Jie Xiao

Biography

Dr. Xiao has been leading research thrusts in both fundamental research and practical applications of energy storage materials and systems to enhance grid resilience, develop new sensors and support AI centers. Dr. Xiao’s research has changed how battery research is conducted and reported in the scientific community. The protocols she developed have been broadly adopted by scientists and engineers to cross validate and accelerate innovations in energy storage. Dr.Xiao currently serves as the Deputy Director for DOE’s Innovation Center for Battery500 Consortium. She is also the Director for DOE’s Cathode-Electrolyte Interphase (CEI) Consortium. Her work has been widely reported by many media including a featured story on the Office of Science website, C&EN, R&D magazine, U.S. Department of State, Scientific American etc. She has published more than 100 peer-reviewed journal papers (Google H-index>100; citation: >50,000) and 2 book chapters. She has been named as the top 1% highly cited research by Clarivate Analytics in the field of materials chemistry many times. Dr.Xiao holds 27 patents and 3 copyrights in the field of energy storage. Seven of her patents/software have been licensed to industry.

Education

• Ph.D in Materials Chemistry, State University of New York Binghamton
• M.S. in Physical Chemistry, Wuhan University, China
• B.S. in Physical Chemistry, Wuhan University, China

Previous appointments

• Battelle Fellow, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (joint appointment: https://www.pnnl.gov/people/jie-xiao)

Research Statement

• Understand synthesis-structure-property relationship in broad energy-bearing materials by applying various scientific tools and engineering solutions
• Explore manufacturing science to accelerate technology translation from academia to market
• Identify and address scientific challenges in electrochemical energy storage systems at industry relevant conditions
  
• Electrochemical devices: from materials selections, architecture design to prototyping, testing and validation
• AI for Electrochemistry  

Current projects

Electrochemical Manufacturing

Harvest and manufacture functional materials through electrochemical approaches. 

Synthesis and Scale up of Energy-Bearing Materials

From raw materials selection, heat distribution to equipment design and manufacturing simplification, different scientific and engineering tools will be combined to provide effective solutions to reduce the manufacturing cost of battery materials. This program is in collaboration with UW and PNNL colleagues along with our industry partner.

Check one example here: https://www.energy.gov/eere/ammto/funding-selections-ammto-bto-and-oe-fy22-multi-topic-foa 

Advanced Battery Technologies

Lithium ion batteries and beyond are being studied in this lab from materials synthesis, characterization, to electrode processing, cell design and fabrication. Jie is currently leading two consortium led by DOE through her joint appointment at PNNL. There are plenty of research topics available for training students who are interested in battery technologies for broad applications from mobile electronics to grid resilience.

Cathode-Electrolyte Interphase (CEI) Consortium

Check the details here: https://www.pnnl.gov/projects/cathode-electrolyte-interphase-consortium 

Battery500 Consortium

Check details here: https://www.pnnl.gov/innovation-center-battery500-consortium

Information Commons

This newly funded project will establish a one-stop shop for information related with energy storage manufacturing from upstream materials processing technologies, middle stream processing and downstream energy products manufacturing. The team will use AI agent to accelerate this process, while ensuring the reliability of source information.

Select publications

1. 1. J.Xiao*, et al, “Assessing Cathode-Electrolyte Interphases in Batteries”, Nature Energy, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-024-01639-y
2. 2. M.S. Whittingham, J.Xiao, “Fifty Years of lithium-ion batteries and what is next?”, MRS Bulletin , 2023, 48, 1-7.
3. 3. J. Xiao*, “A granular approach to electrode design”, Science, 2022, 376, 455
4. 4. Y. Bi, J. Tao, Y. Wu, L.Li, Y. Xu, E. Hu, B. Wu, J. Hu,C. Wang, J.-G. Zhang, Y Qi, J. Xiao*, “Reversible planar gliding and microcracking in a single-crystalline Ni-rich cathode”, Science, 2020, 370, 1313-1317
5. 5. J. Xiao*, “How Lithium Dendrites Form in Liquid Batteries”, Science, 2019, 366, 426-427.
6. 6. B. Wu, R. Yi, Y. Xu, P. Gao, Y.Bi, L.Novák, Z. Liu, E. Hu, N. Wang, J.Rijssenbeek, S.Venkatachalam, J. Wu, D. Liu, X.Cao, J. Xiao, "Unusal Li2O sublimation promotes single-crystal growth and sintering" Nature Energy, 2025, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-025-01738-4
7. 7. J.Xiao*, X.Cao, B.Gridley, W.Golden, Y.Ji,S.Johnson,D.Lu, F.Lin, J.Liu, Z.Liu, H.N.Ramesh, F.Shi, J.Schrooten, M.J.Sims, S.Sun, Y.Shao, A.Vaisman, J.Yang, M.S.Whittingham, “From Mining to Manufacturing: Scientific Challenges and Opportunities behind Battery Production”, Chemical Reviews, 2025, https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemrev.4c00980

Honors & awards

• Innovation Award,Advanced Materials &Manufacturing Technology Office, US Department of Energy (2024)
• Clean Energy Education and Empowerment (C3E) Technology Research & Innovation Award, bestowed by US Department of Energy, Stanford, MIT and Texas A&M (2023)
• E.O. Lawrence Award, U.S. Department of Energy (2022)
• Lab Director’s Exceptional Scientific Achievements Award (2022)
• R&D 100 Award for Lab-on-a-Fish (2021)
• Battery Technology Award, The Electrochemical Society, (2020)
• Materials Today Rising Star Award (2020)
• Fellow, The Electrochemical Society (2020)
• Laboratory Consortium (FLC) Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer of the Suite of Fish and Wildlife Technologies to Advanced Telemetry Systems (2020)
• Researcher Award from International Automotive Lithium Battery Association (Ulm, Germany, 2019)
• Inventor of Battelle (2019)
• Contribution Award, DOE innovation Center for Battery500 Consortium (2018)
• Ronald L. Brodzinski Early Career Exceptional Achievement Award (2013)
• Zappert Award, American Chemical Society (ACS) (2008)
• Fellow, The Electrochemical Society (2020)
• Elected Member, Washington State Academy of Science (2022)

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