01/2023
Zuochen’s invited review on in-situ imaging of superlattices got published on Journal of Crystal Growth. Congratulations, Zuochen!
12/2022
Binbin’s work on resolving crystal growth modes of nanoparticle superlattices got accepted by Nature Nanotechnology. Congratulations to the group! Great collaboration with Erik Luijten’s group at Northwestern University.
10/2022
Lehan’s work on machine-learning based shape fingerprint for heterogeneous nanomaterials got accepted by Nanoscale. Congratulations, Lehan!
10/2022
Ahyoung’s work on symmetry-breaking patchy nanoparticles got accepted by Nature Communications. Congratulations, Ahyoung! Great collaboration with Sharon Glotzer’s group at University of Michigan.
10/2022
Shan and Jiahui’s work on chiral optically active pinwheel superlattice got accepted by Nature. Congratulations, Shan and Jiahui! Great collaboration with Nick Kotov’s group at University of Michigan.
Read the news highlight here @ ILLINOIS NEWS BUREAU.
09/2022
Wenxiang’s work on using 4D-STEM to map the oriented phase domains in cathode nanoparticles got accepted by Nature Materials. See the news story here. Congratulations, Wenxiang!
08/2022
Falon Christina Kalutantirige, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the annual fellowship competition of Chemistry Department. Congratulations, Falon!
08/2022
Oliver Lin, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the Government Scholarships for Studying Aboard from Ministry of Education of Taiwan. Congratulations, Oliver!
08/2022
Oliver Lin, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the Drickamer Research Fellowship from Chemistry Department. Congratulations, Oliver!
08/2022
Jiahui Li, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, won the PPG-MRL graduate student assistantship award. Congratulations, Jiahui!
06/2022
Prof. Chen won the 2022 Hanwha-TotalEnergies IUPAC Young Scientist Award. Read the news here. Congratulations to Prof. Chen!
03/2022
Prof. Chen won the 2022 Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research. Read the news and the interview here. Congratulations to Prof. Chen!
02/2022
Wenxiang’s invited spotlight on ACS Applied Nano Materials on particle size engineering for multivalent ion intercalation got published online. Congratulations to Wenxiang!
02/2022
Falon Christina Kalutantirige, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, got the Robert M. Joyce Travel Award from the Department of Chemistry! Congratulations, Falon!
02/2022
Zhichu’s paper on the reaction mechanism of λ-MnO2 particle cathodes in aqueous zinc-ion batteries got published on Energy Material Advances! Congratulations, Zhichu!
12/2021
Our paper on the synthetic morphogenesis of polyamide membranes got accepted by Science Advances. Congratulations to the group!
12/2021
Our invited Viewpoint on Nano Letters on “Heterogeneous nanomaterials” got published online. Congratulations to the group!
11/2021
Our group’s research was selected as the cover story of the Limitless magazine of the Grainger College of Engineering. Congratulations to the group!
09/2021
Dr. Hyosung An, postdoctoral alumni of our group, got selected as ACS PMSE Future Faculty Scholar! Congratulations, Hyosung!
09/2021
Falon Christina Kalutantirige, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, got the Chia-Chen Chu Fellowship recognizing great work from the Department of Chemistry! Congratulations, Falon!
09/2021
Ahyoung Kim, 6th-year PhD student in our group, got the College’s dissertation completion fellowship! Congratulations, Ahyoung!
06/2021
Ahyoung Kim, 5th-year PhD student in our group, won the Langmuir Graduate Oral Presentation Award! Congratulations, Ahyoung!
04/2021
Prof. Chen has been officially promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure and with the Racheff Faculty Scholarship. Congratulations to the group’s years of hard work!
04/2021
Ahyoung Kim, 5th-year PhD student in our group, got highlighted by Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. Read the “Student Research Spotlight” here. Congratulations, Ahyoung!
03/2021
Lehan Yao, 2nd-year PhD student in our group, won the Yee fellowship of the College of Engineering! Congratulations, Lehan!
12/2020
Chang Liu, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the Grad College Fall 2020 Conference Presentation Award! Congratulations, Chang!
11/2020
Ahyoung Kim, 5th-year PhD student in our group, passed her Preliminary exam. Congratulations, Ahyoung!
10/2020
Our review paper on liquid-phase TEM cinematography got accepted by Accounts of Materials Research! Congratulations to the group!
09/2020
Our paper on imaging thermal capillary waves got accepted by Nature Communications! Congratulations to the group!
09/2020
Our invited review on liquid cell TEM got published on the September issue of MRS bulletin. Congratulations to the group!
09/2020
Ahyoung Kim, 5th-year PhD student in our group, got selected as the Rising Stars in Soft and Biological Materials. Congratulations, Ahyoung!
08/2020
Johnny’s review paper on liquid-phase electron microscopy imaging of cellular and biomolecular systems got published on Journal of Materials Chemistry B! Congratulations, Johnny!
08/2020
Hyosung’s paper, “Charting the quantitative relationship between two-dimensional morphology parameters of polyamide membranes and synthesis conditions”, was selected by Molecular Systems Design & Engineering (MSDE) Editors as a HOT MSDE article. Congratulations, Hyosung!
08/2020
Wenxiang Chen won the opportunity to present in the inaugural North American Materials Colloquium Series as the representative of Illinois MatSE. Congratulations, Wenxiang!
08/2020
Falon Kalutantirige, 2rd-year PhD student in our group, won the Lester E. and Kathleen A. Coleman Fellowship from the Department of Chemistry. Congratulations, Falon!
07/2020
Our paper on machine learning got accepted by ACS Central Science! Congratulations to the group!
Read the news highlight here @ ILLINOIS NEWS BUREAU.
06/2020
Chang’s news and views on interfacial crystallization under DNA control got accepted on Nature Materials! Congratulations, Chang!
06/2020
Our paper on assembly dynamics of gold nanoarrows got accepted by Journal of the American Chemical Society! Congratulations to the group!
05/2020
Zihao Ou, 5th-year PhD student in our group, won the Racheff-Intel Presentation Award for 2020! Congratulations, Zihao!
04/2020
Cong Xu, Binbin Luo and Zihao Ou, 3 PhD students in our group, have successfully passed the thesis defense! Congratulations, Dr. Xu, Dr. Luo and Dr. Ou!
02/2020
Prof. Chen received the 2020 Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research. Congratulations to the group!
02/2020
Prof. Chen got selected as the List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by their students for her teaching of MSE 480. Congratulations, Prof. Chen!
10/2019
Hyosung was selected 2019 Hanwha Travel Award at the Emerging Junior Investigator Open Innovation Forum in the 2019 AIChE Annual Meeting! Congratulations, Hyosung!
09/2019
Our paper on liquid-phase TEM imaging of nanoparticle crystallization pathways got accepted by Nature Materials! Congratulations to the group! Read the paper. Watch the animation.
09/2019
Johnny’s paper on the mechanism of polymer assisted fragmentation and association of amyloid fibrils got published on ACS Applied Nano Materials! Congratulations, Johnny!
07/2019
Ahyoung Kim, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, won the PPG-MRL graduate student assistantship award. Congratulations, Ahyoung!
07/2019
Our paper on tip-Patched nanoprisms from formation of ligand islands got accepted by Journal of the American Chemical Society! Congratulations to the group!
06/2019
Our paper on effects of particle size on ion intercalation into cathode materials got accepted by Nano Letters! Congratulations to the group!
04/2019
Binbin Luo, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the Fall 2019 Racheff Teaching Fellowship. Congratulations, Binbin!
03/2019
Our paper on how ordering can emerge from polydisperse building blocks got accepted by Nature Communications! Congratulations to the group!
03/2019
Ahyoung Kim, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, won the MatSE Spring Fellowship in 2019. Congratulations, Ahyoung!
03/2019
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the Program in Polymers and Soft Materials (PPSM) seminar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology! Thank Prof. Rob Macfarlane for the invitation!
03/2019
Zihao Ou, 4th-year PhD student in our group, won the MatSE Spring 2019 Travel Award. Congratulations, Zihao!
02/2019
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the Topics in Bioengineering Seminar at Harvard University! Thank Dr. Joshua Grolman for the invitation!
01/2019
Our paper on unraveling the morphology–function relationships of polyamide membranes using quantitative electron tomography got accepted by ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces! Congratulations to the group!
12/2018
Our paper on the reconfigurable nanoscale soft materials got accepted by Current Opinion in Solid State and Materials Science! Congratulations to the group!
12/2018
Dr. Shan Zhou joined our group. Welcome!
11/2018
Our paper on the colloidal metal-organic framework hexapods with enhanced catalytic activity and rollable packing got accepted by ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces! Congratulations to the group!
09/2018
Chang passed the qualifying exam of MatSE. Congratulations to Chang for becoming a Ph.D. candidate!
09/2018
Dr. Hyosung An joined our group. Welcome!
08/2018
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the 256th ACS meeting symposium on “Advances in Colloid & Surface Chemistry Enabled by Cryogenic & In Situ Liquid‐cell Electron Microscopy.” Thank Prof. Matt Jones and Dr. Nathan Burrows for the invitation!
08/2018
Johnny Smith, who just finished his second year PhD in our group, got the prestigious 3M graduate student fellowship! Congratulations to Johnny!
06/2018
Prof. Chen is awarded with a Unilever Award by Division of Colloid and Surface Science, American Chemical Society and presented an invited planetary talk in the 92nd ACS Colloid & Surface Science Symposium. Thanks to Unilever and ACS for the recognition!
06/2018
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the Noble Metal Nanoparticle Gordon Research Conference. Thank Prof. Stephan Link for the invitation!
05/2018
May, 2018: Our paper on the reconfigurable polymer coating on shape-anisotropic gold nanoparticles got accepted by Macromolecular Rapid Communications! Congratulations to the group!
05/2018
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the Applied Physical Sciences in University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Thank Prof. Rich Superfine for the invitation!
05/2018
Our group receives a Defense University Research Instrumentation Program (DURIP) Award for a Nanoscopic Imaging and Analysis Platform. Congratulations to everyone!
This highly competitive award augments research capabilities at universities conducting cutting-edge research of interest to the Department of Defense. See the news report here.
04/2018
Prof. Chen gave two invited talks at the 2018 Spring MRS Meeting. Thank Prof./Dr. Hongyou Fan and Dr. Dongsheng Li for the invitation!
03/2018
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the Department of Materials Science and Nanoengineering of Rice University. Thank Prof. Jun Lou for the invitation!
03/2018
Binbin Luo, 3rd-year PhD student in our group, won the MatSE Spring 2018 Travel Award. Congratulations, Binbin!
02/2018
Prof. Chen is named Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, featured in New York Times. Congratulations to Prof. Chen!
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, with a full-page advertisement in today’s New York Times, named Qian Chen one of the 2018 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellows in Chemistry. Read the news highlight here @ ILLINOIS NEWS BUREAU.
The Sloan Fellowship recognizes distinguished performance and a unique potential to make substantial contributions to the Fellow’s field.
12/2017
Our group received the NSF CAREER award on “Imaging and Understanding the Kinetic Pathways in Shape-Anisotropic Nanoparticle Self-Assembly”. Thank NSF for the support!
10/2017
We got awarded with the ACS Petroleum Research Fund. Great thanks to ACS for the precious support!
09/2017
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk in the Department of Chemistry at Ohio State University. Great thanks to Prof. Robert Baker for the invitation and hosting!
09/2017
Dr. Wenxiang Chen and First-year MatSE PhD student Chang Liu joined our group. Welcome!
08/2017
Our paper on liquid-phase TEM imaging of how multi-valent nanoparticles polymerize got accepted by Nature Communications! Congratulations to the group!
Read the news highlight here @ ILLINOIS NEWS BUREAU.
07/2017
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at the topical workshop on “Active Matter at the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences” held at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Great thanks to Dr. Miguel Fuentes-Cabrera for the invitation!
07/2017
The Chen group gave demonstrations on “squishy soft materials” to students from Chicago Public Schools, in collaboration with the ICANEXSEL (Illinois-ChiS&E Alliance for Nurturing Excellence in STEM Education and Leadership) outreach program.
07/2017
Our paper on the polymerization-like co-assembly of nanoplates and patchy colloids got accepted by ACS Nano! Congratulations to the group!
07/2017
Prof. Chen gave talks as a keynote speaker in UK Colloids 2017, an invited speaker at the New Frontiers in Colloid Science workshop at University of Birmingham, and a keynote speaker at the 10th liquid matter conference in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Great thanks to Dr. Dwaipayan Chakrabarti (Birmingham), Prof. Stefano Sacanna (NYU), Prof. Vinny Manoharan (Harvard), Prof. Roel Dullens (Oxford) for the invitations.
06/2017
Valerie Cravens, the Science Teacher in Albuquerque High School in New Mexio, joined our group for summer research through the nano@illinois RET program. Welcome, Valerie!
06/2017
Zihao, Binbin, Johnny, Ahyoung and Brian (junior MatSE undergraduate) presented at 2017 Midwest Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics Conference (MTSM) held at University of Notre Dame.
06/2017
Johnny and Ahyoung passed their qualifying exams. Congratulations on becoming PhD candidates!
04/2017
Our paper on the geometric packing of beveled prisms got accepted by Nano Letters! Congratulations to the group! Read the news highlight here.
04/2017
Our review on seeing is believing for nanoparticle self-assembly dynamics got accepted by Accounts of Chemical Research! Congratulations to the group!
04/2017
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk for the CSI² Seminar at the Wyandotte site of BASF incorporation. Thank Dr. Josh Speros for the invitation and hosting!
03/2017
March, 2017: Juyeong, Xiaohui, Cong, Zihao and Binbin presented talks at the 2017 APS March meeting in New Orleans! Click the names for our talk abstracts.
01/2017
Prof. Chen visited Imperial College, University of Oxford, University of Edinburgh and University of Manchester under the support of Distinguished Visiting Fellowship by RAEng. Many thanks for Prof. Janet Wong, Prof. Roel Dulles, Prof. Wilson Poon, and Prof. Grace Burke for hosting! See her talk details here.
10/2016
Prof. Chen received the 2017 AFOSR YIP award. Many thanks to AFOSR for the support! See the announcement here.
10/2016
Our first paper on liquid-phase TEM imaging and modulation of nanoparticle superlattices is accepted by ACS Nano! Congratulations to the group!
09/2016
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk in the Chemical and Biological Engineering department seminar of University of Wisconsin, Madison. Thank Prof. Nick Abbott for the invitation!
09/2016
Prof. Chen was selected as The SN 10: Scientists to Watch by Science News Magazine. Read the article featuring our work here.
09/2016
First-year MatSE PhD students Ahyoung Kim and Johnny Smith joined our group. Welcome!
09/2016
Binbin passed the qualifying exam of MatSE. Congratulations to Binbin for becoming a PhD candidate!
08/2016
Prof. Chen was awarded a Distinguished Visiting Fellowship by the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) of UK. This fellowship will support her visits to UK to present our recent research and build international collaborations. Read the full story here.
07/2016
Dr. Xiaohui Song joined our group as a postdoc. Welcome!
06/2016
Dr. Nicole Ice, currently a math teacher in Wheeler High School (Marietta, GA) joined our group for the nano@illinois RET program this summer. Welcome, Nickey!
05/2016
Prof. Chen was invited to give a talk in the CNST 14th Annual Nanotechnology Workshop, Urbana, IL.
05/2016
Zihao passed the qualifying exam of MatSE. Congratulations to Zihao for becoming a Ph.D. candidate!
04/2016
Prof. Chen was invited to give a talk titled, “Surprises in nanoscale self-assembly” in CECAM workshop in EPFL, Switzerland.
01/2016
Prof. Chen was named to the 2016 Forbes 30 under 30 Science List. See the awardees and news report.
08/2015
Dr. Juyeong Kim, Zihao Ou, and Binbin Luo joined our group. Undergrads Bonan, Yuka and Brian joined our group. Welcome!
06/2015
Prof. Chen won the national American Chemical Society young investigator award, Victor LaMer award. She gave a LaMer planetary lecture titled, “Dynamics in colloidal self-assembly: From patchy spheres to anisotropic nanocrystals” at the 2015 ACS Colloids and Surface Symposium.
05/2015
Prof. Chen gave an invited talk at ICAM Annual Conference 2015 at Argonne National Laboratory, which covers the science of emergence in quantum matter, biological matter, soft matter and energy matter.
04/2015
The Chen lab officially started!
04/2014
Dr. Chen officially accepted the offer to rejoin MatSE of UIUC. The Chen group on active soft matter will continue bringing new bonds to traditionally discrete areas and finding surprises in materials science.