Xuanhe Zhao, PhD

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering and d'Arbeloff Career Development Chair, MIT

Xuanhe Zhao is Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering, and d'Arbeloff Career Development Chair. Prior to joining MIT's Department of Mechanical Engineering in Sep 2014 he was Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Hunt Faculty Scholar at Duke University. He received his PhD in 2009 from Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Science.

Zhao has received many awards including: the NSF CAREER Award (2012); Young Investigator Awards from ONR (2014), Early Career Researchers Award from AVS
Biomaterial Interfaces Division (2012); and Haythornthwaite Research Initiation
Award from ASME Applied Mechanics Division (2011)

Nonwoven Materials with Extraordinary Functions: From Tough Hydrogels to Graphene Supercapacitors

Abstract: This talk will focus the extraordinary properties and functions of nonwoven materials developed at MIT Soft Active Materials Laboratory. Two examples will be emphasized: 1.) extremely tough hydrogels with ~90% water but fracture toughness similar to car tires. 2.) Crumpled graphene papers with ~800% stretchability and ~200F/g specific capacitance. I will further discuss the potential applications of these novel nonwoven materials.