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Department of Materials
Engineering II, Room 1355;
Telephone (805) 893-4601
Web site: 
www.materials.ucsb.edu
Chair: Michael L. Chabinyc
Vice Chair: Stephen Wilson

Overview

The Department of Materials was conceptualized and built under two basic guidelines: to educate graduate students in advanced materials and to introduce them to novel ways of doing research in a collaborative, multidisciplinary environment. Advancing materials technology today—either by creating new materials or improving the properties of existing ones—requires a synthesis of expertise from the classic materials fields of metallurgy, ceramics, and polymer science, and such fundamental disciplines as applied mechanics, chemistry, biology, and solid-state physics. Since no individual has the necessary breadth and depth of knowledge in all these areas, solving advanced materials problems demands the integrated efforts of scientists and engineers with different backgrounds and skills in a research team. The department has effectively transferred the research team concept, which is the operating mode of the high technology industry, into an academic environment.

The department has major research groups working on a wide range of advanced inorganic and organic materials, including advanced structural alloys, ceramics and polymers; high performance composites; thermal and environmental barrier coatings as well as other engineered surfaces; organic, inorganic and hybrid semiconductor and photonic material systems; catalysts and porous materials, hydrogen storage materials; thermoelectric, magnetic, ferroelectric and strongly correlated materials; biomaterials and biosurfaces, including biomedically relevant systems; colloids, gels and other complex fluids; lasers, LEDs and optoelectronic devices; packaging systems; and microscale engineered systems. The groups are typically multidisciplinary involving faculty, postdoctoral researchers and graduate students working on the synthesis and processing, computational analysis, prediction and design, structural characterization, property evaluation, microstructure-property relationships and mathematical models relating atomic, nano- and microscale properties to macroscopic behavior. The department has close collaborations with, and a number of faculty members have joint appointments in, the Departments of Mechanical Engineering (mechanics, design and additive manufacturing), Chemical Engineering (complex fluids, biological systems, polymers), Electrical and Computer Engineering (electronic and photonic devices), Physics, Chemistry and Biochemistry, and the BMSE Program.

Five-Year Bachelor of Science Engineering/Master of Science Materials and Bachelor of Science Chemistry/Master of Science Materials Programs
A program combining a bachelor of science in chemical, electrical, or mechanical engineering, or a bachelor of science in Chemistry, with a master of science degree in materials provides an opportunity for outstanding undergraduates to earn both degrees in five years. Additional information about this program is available from the College of Engineering. Interested students should inform the Office of Undergraduate Studies in the College of Engineering or the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry of their intention to pursue this program in the beginning of the spring quarter of their sophomore year. Transfer students interested in the combined degree program should contact the undergraduate advising office at the earliest opportunity. In addition to fulfilling undergraduate degree requirements, B.S./M.S. degree candidates must meet Graduate Division degree requirements, including university requirements for residence and units of coursework as described in the section “Graduate Education at UCSB.”

Faculty

Christopher Bates, PhD, University of Austin Texas, Associate Professor
Specialization: polymer mesostructure and dynamics, energy storage, and crystallization

Matthew Begley, PhD, UC Santa Barbara, Professor
Specialization: mechanics of materials, layered and composite materials, computational mechanics, additive manufacturing and micro devices
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Irene Beyerlein, PhD, Cornell University, Professor
Specialization: structural mechanics of multi-phase micro- and nanostructured materials, design of metallic alloys
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Michael Chabinyc, PhD, Stanford University, Professor
Specialization: organic semiconductors, thin film electronics, energy conversion using photovoltaics, characterization of thin films of polymers, x-ray scattering from polymers

Raphaele Clement, PhD, University of Cambridge, Associate Professor
Specialization: electrochemical materials for energy generation and storage, solid-state NMR spectroscopy, EPR spectroscopy, first principles calculations of NMR/EPR parameters

Steven Denbaars, PhD, University of Southern California, Professor
Specialization: metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy, optoelectronic materials, compound semiconductors, indium phosphide and gallium nitride, photonic devices
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering

Dan Gianola, PhD, Johns Hopkins University, Professor
Specialization: nanomechanical behavior of materials, tunable energy conversion, micro- and nanoelectronics, thermal management, and waste heat collection

John Harter, PhD, Cornell University, Associate Professor
Specialization: quantum materials, unconventional superconductors, strongly-correlated electrons, nonlinear optical spectroscopy, angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy

Craig Hawker, PhD, Cambridge University, Professor
Specialization: synthetic polymer chemistry, nanotechnology, materials science
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

Sriram Krishnamoorthy, PhD, The Ohio State University, Associate Professor
Specialization: ultra-wide band gap semiconductors, epitaxial materials and electronic/photonic devices, metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy, Gallium Oxide

Robert McMeeking, PhD, Brown University, Professor
Specialization: mechanics of materials, fracture mechanics, plasticity, computational mechanics, process modeling, cell mechanics, functional materials
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Shuji Nakamura, PhD, University of Tokushima, Professor
Specialization: gallium nitride, blue lasers, white LEDs, solid state illumination, bulk GaN substrates

Daniel Oropeza Gomez, Assistant Professor

Chris Palmstrom, PhD, Leeds University, Professor
Specialization: atomic level control of interfacial phenomena, in-situ STM, surface and thin film analysis, metallization of semiconductors, dissimilar materials epitaxial growth, molecular beam and chemical beam epitaxial growth of metallic compounds
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering

Angela Pitenis, PhD, University of Florida, Associate Professor
Specialization: Surfaces and interfaces, soft matter physics, bio-inspired and biological materials, in situ instrumentation

Tresa Pollock, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor
Specialization: mechanical and environmental performance of materials in extreme environments, unique high temperature materials processing paths, ultrafast laser-material interactions, alloy design and 3-D materials characterization

Ananya Renuka Balakrishna, Assistant Professor

Cyrus Safinya, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor
Specialization: biophysics, supramolecular assemblies of biological molecules, non-viral gene delivery systems
Joint Appointment: Molecular, Cellular, & Developmental Biology

Jeff Sakamoto, Professor
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Omar Saleh, PhD, Princeton University, Professor
Specialization: single-molecule biophysics, motor proteins, DNA-protein interactions
Joint Appointment: Interdisciplinary Program in Quantitative Biosciences; Physics

Rachel Segalman, PhD, UC Santa Barbara, Professor
Specialization: polymer design, self-assembly, and properties
Joint Appointment: Chemical Engineering

Ram Seshadri, PhD, Indian Institute of Science, Professor
Specialization: inorganic materials, preparation and magnetism of bulk solids and nonoparticles, patterned materials
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

Jim Speck, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor
Specialization: nitride semiconductors, III-V semiconductors, ferroelectric and high-K films, microstructural evolution, extended defects, transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction

Susanne Stemmer, PhD, Max-Planck-Institut, Professor
Specialization: functional oxide thin films, structure-property relationships, scanning transmission electron microscopy and spectroscopy

Chris Van de Walle, PhD, Stanford University, Professor
Specialization: Novel electronic materials, wide-band-gap semiconductors, oxides

Anton Van Der Ven, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor
Specialization: first-principles statistical mechanics methods, phase transformation mechanisms, electrochemical behavior and mechanical properties of materials

Claude Weisbuch, PhD, Universite Paris VII, Ecole Polytechnique-Palaiseau, Professor
Specialization: semiconductor physics: fundamental and applied optical studies of quantized electronic structures and photonic-controlled structures; electron spin resonance in semiconductors, optical semiconductor microcavities, photonic bandgap materials

Stephen Wilson, PhD, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Professor
Specialization: strongly correlated electron/quantum materials, spin-orbit coupling and many-body electronic states in functional materials

Francis Zok, PhD, McMaster University, Professor
Specialization: mechanical and thermal properties of materials and structures

Emeriti Faculty

Guillermo Bazan, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

John Bowers, PhD, Stanford University
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering; Technology Management Program

Anthony Cheetham, PhD, Oxford University
Specialization: catalysis, optical materials, X-ray, neutron diffraction
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

David Clarke, PhD, Cambridge University
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Larry Coldren, PhD, Stanford University
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering

Alan Heeger, PhD, UC Berkeley
Specialization: experimental condensed matter physics
Joint Appointment: Physics

Evelyn Hu, PhD, Columbia University
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering

James Langer, PhD, University of Birmingham
Joint Appointment: Physics

Carlos Levi, PhD, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Frederick Milstein, PhD, UC Los Angeles
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

George Odette, PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Specialization: deformation and fracture, high performance materials for use in severe environments
Joint Appointment: Mechanical Engineering

Pierre Petroff, PhD, UC Berkeley
Joint Appointment: Electrical and Computer Engineering

Fyl Pincus, PhD, UC Berkeley
Specialization: soft condensed matter theory
Joint Appointment: Physics

Galen Stucky, PhD, Iowa State University
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

Fred Wudl, PhD, UC Los Angeles
Specialization: organic chemistry and optical and electro-optical properties of processable conjugated polymers as well as in the organic chemistry of fullerenes and the design and the preparation of self-mending polymers
Joint Appointment: Chemistry and Biochemistry

Affiliated Faculty

Glenn Fredrickson, PhD


UC Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California 93106
(805) 893-8000


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