Kenna received their Bachelors in Materials Science and Engineering at Texas A&M. They are now a graduate researcher in Prof. Qian’s materials theory group at Texas A&M focusing on first-principles calculation of functional and electronic materials, especially exploring the intersection between structural and electronic changes in 2D materials and machine learning-enabled materials discovery. In their free time, they enjoy making art, reading, and historical recreation.
Victor Balcorta
Victor earned his BS in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Texas at El Paso. In Fall 2021 he joined Dr. Pharr’s group. His research interests focus on using different nanoindentation techniques to understand the chemo-mechanics of energy storage materials. He also contributes to the development of 3D-printed electrode materials for sodium-ion batteries.
Kyle Burns
Kyle is a physical inorganic chemist interested in the electrochemical production of hydrogen using bioinspired molecular catalysts. Through use of physical and electroanalytical methods to study the mechanism of the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), and its inhibition by small molecules such as O2, Kyle hopes to tune the stability and tolerance of these molecular catalysts.
Sarbajeet Chakraborty
Sarbajeet received his PhD in Chemistry from Texas A&M University, USA, and his M.Sc. Chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, India. His areas of research include the underpinning chemical mechanisms for adjusting the atomic and electronic structure of intercalated metastable polymorphs of V2O5 to design advanced materials for battery cathodes and electrodes for neuromorphic computing. He is particularly interested in dynamic transformations and ion diffusion in correlated systems, with an emphasis on topochemical single-crystal to single-crystal transformations and X-ray diffraction studies.
Publications: Google Scholar
ORCID: 0000-0002-2758-2069
Jenny Chong
Jenny graduated from the University of Michigan with a bachelor’s in Materials Science & Engineering in 2023. Currently, she is a 2nd year master’s student in Prof. Shamberger’s group at Texas A&M University. Her research focuses on electro-thermal characterization and compact model simulations.
Maryam Ghotbi
Maryam received her B.S. in Chemistry from Sharif University of Technology, Iran. Her research Interests include formation and properties of the SEI in lithium metal batteries.
Alice Giem
Alice is a PhD student 4th year at Texas A&M and graduate intern at NREL. Her research interests include leveraging midgap states in semiconductor photocatalysts heterostructures for hydrogen evolution and investigating the role of stereochemically active lone pairs in insertion electrode hosts for mediating fluoride-ion diffusion and for modulating the metal-to-insulator transition of doped MxV2O5 bronzes for neuromorphic computing applications.
Dakota Jones
Dakota obtained his B.S. in chemistry from Brigham Young University (Provo, Utah) in 2021, where he worked on optimizing microwave-promoted iminyl radical cascade reactions to be used as steps in the synthesis of natural products. In the fall of 2021 he joined Professor Kim R. Dunbar’s research group at Texas A&M University. His main research objective for his PhD work has been to design multimetallic coordination complexes with long-range magnetic coupling between transition metal centers using thiolate or organic nitrile bridging ligands.
Aiden Kang
Aiden received his BS in Mechanical Engineering in University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2019. His research focuses on fabrication and characterization of materials for neuromorphic computing and corresponding mechanical phenomena in these systems. His research interests include inspection of stress/damage during operation and how mechanical loading influences phase transitions in these systems.
John Ponis
John got his B.S. in Chemistry from Kutztown University in 2011 and worked in industry, formulating metalworking fluids for International Chemical Company in Philadelphia until joining the Banerjee Research Group at Texas A&M University in 2020. John uses topochemical ion-exchange reactions to synthesize metastable transition metal oxide neuromorphic materials, and studies the atomic and electronic structural origins of their transport instabilities via X-ray scattering and spectroscopy. In his spare time, he enjoys cooking, biking, studying post-industrial ideological history, and getting out of doors with his wife Caitlin and infant son Ansel.