Energy Experts

From biofuels to batteries, UW–Madison has a wealth of expertise in energy. The researchers working in energy at UW–Madison are generating the knowledge and clean technologies that will accelerate a transition to sustainable, resilient, and affordable energy systems. This resource connects you to UW–Madison faculty conducting research in all areas of energy. If you are a UW–Madison faculty member working in energy and would like to be added to this list, please email communications@energy.wisc.edu

For specific media requests, please contact Mary Blanchard.

Name/Email Title/Department Research Interests

Mutlu Özdogan

ozdogan@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Associate Professor of Forest & Wildlife Ecology
College of Agricultural & Life Sciences, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies

  • Remote sensing
  • Land-use and land-cover change
  • Hydrology
  • Climate change

Morgan Edwards

morgan.edwards@wisc.edu

Affiliate

Assistant Professor of Public Affairs
La Follette School of Public Affairs

  • Just transitions, fossil fuels, and stranded assets
  • Leaks in natural gas distribution systems
  • Measuring impacts of local climate action
  • Negative emissions technologies
  • Valuing impacts of non-CO2 emissions

Mikhail Kats

mkats@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Dugald. C. Jackson Faculty Scholar
College of Engineering

  • Optics and photonics
  • Nanoscience and nanotechnology
  • Optical materials
  • Thermal radiation
  • Metasurfaces
  • Thin-film optics
  • Device physics
  • Human vision

Michael J. Wagner

mike.wagner@wisc.edu

Investigator

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Coupled energy systems modeling and simulation
  • Renewable electricity generation technology performance characterization and software tool development
  • Energy storage dispatch optimization 
  • High-temperature power generation technology design
  • Concentrating optics

Michael G. Thomas

michael.thomas@wisc.edu

Affiliate

Professor of Bacteriology, Alfred Toepfer Faculty Fellow
College of Agricultural & Life Sciences

  • Antibiotic discovery and development
  • Metabolic engineering

Michael Ferris

ferris@cs.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Jacques-Louis Lions Chair and Stephen C. Kleene Professor of Computer Sciences
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Development of modeling tools and software
  • Problem analysis routines, data manipulations, and solution visualization procedures
  • Theory and applications of optimization
     

Michael Corradini

corradini@engr.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Wisconsin Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics, Former Director of the Wisconsin Energy Institute
College of Engineering

  • Multi-phase fluid mechanics and heat transfer
  • Fission and fusion reactors
  • Nuclear reactor safety
  • Severe accident phenomena
  • Power plant operation and design
  • Energy policy
  • Nuclear fuel cycle

Michael Casler

mdcasler@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Research Geneticist, U.S. Department of Agriculture
College of Agricultural & Life Sciences

  • Genetics and breeding of perennial forage, biofuel, and turf grasses
  • Genetics of plant traits related to nutritional value, cell-wall structure, cell-wall degradation, and bioenergy conversion; pest resistances; stress tolerances
  • Quantitative and molecular genetics
  • Evolution and domestication of perennial grasses

Michael Arnold

msarnold@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Materials Science & Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Carbon nanotubes
  • Atomically thin sheets of graphene
  • Two-dimensional materials
  • Semiconducting molecules and polymers
  • Heterostructures that integrate these components with conventional, macroscopic materials

 

Mary Blanchard

mary.blanchard@wisc.edu

Investigator

WEI Associate Director
Wisconsin Energy Institute

  • Energy policy and regulation
  • Energy research collaboration
  • Energy stakeholder networks

Martin Zanni

zanni@chem.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

V. W. Meloche-Bascom Professor of Chemistry
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Two-dimensional infrared (2D-IR) spectroscopy
  • Two-dimensional white-light (2D-WL) spectroscopy and microscopy
  • Two-dimensional sum-frequency generation (2D-SFG) spectroscopy
  • Amyloid formation
  • Ion channels and membrane proteins
  • Energy transfer of solar cell materials
  • Aggregation of crystallin proteins
  • Wide-field femtosecond infrared imaging

Mark H. Anderson

manderson@engr.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Consolidated Papers Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Salts, liquid metals, supercritical water (SCW), supercritical CO2 (SCO2) 
  • Supercritical fluids
  • Brayton cycle for nuclear, solar and fossil advanced power generation
  • Fluoride-cooled nuclear reactors
  • Salt chemistry, purification, and materials compatibility. 

Mark Finster

mark.finster@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor Emeritus
School of Business

  • Sustainable strategy, design, and improvement of complex systems in a wide variety of industries and sectors, including for profit, government, education, not-for-profit, large and small organizations

Marisa Otegui

otegui@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Botany and Genetics
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Cell biology
  • Intracellular membrane traffic
  • Cytokinesis
  • Endosperm development

Mario F. Trujillo

mtrujillo@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Liquid sprays in a crossflow
  • Liquid breakup and particle advection dynamics
  • Multiple droplet impingement heat transfer
  • Two-phase flow heat transfer numerics
  • Computational characterization of plunging of liquid jets on a quiescent pool
  • Interface capturing methods 

Marcel Schreier

mschreier2@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Richard H. Soit Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Electrified interfaces
  • Electrochemical energy storage
  • Electrocatalysis
  • Interfacial charge transfer

Manos Mavrikakis

emavrikakis@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Paul A. Elfers Professor, James A. Dumesic Professor, & Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of Chemical & Biological Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Thermodynamics
  • Kinetics and catalysis
  • Surface science
  • Computational chemistry
  • Electronic materials
  • Fuel cells applications
  • Environmental chemical engineering

Luke Mawst

ljmawst@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Semiconductor lasers
  • Metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) growth of semiconductors
  • III/V compound semiconductor materials and devices

Luca Mastropasqua

luca.mastropasqua@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Energy storage technology
  • Fuel cells
  • Hydrogen production
  • Decarbonization of heavy industries
  • Electrochemically-derived fuels and products

Lori Sakk

sakk@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Director, Wisconsin Public Utility Institute

Line Roald

roald@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Assistant Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Modeling, optimization and control of energy systems
  • Integration of renewable energy and resilience to uncertain events
  • Stochastic optimization

Linda Graham

lkgraham@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Botany
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Algal/plant-microbe symbioses
  • Metagenomics & genomics
  • Wastewater remediation

Kyoung-Shin Choi

kschoi@chem.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Chemistry
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Synthesis of semiconductor electrodes for solar energy conversion
  • Catalyst development for solar fuel production
  • Electrochemical and photo-electrochemical biomass conversion
  • Development of materials for electrochemical water desalination

Kurt Feigl

feigl@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Professor of Geoscience
College of Letters & Sciences

  • Tectonic applications of geodesy
  • Measuring and modeling crustal deformation from earthquake faults, volcano activity, glacier loads, and fluid extraction.
  • Geodetic measurement techniques
  • Numerical modeling approaches

Kumar Sridharan

kumar@engr.wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Grainger Professor of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics
College of Engineering

  • Nuclear reactor materials research and development
  • Emerging and commercial surface engineering technologies
  • Conventional and advanced materials characterization and analysis techniques
  • Materials applications, challenges, and solutions for a broad spectrum of industrial applications

Kevin Myers

kmyers2@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Assistant Scientist
Wisconsin Energy Institute

  • RNA-seq, ChIP-seq, Tn-seq, TSS-seq data
  • Metagenomic and metatranscriptomic data
  • Bioinformatics
  • Development of computational pipelines and tools

Katherine (Trina) McMahon

trina.mcmahon@wisc.edu

Investigator

Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering
College of Engineering

  • Water quality
  • Freshwater sciences
  • Wastewater treatment
  • Microbiology
  • Nutrient removal
  • Water quality modeling
  • Limnology

Kaiping Chen

kchen67@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Assistant Professor of Life Sciences Communication
College of Agricultural & Life Sciences

  • Civic engagement in sustainability policymaking
  • Climate justice
  • Computational social science
  • Discourse on controversial and emerging technologies
  • Science communication

Juliana Pacheco Duarte

pachecoduarte@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Assistant Professor of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics
College of Engineering

Nuclear energy
Safety analysis 
Multi-phase flow and heat transfer
Nuclear policy and regulation

Joy Altwies

altwies@wisc.edu

Energy Expert

Faculty Associate/Program Director of Engineering Professional Development
College of Engineering

  • Green and High-Performance Buildings
  • Sustainable Construction
  • Building Commissioning, Commissioning Process
  • HVAC & R Systems
  • Technology Innovation and Adoption