People

Timothy (Tim) was born in Boulder, CO, at a very early age. With ambitions of becoming a pyrotechnics engineer, he set off to the Colorado School of Mines after graduating high school. This particular field of study was not offered in the curriculum, so he settled for the closest major (Chemical Engineering) and obtained a B.S. in 2004. Staying on at Mines for a Ph.D. (2008), he studied gas hydrates with Prof. E. Dendy Sloan where he developed a passion for novel energy materials, molecular compounds, thermodynamics and spectroscopy.

In 2008 Tim joined the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution of Washington as a Carnegie Postdoctoral Fellow. During his postdoc he became fascinated by high-pressure science. In 2010 he was appointed Research Scientist, then Staff Scientist in 2011. He is trying to make new materials with advanced properties using high- pressure techniques.

Curriculum Vitae

When Tim is not in the lab, he can be found in the mountains, on the water, or above the snow.

Li Zhu joins the lab from the University of Basel. Li is working on the development of a reaction pathway prediction methods to predict reaction pathways and transition states. He is also interested in crystal structure and transition state predictions under high pressure.

Curriculum Vitae

Wan Si Tang is working to synthesize metastable materials using molecular precursor-based pathways. Prior to GL, Wan Si was a postdoctoral associate at the Department of Material Science and Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park; and a guest researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, with Dr. Terrence J. Udovic from the NIST Center for Neutron Research. Wan Si's research interests also include materials chemistry, energy storage materials, hydrogen storage, electrochemical storage, novel materials, diffraction (neutrons and x-rays/synchrotron), and Rietveld refinements.

Tom is working on the synthesis and characterization of new forms of silicon, specifically, the optical and electrical characterization of a newly developed silicon allotrope, Si24. Tom's research interests include high-pressure materials science and new materials synthesis, and materials characterization.

Javier Rojas is a Research Engineer supporting the lab. He creates and modifies lab instruments, keeps track of lab inventories and turns rough ideas into working parts. Rojas holds a Masters in Mechanical Engineering from Florida International University. He has professional experience with microelectronic controls, design optimization, 3D modeling and simulation.

Arani is a student from the Badding Group at PSU.