Energy research at Mizzou runs from how power is made to how much industry actually needs — hydrogen and biomass as fuels, the thermal systems that keep reactors and data centers running, the electronics and controls that move electricity across the grid, and the efficiency of the plants that consume it. Faculty from engineering, chemistry and agriculture work across the whole path.
Generation
Xiangqun Zeng
Professor, Chemical and Biomedical Engineering; Chemistry
Hydrogen production and hydrogen leak and emission sensing
Wes Bernskoetter
Professor, Chemistry
Catalysis that converts carbon dioxide into commodity chemicals
Caixia (Ellen) Wan
Associate Professor, Chemical and Biomedical Engineering
Biomass conversion and carbon materials, including algae-based routes from CO₂ to biopolymers
Jaime Barros-Rios
Assistant Professor, Plant Science and Technology
Bioenergy crops and poplar lignin engineering for biorefinery conversion
Felix Fritschi
C. Alice Donaldson Professor in Bioenergy Crop Physiology and Genetics, Plant Science and Technology
Switchgrass adaptation and the physiology and genetics of bioenergy crops
Jay Thelen
Professor, Biochemistry
Raising the oil content of cover crops so they can be harvested for biofuel
Cooling and transfer
Chanwoo Park
Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Two-phase cooling for data centers and electric motor thermal management
Directs the Heat Transfer and Sustainable Energy Laboratory
Yue Jin
Assistant Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Reactor thermal hydraulics and two-phase flow boiling
Yuwen Zhang
Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Thermochemical energy storage and multiscale thermal modeling
Yao Zhai
Assistant Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Radiative thermal management
Bill Ma
Curators’ Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Phase-change heat transfer and thermal management
Transmission
Mert Korkali
Associate Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Power grid modeling, including quantum computing approaches to power flow and state estimation
Qingyun Huang
Assistant Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Power electronics, silicon carbide devices and power modules
Taesic Kim
Associate Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Smart power conversion and cyber-physical security for next-generation grids
Efficiency
Sanjeev Khanna
Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Industrial energy efficiency
Directs the Department of Energy’s Midwest Industrial Assessment Center, which delivers no-cost energy assessments to manufacturers across the region