areas that will shape the future of our field. I invite you to read more about our newest developments in this newsletter.

Through collaboration, innovation, and an unwavering commitment to excellence, we continue to push boundaries — not just in research, but in shaping a safer and more sustainable future for our communities.

Regards,

Prof. Yang Yang

Chair, Department of Materials Science and Engineering

Research News

New cooling pump with a temperature differential of 14 K

A new work from Prof. Qibing Pei's group introduced a self-regenerative heat pump using electrocaloric polymers, obtaining a high temperature differential of 14 K. The study, published in Science, is a significant advance for compact solid-state cooling technologies. [read more]

Cooling buildings while saving energy

A study led by UCLA MSE's Prof. Aaswath Raman shows method to optimize thermal management in buildings by controlling radiant heat. [read more]

An atomistic view of a catalyst during an electrochemical reactions

New study published in Nature shows how catalyst atoms behave in electrified interfaces during reactions, in a first visualization of the complex dynamics of these systems. [read more]

Light-driven soft actuator inspired by insect wings

A study led by Prof. Ximin He published in Nature Materials demonstrates a self-oscillating, light-driven actuator with high output power density that was inspired by insect wings. The mechanism enables many locomotion modes, broad-wavelength operations, and multifunction integration. [read more]

Materials meet medicine to enhance T cell-based therapies

UCLA researchers developed a method to activate T cells in therapeutic treatments based on graphene oxide. The study led by Prof. Yu Huang, published in Nature Nanotechnology, has potential for making CAR-T cell therapy more effective and accessible. [read more]

Towards grid-scale aqueous batteries

UCLA researchers, including MSE Profs. Bruce Dunn and Sarah Tolbert, join DOE-funded consortium do develop new aqueous battery for electrical grids with a 5-year, $62.5 million grant.
[read more]

MSE faculty receives the 2024 DOE Early Career Award

Prof. Daniel Schwalbe-Koda receives the 2024 DOE Early Career Award. The 5-year, $875k grant will develop methods to model how materials synthesis behaves at the atomistic scale. [read more]

Prof. Paul Weiss Receives the Sigma Xi William Procter Prize for Scientific Achievement

Prof. Paul Weiss, who holds a joint faculty appointment at UCLA MSE, received the Sigma Xi William Procter Prize for Scientific Achievement. The honor is awarded since 1950 to a scientist who has made an outstanding contribution to scientific research and has demonstrated an ability to communicate this research to scientists in other disciplines.
[read more] [MRS Bulletin]

Prof. Bruce Dunn receives the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Sol-Gel Society

Prof. Bruce Dunn received the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Sol-Gel Society. The Lifetime Achievement Award is "the highest honour that the ISGS can bestow on our colleagues and reflects outstanding contributions to sol-gel science and technology through broad and productive scholarship; by achievements in commercial and industrial applications of sol-gel science and technology; and/or by outstanding service to the sol-gel community that has been sustained over an entire career."
[read more]

Engineering faculty named to the National Academy of Inventors

Profs. Yang Yang and Gaurav Sant are among the 3 UCLA Engineering faculty elected as fellows of the National Academy of Inventors in 2024. [read more]

Doubling Fuel Cell Lifetime Target set by DOE

New research by Prof. Huang developed ultrafine platinum nanocatalyst with embedded cobalt oxide clusters that is shown to reduce platinum dissolution and greatly increase fuel cell efficiency and durability. The results nearly doubled the projected lifetime target set by DOE, and are described in more detail in a recent publication at Nature Catalysis [read more]

More News

Three MSE faculty (Profs. Dunn, Huang, and Y. Yang) were named among the the world's most influential scholars by Clarivate. [read more]

NSF Awards $1 million, 5-year grant as part of Clean Energy Technology Initiative to UCLA faculty. [read more]

Prof. Huang receives the 2024 Royal Society of Chemistry Faraday Horizon Prize [read more]

A new Brillouin-Mandelstam spectroscope supported by NSF enters operation at UCLA CNSI. [read more]

Prof. Weiss is elected to the Board of Directors of the African Materials Research Society and to the scientific advisory board of the Institute for Basic Science (IBS) in South Korea. [read more]

Prof. Dunn receives a Distinguished Alumni Award from the Rutgers University School of Engineering.

El País: Instructions to make the Sun (with Prof. Marian) [read more]

Alumni and Students Spotlight

An alumna's journey to semiconductor manufacturing

Clair Shen, M.S. '16, shares her journey from Taiwan to UCLA and coming full circle to TSMC to work in semiconductor manufacturing. [read more]

Combining materials science, policy-making, and academic writing

Maggie Fox, Ph.D. '23, describes how her experiences at UCLA MSE shaped her career in the intersection of academic writing, policy, and materials science research. [read more]

Graduate Student Award

Jordan Teeter, an MSE PhD graduate student at UCLA received the Early Career Outstanding Presentation Award given at the Workshop on Innovative Nanoscale Devices and Systems (WINDS), Big Island of Hawaii in December 2024. He was among the four early-career researchers selected for the award sponsored by Applied Physics Letters. Jordan’s presentation was based on his recent paper published in Advanced Materials. Congratulations!

News from MRS Chapter at UCLA

The MRS Chapter at UCLA has (again!) been awarded the Bruin Development Award by the School of Engineering in 2024, and was also a finalist for the Overall Student Group of the Year, competing with a total of 84 engineering student organizations. Congratulations to our amazing students!

Highlights and Events

FAculty and STudents (FAST) Social Hours

The Fall of 2024 saw a number of social events co-organized by the faculty and the students with the help of the Materials Research Society (MRS) Chapter at UCLA. From a global potluck to a comfort pizza event after unexpected rain, the events offered an opportunity for the whole department to mingle together!

MRS Opinion Piece

Opinion: Now I stand on the shoulders of giants, teach me how to see further

In this opinion piece, MRS Outreach Chair and MSE undergraduate student Cylin Wang reflects on finding the essence of engineering, contrasts it with a double major in art history, and explores how we learn to see further. [read more]

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