Evan Lerner
Eric Stach, professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) and Faculty Chair of the Nanoscale Characterization Facility at the Singh Center for Nanotechnology, has been named director of the Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter (LRSM), effective July 1, 2020.
Prior to joining the Penn faculty in 2017, Stach held positions at the National Center for Electron Microscopy at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, at the Center for Functional Nanomaterials at Brookhaven National Laboratory and was a professor at Purdue University. He is also Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Hummingbird Scientific, a nanotechnology firm that develops advanced instrumentation for nanoscale characterization, and serves as Secretary of the Board of Directors of the Materials Research Society.
Stach is a pioneer in the development of advanced in situ and operando imaging and characterization techniques, which enable functional materials to be analyzed on the smallest scales while in the environments they normally work. The broad range of applications these techniques can inform have led Stach to collaborate with researchers from multiple departments and Schools.
“Eric’s experience in leading large research programs, skills at crossing disciplinary and organizational boundaries to facilitate research here at Penn, and international recognition in the materials science community make him an ideal leader to take the LRSM into the future,” said Dawn Bonnell, Penn’s Vice Provost for Research and Henry Robinson Towne Professor in MSE.
The LRSM was established in 1960 as one of the nation’s first interdisciplinary materials research centers and, for 60 years, has been the center for materials research at Penn. With well over fifty active members, it facilitates collaborations among faculty from different departments and Schools and promotes links to partners across industry, government, academe, and society at large.