Credentials
Education
- Ph.D., Materials Science and Engineering, University of Utah (2007)
- M.S., Physics, University of Utah (2004)
Professional Appointments
- Research Scientist, Ames National Laboratory & Department of Physics and Astronomy, Iowa State University (2011-Present)
- Postdoctoral Research Associate, Ames National Laboratory & Institute for Physical Research and Technology, Iowa State University (2007-2011)
- Graduate Research Assistant, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Utah (2003-2007)
- Graduate Teaching Assistant, Department of Physics, University of Utah (2001-2003)
Areas of Expertise
- Materials Science
- Condensed Matter Physics
- Chemical Physics
- Computational Physics and Chemistry
Research
Research Projects
Research Interests
- Computational simulation and physical modeling from atomic to mesoscopic scales; thermodynamic and kinetic properties of bulk materials as well as surfaces and interfaces of materials; growth mechanisms of solid nanofilms; self-assembly, self-organization, and quantum effects of various nanostructures; nanofilms, nanowires, monatomic chains, nanotubes, nanoclusters, graphene, topological insulators, silica nanopores; chemical adsorption on material surface; electric and magnetic properties of surface-related nanostructures; electronic structure and energy band analyses for bulk and surface systems, etc.
- First-principles (or ab initio) density functional theory; kinetic Monte Carlo simulation; molecular dynamic simulation; atomistic and coarse-grained models; electron-gas and jellium models; climbing elastic nudged band method; empirical potentials; step flow and step dynamics; diffusion rate equation analysis; continuum modeling, etc.
- Some of my current theoretical and computational research projects are often closely related to experimental observations, e.g., frequently from scanning tunneling microscope experimental technology. These experimental observations are generally from our collaboration groups, as well as from published literature.