Research Focus Areas
& Key Applications

New and better-understood nanomaterials are at the forefront of making more affordable, higher-performing, and environmentally sound systems for energy production and storage. Some of our faculty's work includes truly recyclable Li-ion batteries, improved solar and motion harvesting, higher-output supercapacitors for transportation, and grid load-balancing.

Diamond materials in microelectronics are a critical topic at the overlap of Materials Science and Electrical Engineering, and MSNE is partnered with Rice's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering to explore the frontier of this emerging field.

Materials Science makes the most progress when theorists provide both targets for research and explanations of or predictions about phenomena. Our department is a world leader in theory, modeling, and computational work at the nano, micro, and macro scales.

Composites and polymers are both traditional in the sense of being a mainstay of the materials that make modern life possible. They are also leading-edge in allowing the world to do brand-new things in aviation, space exploration, and consumer products. Our labs provide a constant flow of breakthroughs in this domain, where progress in nanoscale engineering often finds its first application.

Rice researchers in quantum materials take some of the most recent advances in physics and use them to explore the nature of materials in extreme conditions. The practical application of these discoveries may end up advancing the fields of electronics and sensing — to name just two important areas.

Additive Manufacturing has moved from the experimental realms — and even the hobbyist — to that of practical industrial use. Our research aims to make further progress in this emerging area. The promise of additive manufacturing includes producing vital replacement parts in remote locations (including interplanetary space), enabling industries to reduce costs through smarter parts inventory, and designing parts and machines that aren't possible to fabricate through traditional means.

Catalysts are essential to modern chemical and biological processes — in manufacturing, food production, environmental remediation, and more. Our faculty's research projects in catalysis are aimed at improving processes in chemical production, production of nanoscale materials, etc.

Although virtually all of our faculty in the Department of Materials Science and Nanoengineering are involved in electron microscopy, it is Yimo Han who is most focused on this area. Her research is expected to get the most out of the resources in our Advanced Microscopy Center.