JENNIFER Q. LU FUNCTIONAL MATERIALS LAB
RESEARCH SUMMARY
LOW-ENERGY DRIVEN SUBMOLECULAR UNIT FOR ACTUATION AND ENERGY CONVERSION AND HARVESTING
Biological activities are controlled by highly-efficient and fully-recoverable conformational changes. Inspired by nature, we are investigating if a low-energy driven submolecular conformational change can be used for harvesting waste thermal energy and enabling heliotropism for autonomous power-free solar tracking.
HIERARCHICAL 3D FUNCTIONALIZED NANOCARBON FOR GREEN ENERGY STORAGE AND CONVERSION
We are creating free-standing hierarchical 3D electrode platforms that consist of a well-defined and reproducible 3D carbon surface grafted with engineered functional species for electrocatalysis for efficient energy conversion and energy storage.
DYNAMIC SCAFFOLD FOR STEM CELL DIFFERENTIATION
Combining near-infrared stimuli-responsive polymeric composites with optical wavefront engineering, we are developing a new platform that can impose spatiotemporally-controlled force on cells to control stem cell differentiation.
