About

Motivated by a desire to develop materials solutions to energy, health, and environmental challenges, the Perry group seeks to understand, tailor, and design functional and adaptive “solid state ionic” materials. Typically complex oxides or halides, the materials of interest can transport ions and/or electrons, catalyze reactions, and interact with their surroundings. As a result, they undergird the performance of a vast array of energy storage and conversion devices (e.g., batteries, fuel cells, electrolyzers), reactors, sensors, actuators, therapeutic agents, and electronics. We focus on atomic-scale anomalies, called point defects, and the active electrical, catalytic, optical, and electro-chemo-mechanical behavior they control.  We leverage in situ electrochemistry, bulk and thin film synthesis, and spectroscopic and structural methods in controlled environments across many length scales to achieve this vision.

Our group forms part of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and the Materials Research Laboratory at UIUC. We are grateful for this institutional and administrative support as well as for funding support from the DOE, NSF, US Army/CERL, bp-ICAM, and IIE-GIRE. Learn more about research here. See the team here.

We are committed to supporting a nurturing, vibrant community that promotes opportunities for broad demographic cohorts in STEM and to learning about and implementing best practices for the success of heterogeneous teams in research, mentoring, teaching, and outreach. The campus IDEA institute and anti-racism task force have provided lists of resources here and here.

News

Read more news here.

5/2025: A new paper on solid-state battery characterization is out in collaboration with a large portion of the MUSIC EFRC team (see papers tab).
3/2025: Congratulations to Sipei who was awarded a Yee Fellowship!
12/2024: Sipei’s paper on suppressing redox chemical expansion by leveraging interfacial reducibility was published. Congrats Sipei!