BEYOND LITHIUM
ION XVI
Embedded Files
Speaker Bios
Speaker Bios
Listed in alphabetical order by last name.
KEYNOTE
SPEAKER
Caitlin Callaghan
Caitlin Callaghan
Director of Storage Materials & Systems, Department of Energy Office of Electricity
Dr. Caitlin Callaghan is the Director of Storage Materials & Systems at the Office of Electricity (OE) in the U.S. Department of Energy. Her team evaluates and advances high-potential energy storage technologies to reach the prototype stage. This includes identifying future supply chain and workforce requirements and leveraging DOE-wide efforts to serve expected deployment targets.
Caitlin has more than 15 years of experience working in different capacities across the energy sector. She returned to OE after serving as the Research and Engineering Division Chief at USACE’s Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory. While there, Caitlin also served as a research general engineer where she started a Cold Regions Energy Research Development Testing and Evaluation (RDTE) program and as a Code 4 Supervisor and Branch Chief within the Engineering Resources Branch.
Caitlin previously served in OE’s Transmission Permitting and Technical Assistance Division. In this capacity, Caitlin led OE's energy-water nexus efforts and provided expertise regarding environmental aspects of the electricity system. She was also the Program Lead for OE's Electricity Policy Technical Assistance Program, which provided unbiased technical assistance to localities, states, regions, and tribes on their electricity-related policies through analysis, stakeholder-convened discussions, education and training, and consultations with technical experts.
Caitlin also spent time with the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, as an American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Science and Technology Policy Fellow, working on energy and environmental issues associated with the electricity sector.
Caitlin holds a Juris Doctor and Master of Environmental Law and Policy from Vermont Law School, a Ph.D. and MS in Chemical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of New Hampshire.
Argonne National Laboratory
Rajeev Assary
Rajeev Assary
Rajeev Assary obtained PhD degree in Computational Chemistry in 2005 from The University of Manchester UK. Rajeev held postdoctoral positions in University of Manchester and Northwestern University prior to joining Argonne National Laboratory in 2009. At present, he is a group leader at Materials Science Division of Argonne National Laboratory. Rajeev also completed Strategic Laboratory Leadership Program (SLLP). Rajeev’s research interests include fundamental and applied aspects of computational modeling based on quantum chemistry and machine learning in catalysis and ‘beyond lithium ion’ energy storage systems. He has published over 150 papers in peer reviewed journals. During 2013-2023, he conducted research as part of Joint Center of Electric Energy Storage (JCESR). At present, he conducts research as part of Consortium for Computational Physics and Chemistry (CCPC), Enerrgy Storage Research Alliance (ESRA), Center for Steel Electrification by Electrosynthesis (C-STEEL), and DROPLETS.
Washington University in St. Louis
Peng Bai
Peng Bai
Jointly trained at MIT and Tsinghua University, Professor Bai obtained his PhD degree in Mechanical Engineering from Tsinghua University in 2012. He continued his research in the Department of Chemical Engineering at MIT as a postdoctoral associate, then senior postdoctoral associate and research scientist, prior to joining Washington University in St. Louis as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in 2017. With his expertise in physics-based mathematical modeling and analytical electrochemistry, Professor Bai has published original research in scientific journals including Science, Nature Communications, Energy & Environmental Science, Nano Letters, etc. His unique contributions earned him the Oronzio and Niccolò De Nora Foundation Young Author Prize from the International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE) in 2014, and the ISE Prize for Electrochemical Materials Science in 2018.
Solid Power
Josh Buettner-Garrett
Josh Buettner-Garrett
Joshua Buettner-Garrett serves as Chief Technology Officer of Solid Power. Prior to joining Solid Power in 2013, he served as Program Manager of the Energy Storage Group at ADA Technologies, Inc., a research and product development business, and as a Senior Research Scientist in the ADA Technologies’ Energy Storage Group. Mr. Garrett holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Arizona State University and an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Colorado State University.
SirenOpt
Christina Cheng
Christina Cheng
Sr. Data Scientist at SirenOpt
National Laboratory of the Rockies
Katie Harrison
Katie Harrison
Katharine (Katie) Harrison is a researcher at NLR. Her skills include electrochemistry and materials science. Her current research focuses on understanding calendar aging in silicon anodes for next generation lithium-ion batteries, developing materials for behind-the-meter stationary storage batteries, and validating critical mineral/material sources for their applications (such as domestic sources of materials for batteries).
Oregon State University
Xiulei "David" Ji
Xiulei "David" Ji
Xiulei "David" Ji is the Bert & Emelyn Christensen Professor of Chemistry at Oregon State University. His research focuses on the fundamental chemistry of charge-storage materials, aiming to design sustainable energy storage and conversion solutions. By integrating electrochemical principles with material chemistry, Dr. Ji’s group explores innovative charge-storage mechanisms and device configurations, including his pioneering work on aqueous batteries and new ion-storage systems.
Dr. Ji has authored over 150 publications and has been recognized as a "Highly Cited Researcher" by the Web of Science Group since 2019. He has received the NSF CAREER Award, Scialog Fellowship, and Department of Energy Battery500 Seedling Award. A dedicated educator, he has also received the Loyd Carter Graduate Teaching Award for his inspirational mentorship. Dr. Ji holds a Ph.D. in Materials Chemistry from the University of Waterloo and conducted postdoctoral research at the University of California, Santa Barbara, as an NSERC Fellow.
Argonne National Laboratory
Chris Johnson
Chris Johnson
Chris Johnson is currently a senior chemist and Argonne Distinguished Fellow at Argonne National Laboratory, specializing in the research & development of battery materials and battery systems with 30 years of experience.
Johnson is known worldwide for his development of state-of-art lithium-ion battery cathode materials and emerging sodium-ion batteries. He holds a BS. Chemistry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Northwestern University. He has published over 150 publications, and 45 issued US patents in the battery field. He has received the research award from the International Battery Association in 2006, and a R&D-100 award for the commercialization of lithium battery materials in 2009. Johnson was named a Fellow of The Electrochemical Society in 2017. He is past-Chairman of the Electrochemical Society Battery Division, and has been a member of the Electrochemical Society since 1993.
Peak Energy
Brandon Kelly
Brandon Kelly
Brandon is Chief Scientist at Peak, where he leads the development and scale-up of the company’s sodium-ion battery technology. He has extensive experience advancing next-generation cell programs, having served as Vice President of Engineering at Solid Power, where he guided solid-state and lithium-based technologies from prototype to commercial production. Brandon holds a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science from Colorado State University and works across teams at Peak to ensure innovation in chemistry translates into products built for safety, reliability, and scale.
Berkeley Lab
Haegyum Kim
Haegyum Kim
Haegyeom Kim is a Career Staff Scientist at the Materials Sciences Division of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). He received his PhD in 2015 from Seoul National University and was a postdoctoral researcher at LBNL until early 2019. His research interest lies in the materials design for energy storage and conversion materials based on the fundamental understanding of the synthesis process-structure-property relationship. He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles and 9 patents until now. He was selected as a Clarivate’s ‘Highly Cited Researcher (HCR)’, and won several awards, including Berkeley Lab Director’s Exceptional Achievement: Early Scientific Career, 2023 ACS Materials Au Rising Star, Young Scientist Award from the International Society for Solid-State Ionics, ECS Battery Division Postdoctoral Associate Research Award.
Talk Title: Strategies to Mitigate Li Metal Dendrite Formation and Its Propagation
Abstract:
Venkata Sai Avvarua, Seonghun Jeonga, Haegyeom Kima*
a. Materials Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
*Corresponding author: Dr. Haegyeom Kim (Email: haegyumkim@lbl.gov)
All solid-state Li metal batteries (ASSLBs) hold great promise as the future of energy storage due to their high energy and safety. In past years, several highly conductive solid-state electrolytes have been developed, making the solid-state battery system even more attractive. Nevertheless, several important challenges remain to be addressed before any ASSLBs can be competitive and outperform the existing Li-ion batteries. In this presentation, I will provide an overview of the solid-state battery programs at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and discuss the important challenges in solid-state Li metal batteries, as well as our strategies and recent progress in suppressing Li metal dendrite formation and its propagation through the solid-state electrolyte for improved cycling performance.
Berkeley Lab
Robert Kostecki
Robert Kostecki
Robert Kostecki is a Senior Scientist and Division Director of the Energy Technologies and Systems (ETS) Division in the Energy Technologies Area in Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
He is responsible for ETSD scientific, programmatic and strategic leadership in the areas of energy and environment through expanding existing research programs, assistance with development and maintenance of sponsor and partner relationships and creating new research initiatives.
Robert received his Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the University of Geneva (Switzerland) in 1994. He has (co-)authored more than 110 papers in refereed journals, 16 conference proceedings papers, more than 240 meeting presentations and 30 patents and invention disclosures. He is Vice President of the International Society of Electrochemistry and an active member of numerous scientific societies and committees; organizer and chair of numerous symposia; and workshops and government-university-industry research meetings.
IBM Research-Zurich
Teodoro Laino
Teodoro Laino
Teo received the Master degree in theoretical chemistry in 2001 (University of Pisa and Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, Italy) and the doctorate in computational chemistry in 2006 (Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, Italy) defending a thesis on 'Multi-Grid QM/ MM Approaches in ab initio Molecular Dynamics' supervised by Prof. Dr. Michele Parrinello. From 2006 to 2008, Teo worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the research group of Prof. Dr. Jürg Hutter at the University of Zurich, contributing to the development of the CP2K simulation package. In 2008, Teo joined the IBM Research - Zurich Laboratory (ZRL) as Research Scientist. He is currently Distinguished Research Scientist and manager.
His research interests focus on developing machine learning/artificial intelligence technologies to digitalize chemistry and materials science, with IBM RXN for chemistry being an example of a recent community success. In 2022, the team received the Sandmeyer Award of the Swiss Chemical Society for the important contributions to the field of digital chemistry.
Talk Title: A Foundation-Model Digital Twin for Energy Storage Devices
Abstract:
Energy storage devices generate rich, continuous data streams throughout their operational lifetime, yet exploiting this information to accurately predict performance remains a major challenge. In this talk, we present a foundation-model–based digital twin for energy storage devices, designed to learn jointly from design specifications and multimodal sensor time series.
Design parameters are encoded as structured tokens, while device sensor signals are represented through numerical embeddings, enabling unified sequence modeling across heterogeneous data sources. A multi-stage pretraining strategy teaches the foundation model to capture correlations between design choices and device behavior over time, as well as to extrapolate future sensor states. The resulting embeddings form a compact, transferable representation of device state and evolution.
We demonstrate that these embeddings enable highly accurate prediction of key performance indicators over time, achieving average percentage errors below 0.01% across representative metrics. This approach establishes foundation models as a powerful backbone for digital twins, enabling robust performance forecasting, cross-device comparison, and accelerated innovation in energy storage technologies.
Object Tech
Jiaojiao Li
Jiaojiao Li
Colorado School of Mines
Annalise Maughan
Annalise Maughan
Prof. Annalise Maughan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Colorado School of Mines and holds a joint appointment with the National Laboratory of the Rockies (NLR). She received her B.S. in Chemistry from Northern Arizona University and her Ph.D. in Chemistry from Colorado State University working with Prof. Jamie Neilson. She then joined the NLR as a Director’s Postdoctoral Fellow prior to joining the faculty at Colorado School of Mines in 2021. Her research program is focused on solid-state materials chemistry for renewable energy, with an emphasis on understanding the fundamental principles that connect chemistry, local and long-range structure, and dynamics to functional properties such as charge transport and light absorption/emission. She is the recipient of several awards, including the NLR's Foundation’s Outstanding Woman in STEM Award, the NSF CAREER Award, the Department of Chemistry Outstanding Faculty Award, the W. M. Keck Award for Graduate Mentorship, and the 2025 Chemistry of Materials Lectureship and Best Paper Award.
Soteria Battery Innovation Group
Brian Morin
Brian Morin
Dr. Brian Morin received his Ph.D. and M.S. degrees from the Ohio State University and began his career at DuPont and Milliken. Brian moved into the battery industry in 2011 and has become a passionate evangelist for battery safety. As Co-Founder and CEO of Soteria Battery Innovation Group, Brian serves the industry as a battery safety thought leader and through leading the commercialization of innovative battery safety technology. Brian loves children and has served as a Guardian ad Litem, serves the youth in his church and hosted foreign orphans in his home.
Talk Title: Battery Safety Quantification, and Technologies to Improve It
Talk Title: Battery Safety Quantification, and Technologies to Improve It
Abstract:
Safety in the battery industry is often viewed as binary, batteries that survive a certain type of abuse, or do not survive. Impact abuse, nail penetration, overcharge, hard short, and ballistic abuse are some of the ways cells are abused. Unfortunately, this leads to the concept that all cells that survive the abuse are the same, and all that don't are the same, but in the "fail" class. Safety standards are the worst culprits, which set up a long series of tests to be passed, but then to achieve a commercial reality each test is numbed down to the point that most cells pass the full battery of tests. In this talk a new concept will be presented in which cells are abused to failure along three metrics: electrical, thermal and physical abuse. The abuse is started mild, and then continues aggressively until the cell fails. The conditions of cell failure are used to give the cell a safety score along the three metrics. The talk will finish with a summary of technologies that can improve the safety performance along each metric, and also a summary of which metrics are most relevant for different market segments such as EVTOL, BESS, EV, drones, robotics and others.
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Jagjit Nanda
Jagjit Nanda
Dr. Jagjit Nanda is a Distinguished Scientist and Executive Director of the joint SLAC-Stanford Battery Research Center. He is also an adjunct professor in Materials Science and Engineering Department, Stanford University and Scholar at the Stanford’s Precourt Energy Institute. Dr. Nanda is an international leader in the area of battery and energy storage materials and systems and previously worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Ford Motor Co. He is a Fellow of Electrochemical Society (ECS), Materials Research Society (MRS) and National Academy of Inventors.
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Johanna Nelson Weker
Johanna Nelson Weker
Dr. Johanna Nelson Weker is a lead scientist at SLAC. Her group's research focuses on synchrotron-based X-ray characterization of materials and systems far from equilibrium. Her work spans a range of topics including electrochemical energy storage, catalysis, and additive manufacturing. In addition to a leading a vibrant research group, she helps run the transmission X-ray microscopy on beamline 6-2 at SSRL. Dr. Nelson Weker graduated in 2005 with a B.S. in mathematics and physics from Muhlenberg College, a small liberal arts college in Allentown, PA. In 2010, she received a Ph.D. in physics from Stony Brook University on Long Island, NY, where she studied Coherent Diffractive Imaging (CDI) with X-rays, a microscopy technique that eliminates the need for X-rays lenses. Since then, Dr. Nelson Weker has been working at SSRL, first as a postdoc using x-rays to study Li-ion batteries under operating conditions and now as a staff scientist in the Materials Science Division at SLAC.
Berkeley Lab
Marcus Noack
Marcus Noack
Dr. Marcus Noack earned his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the University of Oslo in 2017, with a focus on theoretical and numerical methods for wave propagation and constrained optimization. He joined Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory as a postdoctoral researcher the same year and subsequently advanced to Research Scientist and Staff Scientist positions. Dr. Noack’s research centers on uncertainty quantification, stochastic processes, random fields, and scalable function approximation with a focus on decision-making under uncertainty. He has made substantial contributions to autonomous and optimal data-acquisition methodologies, particularly through the development of advanced Gaussian process algorithms, including a world-record–scale implementation. He received the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Early Career Achievement Director’s Award in 2022. His primary software framework, gpCAM, was recognized with an R&D 100 Award in 2024.
UC Berkeley & Berkeley Lab
Kristin Persson
Kristin Persson
Prof. Kristin Persson is a materials scientist whose research focuses on data-driven materials design and understanding. She develops methods that incorporate machine-learning, experimental information and computational databases to predict material properties, understand and predict synthesis and characterization to accelerate innovation. Persson has pioneered the data-driven design of materials for batteries, photovoltaics, and catalysis, and more recently has advanced fundamental understanding of interfacial solid-liquid and solid-solid reactivity using machine-learning, reaction networks and kinetics in model amorphous interfaces. Her research has enabled the Materials Project, a global open-access resource for materials data, analysis and machine learning.
She is the Daniel M. Tellep Distinguished Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at UC Berkeley and also the Division Director of the Molecular Foundry at Berkeley Lab. She is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Science, class of Chemistry. She mentors students in computational materials science, chemistry and sustainable energy.
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
An Phan
An Phan
ION Storage Systems
Elizabeth Santori
Elizabeth Santori
Dr. Santori is the VP of Research & Development at ION Storage Systems and has conducted battery R&D and testing across multiple technologies, for both the US Government and within the private sector. In her previous role with the USG, Dr. Santori managed application testing for custom prismatic Li-ion cells, which will directly translate to the evaluation of ION’s solid-state cells for the critical requirements of the U.S. military. As a Staff Scientist at Lockheed Martin, she worked on the development of an advanced grid scale battery, leading technical cross-company efforts in battery testing and materials evaluation. Dr. Santori served as a Fellow at ARPA-E in the U.S. Department of Energy, identifying technology opportunities beyond current investments and assisting leadership in launching new funding areas in solar and electrochemical technologies. Dr. Santori received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from Caltech in 2012.
UC Santa Barbara
Jeff Sakamoto
Jeff Sakamoto
Prof. Jeff Sakamoto, a widely recognized battery expert who came to University of California, Santa Barbara in 2024 from the University of Michigan, with three decades of research experience in the field of electrochemistry, holds the Mehrabian Endowed Chancellor’s Chair at UCSB and is director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Mechano-Chemical Understanding of Solid Ion Conductors Energy Frontier Research Center (MUSIC). Sakamoto, who has developed Li-ion batteries for the NASA 2003 Mars Exploration Rovers and ceramic electrolytes for advanced electrochemical technologies, now works as part of a collaborative group of UCSB faculty whose research is aimed at developing next-generation batteries.
The Pennsylvania State University
Feifei Shi
Feifei Shi
Prof. Feifei Shi currently serves as Assistant Professor of Energy Engineering in the John and Willie Leone Family Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University. She holds courtesy appointments in the Material Science and Engineering and Mechanical Engineering Departments at Penn State. Shi’s research interests lie broadly at the intersection of surface chemistry, material science, and mechanical engineering, with an emphasis on integrated energy systems, e.g. catalysis, battery, and nuclear energy systems.
She holds a B.S. degree in chemistry from Fudan University, China in 2010, and a Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 2015. Before joining Penn State on August 2019, Shi was a postdoctoral researcher in the Material Science and Engineering department at Stanford University from 2016-2019. Shi received awards including 2023 NSF CAREER Award, 2022 J&J WiSTEM2D Scholar by Johnson & Johnson, 2021 George H. Deike, Jr. Research Grant, and 2019 Virginia S. and Philip L. Walker Faculty Fellow at Penn State University. The author of 55 articles (h-index 38) and one book chapter, she serves as the guest editor for Frontiers in Energy Research, Energy & Environmental Materials (EEM) and the editorial board of Energy Materials.
Talk Title: Thermodynamics of Solvation Process in Liquid Electrolytes
Abstract:
Corelating solvation structure and thermodynamic properties with transport properties serve as the foundation for electrolyte design. While various physicochemical properties, such as relative solvating power, solvation energy and spectroscopies have been used to study Li+ solvation, fundamental investigations in thermodynamic properties of solvation equilibrium across broad temperature ranges are still lacking.
In this work, we combined temperature-resolved Infrared and Raman spectroscopies to systematically pinpoint the dynamic evolution of Li+-solvent and Li+-anion local coordination in typical ether and carbonate electrolytes. We identified a trend of temperature-driven equilibrium among electrolyte components. By quantifying the temperature-responsive mean coordination number and ionic species concentrations, we reveal a preferential CIP association in carbonates compared to ethers. Gibbs free energy changes in diverse electrolytes exhibit a strong correlation with their respective Li⁺ transference number. The thermodynamic properties of solvation equilibrium can serve as new descriptors for quantifying dynamic solvation structure and facilitate the precise extraction of transport properties across a broad spectrum of battery electrolytes.
Form Energy
Matthew Suss
Matthew Suss
Dr. Matthew Suss obtained his PhD in 2013 in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University. From 2010-2013, Matthew was a Lawrence Scholar at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and from 2013 to 2014 a Postdoctoral Associate in Chemical Engineering at MIT. From 2014-2023, Matthew directed the Cleantech Innovations Lab at Technion, as an Associate Professor affiliated with Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, the Grand Technion Energy Program (GTEP) and Grand Water Research Institute (GWRI). In 2023, Matthew joined the team at Form Energy to push forward the development of decarbonized electrochemical grid-scale energy storage solutions.
Matthew served as a member of the Israel National Research Center for Electrochemical Propulsion (INREP), on the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE) working group on electrochemical engineering, and is a past Chairman of the International Working Group on Capacitive Deionization & Electrosorption (CDI&E). He has co-authored over 70 journal papers in the fields of electrochemical systems theory and electrochemical energy and water systems and is the recipient of several research awards including the Alon Fellowship from the Israeli government and an ARCHES award from the German government.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Bishnu Prasad Thapaliya
Bishnu Prasad Thapaliya
Dr. Bishnu Prasad Thapaliya received B.S. (2004) & M.S. (2012) degrees in Chemistry from Tribhuvan University (TU) Kathmandu, Nepal, and M.S. (2016) degree in Physical Chemistry from University of Akron, OH, USA (2016). He completed Ph.D., in Polymer Chemistry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in 2020. He is now a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Nanomaterials Chemistry Group, Chemical Sciences Division, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. His research interests include synthesis/tailoring of materials including ionic liquids, solid/composite polymer electrolytes, functional materials for energy storage and conversion.
Dr. Bishnu Prasad Thapaliya has results-oriented synthetic chemist/electrochemist/material scientist with a proven track record in synthesis, formulation, and purification of molten salts for graphitization, ion separation, and energy storage, and synthesis of electrode materials (anode, cathode, and electrolytes- both liquids and solid polymer electrolyte) for energy storage technology. He has also authored 37 peer-reviewed conference/journal papers.
UCLA
Sarah Tolbert
Sarah Tolbert
Prof. Sarah Tolbert is a professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at University of California, Los Angeles. Research in her group focuses on self-organized nanoscale materials and includes both organic templated inorganic phases and colloidal materials. Current work in her group is aimed at understanding and controlling structure and periodicity in complex nanostructured composite materials, and in exploiting that periodicity for a range of structural, optical, and electronic materials applications. Projects in Prof. Tolbert’s group range from examination of nanoscale phase transitions in surfactant templated inorganic solids to the designed assembly of electro-active composite materials. Professor Tolbert’s honors include a National Science Foundation Early CAREER Development Award, the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, a Beckman Young Investigator Award, and an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship.
Sandia National Laboratories
Loraine Torres-Castro
Loraine Torres-Castro
Dr. Loraine Torres-Castro joined Sandia in 2016 to conduct research and development into the safety and reliability of batteries under abusive conditions. The abuse testing work Loraine conducts evaluates batteries well outside of manufacturer recommended specifications and the severity of any catastrophic thermal runaway. Her work in the Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory is focused on understanding the mechanisms that lead to energy storage system safety incidents, and developing mitigation strategies for single-cell and system failures. Loraine has innovated abuse testing by targeting problems using a predictive approach (early detection for intervention) to eliminate failure rather than reacting to it. Her work has led to developments on advanced abuse testing, including a fundamental understanding of cell failure to facilitate the design of safer energy storage systems. Her expertise and commitment to safety science have led to multiple cross-collaborations among sponsoring organizations, including the Department of Energy (Office of Electricity and the Vehicle Technologies Office), Department of Transportation, and NASA. On behalf of the Vehicle Technologies Office, her team developed and maintains the US Advanced Battery Consortium (USABC) Battery Abuse Testing Manual, widely used by car manufacturers to evaluate new technologies. Loraine is also a member of the USABC, for which she provides technical advice and recommendations. She is recognized as a battery safety expert, as demonstrated by invited talks and high visibility of peer-reviewed publications. In addition, Loraine actively mentors on energy storage challenges and professional leadership both in English and Spanish at the University of Puerto Rico, her alma mater.
Boise State University
Claire Xiong
Claire Xiong
Dr. Hui (Claire) Xiong joined the faculty of the Micron School of Materials Science and Engineering at Boise State University in 2012. Her current research interests focus on the synthesis, characterization and development of advanced functional nanomaterials for sustainable energy systems. She came to Boise after a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Nanoscale Materials at Argonne National Laboratory, where she worked on the development of novel nano-architectured electrode materials for energy storage and conversion.
Dr. Xiong holds a Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry and Electrochemistry from the University of Pittsburgh, and a B.E. in Applied Chemistry and an M.S. in Inorganic Chemistry, both from East China University of Science and Technology in Shanghai. Dr. Xiong also spent a year as a postdoctoral fellow at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) in Harvard University where her research involved electrochemical characterization of micro-fabricated cathode materials for micro-solid oxide fuel cells
Talk Title: Development of Mn-Rich Positive Electrode Materials for Sodium Ion Batteries
Sodium ion batteries (SIBs) are considered as an appealing candidate owing to the abundance and low cost of raw materials, with large deposits of Na, Mn, Fe, and Ti located in the continental US. Positive electrodes play the most critical role for the overall energy density, operating voltage, and cyclability in SIBs. However, the insufficient electrochemical performance of conventional positive electrodes remains one of the primary challenges preventing the widespread adoption of sodium battery technology. In this talk, I will introduce our recent work at the Electrochemical Energy Materials Laboratory (EEML) related to the development of Mn-rich layered oxide positive electrode materials for SIBs. We hope to provide some perspectives regarding the promises and challenges in developing these materials.
SES AI
Kang Xu
Kang Xu
MRS Fellow, ECS Fellow, emeritus ARL Fellow and one of the world's leading researchers in electrolyte materials and interfacial science. Dr. Kang has published more than 350 papers in this field, with an h-index of 118, and has been recognized with many awards for the discovery of new electrolyte materials as well as understanding of the fundamental mechanisms.
University of Houston
Yan Yao
Yan Yao
Yan is currently the Hugh Roy and Lillie Cranz Cullen Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He is an internationally recognized leader in the field of electrochemical energy storage, particularly known for his pioneering work on battery chemistries beyond lithium-ion. His research focuses on the intersection of electrochemistry and materials science. He specialize in multivalent, solid-state and aqueous batteries designed to improve safety and reduce environmental impact. Dr. Yao serves as the Thrust Co-Lead in DOE’s Energy Storage Research Alliance (ESRA) as well as Principal Investigator for several flagship battery programs, including the Battery500 Consortium, the Low-cost Earth-abundant Na-ion Storage (LENS) Consortium, Vehicle Technology Office’s Battery Materials Research program, and three ARPA-E projects. Dr. Yao authored over 170 research papers and has received numerous awards, including the 2025 Edith and Peter O’Donnell Award in Engineering from TAMEST, Texas Academic Leadership Academy Fellow (2023), Senior Faculty Research Excellence Award from the University of Houston (2022), Highly Cited Researchers list by Clarivate Analytics (2021), Scialog Fellow on Advanced Energy Storage (2017), and the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award (2013). He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and a senior member of both the National Academy of Inventors and the IEEE. He holds 12 issued U.S. patents and has co-founded two start-ups.
Talk Title: All-Solid-State Batteries: Bridging Fundamental Science and Scalable Manufacturing
Abstract:
All-solid-state batteries (ASSBs) represent a paradigm shift in energy storage, offering the potential to surpass the safety and energy density limits of conventional liquid-electrolyte-based lithium-ion systems. However, realizing commercially viable ASSBs requires overcoming formidable hurdles in interfacial stability and large-scale processing. In this talk, I will detail our group’s recent advances in addressing these bottlenecks through a multi-scale approach. I will first discuss the application of operando scanning electron microscopy (SEM) to directly visualize the dynamic evolution of buried interfaces. These studies provide rare, real-time insights into crack propagation within composite cathodes and void formation at the Li–electrolyte interface under realistic operating conditions. To address these mechanical instabilities, I will introduce a strategy utilizing low-hardness, "creep-type" electrodes designed to accommodate microstructural changes without the need for high external stack pressure. Finally, I will highlight our progress in ASSB manufacturing, specifically focusing on how understanding lithium transport in percolating mixed ionic–electronic conductor (MIEC) interlayers can unlock high-performance, anode-free ASSB manufacturing.
Northeastern University
Hongli (Julie) Zhu
Hongli (Julie) Zhu
Dr. Hongli (Julie) Zhu is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at Northeastern University. Her research focuses on sulfide-based all-solid-state batteries (ASSBs), with emphasis on interfacial phenomena, lithium nucleation and growth, and chemo-mechanical coupling governing stability in all solid state batteries. Her group develops a mechanistic understanding through operando studies for all solid-state batteries. In parallel, her lab advances biomass-derived sustainable materials, cellulose-based functional materials, and roll-to-roll manufacturing. From 2012-2015, She worked at the University of Maryland as postdoctoral research associate, focusing on the research of nanocellulose and energy storage. From 2009 to 2011, she conducted research on materials science and processing of biodegradable and renewable biomaterials from natural biomass at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden. In energy storage, her group at Northeastern University works intensively on all-solid-state batteries, flow batteries, and alkali metal ion batteries, such as Li+, Na+, K+ batteries. Visit her group webpage.
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