Mesoscale Transport and Energy Conversion
Directing thermal transport using scalable nanostructured materials
News
May 2020
Congrats to Bosun Roy Layinde on passing the doctoral candidacy exam!
March 2020
Congrats to undergraduate student (and resident hard-worker) Kevin Turaczy on receiving an NSF GRFP!
Our new publication, a book chapter in Nanoscale Energy Transport, reviews the development of thermophotovoltaic energy conversion and advancements in materials and fabrication for thermophotovoltaic devices. Congratulations to both Tobias Burger and undergraduate student Caroline Sempere!
January 2020
Lenert Lab alum Brandon Woo receives the University of Michigan’s College of Engineering Incentives Award. Congratulations Brandon!
Our new publication in ACS Catalysis, led by Alex Hill, demonstrates that thermally induced restructuring of core@shell morphologies under controlled conditions can provide a strategy for enhancing low-temperature catalytic activity.
Happy New Year from the Lenert Lab!
December 2019
Tobias Burger (4th year PhD) wins 3rd place at the LNF symposium!
PhD candidate Zach Berquist receives the Dow Sustainability Fellowship! He is one of ten exceptional doctoral candidates from six University of Michigan (U-M) schools and colleges to be part of the Dow Sustainability 2020 Doctoral Fellows cohort.
Congrats to Sean on passing the Thesis Proposal Exam!
October 2019
Our new publication in Optics Express, led by undergraduate researcher Vinod Raman, suggests a way to minimize the gap between lab and prototype efficiencies of TPV systems by making them more tolerant of parasitic absorption of light.
We are thrilled to welcome a new PhD student to the group this week: Bosun Roy!
September 2019
Alex Hill (3rd year PhD) wins 2nd place at the Chemical Engineering graduate student symposium!
May 2019
Congrats to Alex and Zach on passing their Thesis Proposal Exams with flying colors!
April 2019
A special issue of JPE on “Thermal Photonics in Energy” has been published. It includes a guest editorial by Andrej Lenert (UM), Sheng Shen (CMU) and Yi Zheng (URI) which introduces the contributions and highlights recent developments in the field.
Zach Berquist (2nd year PhD candidate) receives an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, while Michael Veksler (UG) receives an honorary mention. Congrats to both!
March 2019
Our publication in Journal of Photonics for Energy, led by Sean McSherry, looks at how near-field electroluminescence enhances the energy flux in solid-state heat engines and analyzes which heat engines benefit from near-monochromatic emission.
November 2018
Our project on robust and spectrally-selective aerogels has been selected by the Department of Energy’s Solar Energy Technologies Office.
Congratulations to Sean McSherry on receiving a poster award for his work on thermal transport in van der Waals metamaterials at the 2018 LNF Symposium!
October 2018
Congratulations to Vinod Raman for his selection to attend the Future Leaders in Chemical Engineering Symposium at @NCState!
July 2018
ACS Photonics publication, led by Tobias Burger, in collaboration with Stephen Forrest’s group, proposes strategies for enhancing the spectral selectivity of thin-film III-V thermal photovoltaics and evaluates their impact on efficiency.
Recent Physical Review Applied paper was selected as an Editor’s Suggestion. The paper, by Andrej Lenert and colleagues at MIT, Harvard, Purdue, and U-Wisconsin, describes a radiative thermal runaway phenomenon observed due to a VO2 solid phase transition.
June 2018
Journal of Optics publication in a Special issue on new materials for nanophotonics, led by Hannah Kim, proposes a new approach for radiative cooling to low temperatures using infrared-transparent nanoporous materials, and develops a model for evaluating various structures and material compositions.
May 2018
Congratulations to Alex, Sean, and Zach on passing their candidacy exams, and to Hannah and Tobias on passing their preliminary exams!
April 2018
Alex Hill receives an honorary mention from the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship program.
March 2018
Congrats to Hannah on co-authoring a publication in ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces on transparent aerogels for solar thermal energy conversion.