Pore-scale modeling of viscous fingering in porous media (2019)
This video comes from a computational benchmark study comparing many different simulation techniques for modeling pore-scale flow. In the video, a low-viscosity fluid (e.g. water) is displacing a high-viscosity fluid (e.g. oil) in a porous medium defined by the gray circular posts. In this particular example, the injected fluid is non-wetting and the capillary number is large. The result is the growth of a beautiful fractal structure.
Phase-field modeling of electrodeposition (2015)
I developed a phase-field model that accurately captures many of the experimentally observed features of electrodeposition, including fractal dimension and tip velocity and radius of curvature. This work shows how to coarse-grain microscopic physics in order to simulate experimental length and time scales. The video on the right shows a simulation of zinc dendrite growth during electrodepsition from an aqueous electrolyte. Read more…
Postdoctoral Associate, MIT Department of Chemical Engineering (2010-2012)
Supervisor: Martin Z. Bazant
I developed phase-field methods for electrochemical systems, with a focus on modeling the phase-separating battery material lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4). This work inspired the development of new in situ experimental imaging techniques and changed our understanding of a class of important battery materials. This video shows the formation of stripes in LiFePO4, which for in finite-size crystals as the result of elastic strain energy. Read more…
MIT Press Release: Revealing how a battery material works
MIT Department of Materials Science & Engineering (2004-2010)
Thesis Advisor: W. Craig Carter
I developed a thermodynamic phase-field model for systems with an arbitrary number of components and phases, and used to the model to study microstructure evolution in ternary eutectics. The addition of a third phase leads to the formation of complex morphology, as shown in this video. Read more…
PhD Thesis (2010): A phase-field study of ternary multiphase microstructures
Northwestern University Department of Materials Science & Engineering (2002-2004)
Undergraduate Advisors: Peter W. Voorhees, Katsuyo Thornton
I was first introduced to phase-field modeling as an undergrad at Northwestern, where I wrote phase-field simulations of quantum dot growth with anisotropic interfacial energy.