About me

I am a postdoc in the joint group of Prof. Michael Urbakh and Prof. Oded Hod at the School of Chemistry, Tel Aviv University, Israel from November, 2022. I received my Ph.D. in Mechanics, supervised by Prof. Zheng Zhong, from School of Science, Harbin Institute of Technology, Shenzhen, China, in September, 2022. My doctoral work focused on mechanical and thermal transport behaviors of two-dimensional materials and metal-organic frameworks using atomistic simulations including ab initio methods, molecular dynamics simulation and machine-learning potential approaches. In 2020, I was awarded the National Scholarships for doctoral students from Ministry of Education, China. In 2023, I was awarded the prestigious Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities (IASH) and Council for Higher Education (CHE) Excellence Fellowship for International Researchers.

My postdoctoral research will focus on cutting-edge investigations to reveal the physical origins of friction in complex interfaces of two-dimensional (2D) materials. To achieve this goal, I will develop a multiscale computational approach for studying shear dynamics of large-scale interfaces incorporating heterogeneous layered material coatings. The method will tailor the finite-elements coarse-grained simulation approach for bulk systems with physically motivated and machine-learning based classical force-fields dedicated for the simulation of layered material interfaces. The developed approach will be used to address key questions relevant to large-scale superlubricity, including friction in polycrystalline layered interfaces, corrugated surfaces, multi-contact junctions, and the interplay between bulk mechanics and interfacial friction.

Richard Feynman: ‘I, a universe of atoms, an atom in the universe’

I stand at the seashore, alone, and start to think. There are the rushing waves mountains of molecules each stupidly minding its own business trillions apart yet forming white surf in unison.

Ages on ages before any eyes could see year after year thunderously pounding the shore as now. For whom, for what? On a dead planet with no life to entertain.

Never at rest tortured by energy wasted prodigiously by the sun poured into space. A mite makes the sea roar.

Deep in the sea all molecules repeat the patterns of one another till complex new ones are formed. They make others like themselves and a new dance starts.

Growing in size and complexity living things masses of atoms DNA, protein dancing a pattern ever more intricate.

Out of the cradle onto dry land here it is standing: atoms with consciousness; matter with curiosity.

Stands at the sea, wonders at wondering: I a universe of atoms an atom in the universe.

Poem extracted from “The Value of Science,” public address at the NAS (1955).

Jennifer Doudna: you’re at a buffet table

I think you can put scientists into two buckets. One is the type who dives very deeply into one topic for their whole career and they know it better than anybody else in the world. Then there’s the other bucket, where I would put myself, where it’s like you’re at a buffet table and you see an interesting thing here and do it for a while, and that connects you to another interesting thing and you take a bit of that. That’s how I came to be working on Crispr – it was a total side-project.

Extracted from an interview.