Available Ph.D. Position in Electrochemical Materials for Summer / Fall 2025 

Özgür Çapraz, Ph.D.
Performance of materials for electrochemical energy storage and conversion systems

Department Website: https://cbee.umbc.edu/faculty/ozgur-capraz/

Lab website: amee.umbc.edu

Available Ph.D. Position in Electrochemical Materials

Job Description:

Overview: We are looking for a motivated student who can start in Fall 2025 semester in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical and  Environmental Engineering at the University of Maryland - Baltimore County (UMBC). Ph.D. student will investigate chemo-mechanical nstabilities in electrochemical materials for environmental remedy and energy storage, in collabration with Dr. Teng from Worcester Polytechnic University. Detailed project descriptions and planning will be undertaken directly with the successful candidate. Students with Chemical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science, Chemistry or Physics background are encouraged to apply.

Our Offer: The student will develop exceptional skills and expertise in the areas of electrochemistry, defect chemistry, mechanics of materials, and material fabrication during his/her studies.

The student will learn operando techniques to monitor stress /strain evolution in the electrodes. The selected candidate will present their work at international conferences such as AlCHE and ECS.

About Our Group: Advanced Materials & Electrochemistry for Energy (AMEE) Research Group is established by Prof. Ozgür Çapraz and is recently relocated to Chemical, Biochemical and Environmental Engineering in the University of Maryland Baltimore County. The group has been funded by various agencies such as NSF, DOE, NASA, Air Force, and BSF. Students in our group has published in high impact factor journals such as Advanced Energy Materials, Nano Letters and J. Power Sources. The group alumni are currently working as either scientists in Universities, National Laboratories or engineers in battery companies. For more information about the group, please visit, https://amee.umbc.edu/.

About the University: University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is a top-ranked university with an inclusive culture that connects innovative teaching and learning, research across disciplines, and civic engagement. The university is located in the suburb of vibrant Baltimore city. The location offers direct access to wonderful outdoor activities (beaches, mountains, forest and state parks), museums in DC - Baltimore area and international airports. Also, it is close to
government agencies and industrial companies.

How to Apply: Interested candidates are encouraged to send their CV, transcript and a short cover letter to amee@umbc.edu with the title of “Application to PhD position in AMEE Lab”. Please follow the application guideline as described in the department website (see below).

Application details:

Deadline for Ph.D. programs: January 7
Application fee waivers: available by emailing cbeegrad@umbc.edu
Contacting an potential advisor: Students interested in applying are welcome to reach out directly to the faculty members whose research aligns with your specific research interests. Applicants are not required to secure an advisor prior to applying to the program for Fall admission. Applicants should identify which faculty they would like to work with in your 'Statement of academic goals and research interests'

More details on Application process: https://cbee.umbc.edu/academics/graduate-application/

Yonathan Zohar, professor of marine biotechnology, has received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Fish Endocrinology. Zohar’s work at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor has produced fundamental discoveries in fish reproductive biology and applied the findings to the aquaculture industry, resulting in major advances. In 2020, the Binational Agricultural Research Development (BARD) Fund, a partnership program between the U.S. and Israel, also recognized Zohar for the outsize economic impact of his research. 

In addition to  Zohar’s core work in fish reproductive physiology, he has led a decades-long effort to develop land-based aquaculture methods that could bring fresh seafood to inland areas of the United States. Land-based fish production operations avoid pitfalls of open-water aquaculture such as disease, polluted water, and escapes. Land-based aquaculture could also limit the need for long-distance seafood transportation.

Maryland Farm and Harvest on Maryland Public Television (MPT) recently featured Zohar and his colleagues’ work. The aquaculture industry is the world’s fastest growing sector of agriculture, Zohar told MPT. American demand for seafood is rising, and currently, most of it is imported. With a $10 million grant from the USDA, Zohar has been working with team of scientists and government and industry stakeholders from the U.S. and abroad to help move land-based aquaculture toward commercial viability. 

“We here at IMET, at the Aquaculture Research Center [ARC], are trying to address all these challenges, bottlenecks, hurdles to this industry so it can become economically feasible as well as—obviously as much as possible—environmentally responsible,” Zohar told MPT. 

Addressing aquaculture’s hurdles

One of those hurdles is figuring out how to bring salmon to market size year round. Typically, salmon only reproduce once per year, Zohar explained. “We are using environmental manipulation to phase shift—to change the time of the spawning of the fish—so the farmer can get good quality eggs all year round,” he said. The team at the ARC has had success spawning salmon six months after their typical spawning time, Zohar told MPT, as a tray of red-orange salmon eggs spawned at IMET showed on the screen. And “if you can do it six months, you can do it four months, three months, all year round,” he said.

Another challenge to land-based systems is the accumulation of sludge—otherwise known as fish poop—in the tanks. Kevin Sowers, professor of marine biotechnology and a microbiology expert, explained that as the water in the fish tanks passes through a filter to be reused, bacterial colonies living on the surface of what look like pieces of wheel-shaped pasta break down the sludge. One of the products is methane gas.

“The goal here is to get rid of that waste, reduce it, and turn it into a product that can be used,” Sowers said. “And the product we produce, the biogas, will actually help power about 10 percent of the energy costs here in the facility.”

Still swimming along

All of these advances represent years or decades of effort by Zohar, Sowers, and additional colleagues to first understand the fundamentals of fish biology and reproduction, and then to find ways of tweaking it that serve the aquaculture industry and address the rising consumer demand for fish. 

Zohar may have been doing this for a while, but with the industry on what feels like the cusp of a breakthrough, his continued enthusiasm for his work was obvious on Maryland Farm and Harvest.

“For someone who has been working on aquaculture for over 40 years, well, I have a lot of energy still to make sure that we make this happen,” Zohar told MPT—“that we stop overfishing our oceans and we satisfy the increasing demand of seafood in the United States and in the world.”

BEYA STEM Career Fair (FREE --Both In-Person or Virtual)

Friday, February 14, 2025

Saturday, February 15, 2025

Time: 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Registration Deadline: Tuesday, February 11, 2025

Open to ALL Students (undergraduate and graduate)

Jobs--full-time, part-time, internships and graduate admissions

This event is sponsored by Career Communications Group (CCG) and is part of their large annual conference, which will be held at the Baltimore Convention Center. Representatives from major corporations and universities will be available to meet with students pursuing careers in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) fields as well as Business, Finance, and Marketing. Why should you participate?

•       FREE Career Fair (in-person & virtual options)
•       Career seminar options
•       On the spot job offers
•       Networking with recruiters
•       Learn and network with the country's best and brightest STEM minds

Registration is required. Your registration will give you access to the in-person and online Career Fairs. The UMBC Career Center will provide a free shuttle bus to the Career Fair on Friday. If you would like to take the free shuttle bus, you must register with both BEYA and the UMBC Career Center by Tuesday, February 11th.

•      To register, please follow the instructions at: https://careers.umbc.edu/beya 

Please be sure to upload your resume at the time of registration.

 Contact Diane Crump-Fogle (crump@umbc.edu) or Chrisi Giannakaris (chrisig@umbc.edu) at the UMBC Career Center for additional information.