silicon-based light emitter
The half-century challenge. Modern optoelectronic integration on chips needs materials that can emit light directly on a silicon platform. Group-IV semiconductors (Si, Ge) are intrinsically indirect-bandgap, with extremely low luminescence efficiency — a problem that has blocked CMOS-monolithic on-chip light sources for half a century.
A unified theory. During my PhD at the Institute of Semiconductors, I built a unified theory of why some conventional semiconductors have direct bandgaps and others indirect — explaining the mechanism on a single chemical and structural footing (PRB 98, 245203 (2018)).
Inverse design. I then did inversion design: which doping exerts a strain and pushes Ge across the indirect/direct boundary while remaining CMOS-compatible. The results was published in Nature Communications 15, 618 (2024) and is protected by a Chinese patent and a US patent application.
What it could enable. A silicon-monolithic, CMOS-compatible on-chip light source — a direct response to a core need in chip manufacturing and a concrete lever on the Moore’s-law extension problem.
I develop predictive theories of condensed matter materials and propose them for experimentalists to make. My work pairs first-principles calculations with symmetry analysis to discover new classes of materials with interesting electronic and magnetic properties. Specific material class of interests include semicondcutors and ferroic materials. My recent interest extends to integrating these methods into agentic workflows to accelerate materials discovery.
I moved to Evanston in May 2023 to join the Rondinelli Group at Northwestern University as a research associate.