MSE Seminar: MSE Faculty Spotlight - Arthur Barnard and Jun Liu

About this event

Speaker Bios

Arthur Barnard Dr. Arthur Barnard is currently an assistant professor of Physics and Materials Science and Engineering. Prior to UW, Barnard received his PhD in applied physics from Cornell University followed by a post-doc at Stanford. He is a recent recipient of a 2026 NSF CAREER award.

Dr. Barnard’s research focuses on developing and utilizing new probes that enable in situ manipulation of nanoscale quantum materials with the goal of better understanding structure-property relationships. Examples include using scanning probes to slide layered materials and to screen electron-electron interactions as well as using photonics to measure motion of nanomechanical structures.

Jun Liu

Dr. Jun Liu is the Washington Research Foundation Innovation Chair in Clean Energy, Campbell Chair of Materials Science & Engineering, Professor of Chemical Engineering, and a Battelle Fellow at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). He also serves as the Director for Innovation Center for the Battery500 Consortium, a multi-institute program supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) with the goal of developing next generation batteries. In the past, he has served as senior researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratories, Bell Laboratories and Sandia National Laboratories. He also served as the Department Manager for Chemical Synthesis and Nanomaterials at Sandia, the Thrust Leader for the Complex Materials for the Integrated Center for Nanotechnologies (CINT), Lead Scientist for Cross-Cutting Sciences for the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR), Laboratory Fellow and Division Director for Energy Processes and Materials Division at PNNL.

Jun is the recipient of the Battery Division Technology Award from The Electrochemical Society (ECS), two R&D100 Awards and the DOE EERE Exceptional Achievement Award. He is an elected member of Washington Academy of Science, a Materials Research Society Fellow, and an American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellow. He has been ranked in the top one percent of highly cited researchers since 2014 (Clarivate Analytics). He was named a Distinguished Inventor of Battelle in 2007, and was selected as PNNL's Inventor of the Year in 2012 and again in 2017.

Dr. Liu’s research focuses on developing fundamental principles to guide materials synthesis, characterization and application of advanced materials for energy, biomedicine and environment, development and deployment of new materials and technologies for electric vehicles, grid scale energy storage and modern communications.