Chang Receives MRI Della Roy Innovation in Materials Research Award
Cui-Zu Chang, Henry W. Knerr Early Career Professor of Physics, is one of five researchers at Penn State to be selected to receive the 2021 Rustum and Della Roy Innovation in Materials Research Award. The award is presented by the Materials Research Institute and recognizes interdisciplinary materials research at Penn State which yields innovative and unexpected results. The award exists thanks to a gift from Della and Rustum Roy, who are both alumni of Penn State’s College of Earth and Mineral Sciences and long-serving faculty in the college. Della died in March of this year at age 94.
This year’s winners were announced at the 2021 Materials Day event. Awardees from other colleges include Andrea Argüelles, assistant professor of engineering science and mechanics; Huanyu “Larry” Cheng, Dorothy Quiggle Career Development Professor of Engineering Science and Mechanics; Elena Vazquez, doctoral candidate in the Stuckeman Center for Design Computation; and Yihuang Xiong, graduate research assistant in materials science and engineering.
Chang’s group combines state-of-the-art materials synthesis such as molecular beam epitaxy and unconventional device concepts to discover emergent quantum phenomena at the interface/surface of quantum materials. The central focus is on “quantum anomalous Hall (QAH) insulators” which harbors dissipation-free “highways” for transporting electrons.
“The QAH materials help tackle global environmental challenges by revolutionizing the next generation of energy-efficient electronic and spintronic devices and providing a new coherent platform for quantum information science,” Chang said.
Chang was selected as an Emergent Phenomena in Quantum Systems Initiative (EPiQS) Investigator by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation in 2019. His awards and honors also include the Outstanding Young Researcher Award (Macronix Prize) from the International Organization of Chinese Physicists and Astronomers in 2019, the National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award in 2019, the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in 2018, the Arm Research Office (ARO) Yong Investigator Program (YIP) Award in 2018, the MIT Tech Review 35-Under-35 Innovation Award (China region) in 2018, the Young Scientist Prize from the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) in 2017, and the Switzerland Dimitris N. Chorafas Foundation Award in 2013. Chang is a member of the American Physical Society and holds five patents in both the United States and China.
Prior to joining the faculty at Penn State in 2017, Chang was a postdoctoral associate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He earned a doctoral degree in condensed matter physics at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, in 2013 and a bachelor's degree in optical engineering at Shandong University in Jinan, China, in 2007.