Yan Yao
About Yan Yao
Dr. Yan Yao is the Cullen Professor of Engineering at the University of Houston. He received his Ph.D. degree in Materials Science and Engineering from UCLA and conducted postdoc research at Stanford University. He joined the University of Houston in 2012 as an Assistant Professor, promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2017, and Full Professor in 2020. Dr. Yao’s research focuses on scientific and technological gaps in battery landscape unmet by today’s Li-ion batteries, including inexpensive earth-abundant domestic supply chain with a diverse set of novel materials and chemistries, and understanding battery failure mechanisms through operando characterizations. He served as an expert reviewer for the DOE Battery Hub and Office of Electricity Energy Storage Program. His research group has been funded by federal agencies (DOE, ARPA-E, NSF, ONR) and industry with over $12M. He has authored more than 120 papers in Nature Energy, Nature Mater. etc. with over 28,000 total citations, 10 granted US patents, and delivered 140 keynote and invited talks. He received several awards for his research, including the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate Analytics, Scialog Fellow, and Cullen College of Engineering Professorship. Yao is a Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry, a Senior Member of National Academy of Inventors and IEEE. He co-founded two spin-offs from his research.