What area of research does your lab focus on?
Our lab explores the fundamental surface science of complex materials, focusing on three main pillars: (1) tribology and tribochemistry, (2) silicate glass surfaces, and (3) biopolymers and natural materials.
In tribology, we look beyond bulk material properties to understand how ever-changing chemistry and mechanochemical reactions at the sliding interface govern friction and wear. This fundamental understanding has direct, real-world implications for designing ultra-low-friction systems, improving energy efficiency, and developing advanced lubricants for extreme environments. For silicate glasses, we study the intricate interplay of mechanical, chemical, and optical properties of glass surfaces, such as how humidity and adsorbed water dictate wear and invisible subsurface damage. This knowledge is critical for manufacturing stronger display glasses, durable building materials, and even optimizing nuclear waste immobilization. In the realm of biopolymers, we pioneered the use of Sum Frequency Generation (SFG) spectroscopy to non-destructively map the 3D hierarchical structure, polarity, and orientation of nanomaterials like cellulose in plant cell walls and crystalline nano-domains in silk fibers. This breakthrough is vital for the effective utilization of lignocellulosic biomass as a renewable energy resource and for developing sustainable, bio-based functional materials.
How does the interdisciplinary aspect of your research enhance your work and add value to it?
My career path has been quite unconventionally interdisciplinary. My educational background is in physical chemistry, and my early research focused on ultra-high vacuum surface science related to catalysis. However, I now teach and work in the Department of Chemical Engineering, and our research explores drastically different frontiers: tribology (a subject perhaps more well-known in mechanical engineering), silicate glass (usually considered in materials science disciplines), and plant cell walls (also called lignocellulose biomass by engineers).
The crux of these seemingly disparate programs is the fundamental understanding of surface science and characterization principles, and the application of those principles to research fields that desperately need such expertise—even though they may be outside the comfort zone of my past training. In doing so, we have been able to question assumptions that others have taken for granted, propose new alternative hypotheses, and improve existing theories.
Because we tackle such complex, multifaceted problems, interdisciplinary collaboration is absolutely essential. We work closely with computational researchers for things like density functional theory (DFT) calculations, molecular dynamics (MD) simulations with reactive force fields, and continuum theories to bridge the gap between our experimental spectroscopic observations and theoretical models. Furthermore, our work on natural materials relies heavily on deep collaborations with plant biologists to understand how our structural findings regarding cellulose relate to actual biological functions and plant growth.
How does your lab enhance your student's education? Are there any ways that someone might find surprising?
We place a massive emphasis on understanding the physics and chemistry behind characterization techniques, rather than just following standard protocols. In today's landscape, advancements in instrumentation and AI-powered search engines have made techniques readily available and easy to use. However, this often leads to students treating these tools as "black boxes"—simply comparing peak positions with literature values without knowing the underlying optical and physical principles. This frequently leads to widespread misinterpretations in scientific literature. What might surprise people is how much time we spend "un-learning" bad habits found in published papers. Our students are trained to rigorously question data interpretation, ensuring they become true scientists who can accurately process and evaluate data, rather than just machine operators. To help them, I recently wrote a textbook, Surface and Interface Analysis – Principles and Applications, to teach students how analysis principles are built upon basic chemistry, physics, and math that they have studied in college.
From the Students
How has the experience working in this lab helped with your education?
Students often describe their experience in the lab as a shift from learning concepts to thinking like scientists. Many initially find research overwhelming due to the tight coupling between spectroscopy, molecular structure, and theory. Through hands-on work, they learn to break complex problems into smaller, manageable questions and to analyze data in a structured and logical way. A key realization is that no single experimental technique can fully explain a system; methods such as XPS, Raman, XRD, and SFG each provide partial insight, requiring careful interpretation and validation through theory, simulation, and comparison across approaches. This process helps students move beyond simplified classroom models and develop the ability to reason through differences between experiment and theory.
At the same time, the lab emphasizes independence, communication, and intellectual ownership. Students become more confident in presenting ideas, discussing interpretations, and questioning assumptions. In several cases, this has led to original contributions, for example, identifying new variables in theoretical models and designing experiments that resulted in publications. Collaboration is also approached as shared problem-solving rather than simple exchange, including interdisciplinary work such as linking spectroscopic measurements of cellulose structure to biological function. Overall, students highlight growth in critical thinking, practical problem-solving, and the ability to connect fundamental science to real-world systems.
How do you engage with industry, and create connections and collaborations? What are the benefits for both sides - your research and for the company?
We actively engage with industry by demonstrating how fundamental surface science studies have direct, tangible impacts on industrial processes. For example, we collaborate with Corning to study silicate glass surfaces, investigating how surface chemistry, water adsorption, and cleaning histories impact the durability and electrostatic charging of display glass surfaces. We also work with Axalta on the fundamental surface analysis of clearcoats used to protect automobile surfaces. Additionally, we are exploring tribochemistry at electrified surfaces to understand tribofilm formation under electrical current flow conditions—a critical challenge for the rapidly growing electric vehicle (EV) market—in collaboration with Syensqo.
For the companies, the benefit is gaining access to cutting-edge, molecular-level insights that explain why a material behaves a certain way during an industrial process, rather than just observing that it happens. For our lab, these collaborations are invaluable because they provide us with highly relevant, complex material systems to study. It ensures that our fundamental scientific inquiries do not just live in academic journals, but actively solve persistent, real-world manufacturing and technological challenges.
I’d like to share a quote by the eminent physicist Wolfgang Pauli: "God made the bulk; the surface was invented by the devil." To that, I would like to add: “We are solving this devil’s puzzle."