Chris Dames received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2006. His B.S. and M.S. are from UC Berkeley (1998, 2001). He was a faculty member at UC Riverside from 2006-2011 before joining UC Berkeley in 2011, and he has also worked as a research engineer for Solo Energy Corp. (1998-1999). His research interests emphasize fundamental studies of heat transfer and energy conversion at the nanoscale, using both theoretical and experimental methods. Some topics of current interest include graphene, nanocrystalline materials, mean free path distributions, thermoelectrics, biological systems, and highly anisotropic and nonlinear transport including thermal rectification. His research has been recognized with a DARPA Young Faculty Award (2009) and NSF CAREER award (2011).

Dr. Menglong Hao

Menglong Hao received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University in 2016. His B.S. and M.S. are from Southeast University, China, and Ulm University, Germany, respectively. His research mainly involves developing novel materials and devices with strongly nonlinear heat transfer characteristics. Such materials and devices provide benefits in terms of energy saving and pollution control in a wide range of automotive and terrestrial applications. In the meantime, he is also leading an effort to utilize SEM as a thermometry tool and perform temperature mapping at the nanoscale. His past research focused on studying carbon-based nanomaterials for high-temperature thermal applications. In his free time, Menglong enjoys learning new cooking recipes. He is also a skier.

Dr. Ruijiao Miao

Ruijiao Miao is a postdoctoral scholar working on tunable energy storage materials and thermal switches for thermal management applications. She received her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan, where her doctoral research focused on tuning the charge transfer and thermoelectric properties in molecular junctions. She is co-advised by Prof. Ravi Prasher at LBNL.

Dr. Pengyu Yuan

Pengyu Yuan received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Iowa State University (ISU) in 2018. He has one B.S. in Energy and Power Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, and another B.S. in Business Administration from Wuhan University in 2012. He was a project mechanical engineer at GEA China from 2012 to 2014 before his graduate study at ISU. Currently, his research is to characterize ultrafast heat transfer induced by a pulsed electron beam from SEM through numerical simulations and thermal measurements with designing and fabricating devices for nanothermomertry. His past research focused on studying the interface thermal energy transport and hot carrier diffusion in two-dimensional TMDs (transition metal dichalcogenides) by Raman-based thermal probing techniques. Pengyu enjoys photography, and he is a co-founder and portrait photographer of a website-based photography studio.

Dr. Qiye Zheng

Qiye Zheng is a postdoctoral scholar working on high-throughput optical thermal metrology for the characterization of porous materials in multiscale. Before joining the lab, he received his PhD in materials science and engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where his research is focused on the energy transport and structure properties relationship in thermal functional materials for heat dissipation and thermal regulation applications. He is co-advised by Ravi Prasher at LBNL.

Hyungmook (Mook) Kang

Hyungmook Kang received his B.S. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Seoul National University (SNU) in 2011 and 2013, respectively. He was a staff scientist at Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST). He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley with the help of Kwanjeong Scholarship and co-advised by Prof. Chris Dames (UCB) and Dr. Jeff Urban (LBNL). His research interests emphasize fundamental studies of heat and mass transport using molecular dynamics simulations for materials in water/energy applications. In his free time, Mook enjoys traveling, snowboarding and golfing.

Joseph Schaadt

Joseph Schaadt received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Villanova University in 2015, with minors in mathematics, physics, and mechatronics. Joseph is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. Upon graduation from Villanova University, Joseph spent time in industry in Silicon Valley. Subsequently, Joseph was a Fulbright Research Fellow and a Swiss Government Excellence Scholar with Professor John Thome in the Heat and Mass Transfer Laboratory (LTCM) at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL). Joseph followed this with spending a year as a research assistant with Professor Kenneth Goodson in the NanoHeat Lab at Stanford University. His current research focuses on the application of nano/microfabrication techniques to study the fundamentals of phase-change heat transfer through the development of an electrowetting thermal switch. Joseph is a recipient of the Chang-Lin Tien Graduate Fellowship at UC Berkeley.

Lei Tang

Lei Tang received his B.S. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Utah in 2017 and 2018, respectively. His past research mainly focused on investigating near-field thermal radiation-mediated photonic thermal diodes via both numerical and experimental approaches. Currently, his research focuses on studying polycrystalline ceramics for high power lasing gain media.

Josh Wilbur

Josh Wilbur received his B.S. in Biomedical Engineering with a minor in Mathematics from Cal Poly, SLO in June of 2015. He is now pursuing a Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley with the help of a Berkeley Graduate Fellowship and a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. His current research focuses on photothermal techniques for the characterization of novel materials, and design of porous metal foams for use in phase-change microactuators. Josh's free time is spent searching the Bay Area for new restaurants and exploring the many nature reserves around Berkeley.

Jason Wu

Jason Wu received his M.S. and B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from University of Connecticut in 2015 and 2016 respectively. He is currently pursuing his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He has been selected as a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program fellow. He had been focused on low dimensional materials synthesis and its thermal and electrical transport characterization before joining UC Berkeley. His current research focuses on thermal transport characterization of ferroelectric materials. In his free time, Jason enjoys baking, cooking, and traveling.