This research area focuses on developing the materials, electrode architectures, and fundamental electrochemical understanding needed to advance batteries, fuel cells, and related energy storage and conversion technologies. A central theme is next-generation battery chemistries — including lithium metal, sodium-sulfur, aluminum-ion, and all-solid-state systems — where work targets key failure mechanisms such as dendrite formation, electrolyte instability, and polysulfide shuttling, alongside the electrolytes and separator materials needed to overcome them. Parallel efforts advance fuel cell technologies, from non-precious metal catalysts that could replace platinum to solid oxide fuel cells requiring improved oxygen ion transport at lower operating temperatures. Underlying much of this work is multiscale modeling and characterization — from atomistic and machine-learned simulations of ion transport, to microstructure-level simulations of electrode behavior, to advanced spectroscopic and microscopy techniques — that connect fundamental electrochemical mechanisms to practical device performance, cost, and durability.
