2 Ceder group alumni receive DOE Early Career Awards!

Professor Wenhao Sun, currently an assistant professor at the University of Michigan in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and Dr. Maria Chan, currently a scientist at Argonne’s Center for Nanoscale Materials (CNM), received 2020 Awards for the Early Career Research Program from the Office of Basic Energy Sciences. The coveted Early Career Award was given to only 76 scientists across the nation and provides five years of grants for salary and research expenses.

Prof. Sun, previously a graduate student and post-doctoral researcher in the Ceder group, received the award for his proposal on building new fundamental theories that can help explain how ceramic materials form as a function of temperature and reaction time. By better understanding how precursors react to form product phases, solid-state chemists can more rationally design time- and energy-efficient synthesis reactions to these advanced materials. Read more about Prof. Sun’s award in the article from University of Michigan: Sun receives D.O.E. Early Career Award.

Dr. Chan, previously a post-doctoral researcher in the group, won the award for her proposal on using an AI and ML computational framework to allow researchers to determine atomic positions in real time from experimental characterization data. Implementing the aforementioned framework involves developing and connecting approaches for the simulation of X-ray, electron, laser and scanning probe data; adopting and applying pattern recognition and computer vision algorithms; and constructing and training ML models to find the relationship between experimental data and the local atomic environment in a material sample. Read more about Dr. Chan’s award in the article from Argonne National Lab: Six Argonne researchers receive DOE Early Career Research Program awards.

Congratulations to both Prof. Sun and Dr. Chan on the prestigious award!