I was born at a “Water Town” in the south of China. I got my BS/MS degree at the Harbin Institute of Technology (located at the “Ice City”, Harbin) in Materials Science in 2008. In 2008 summer, I came to Northwestern University (lying in the “Windy City”), where I am pursuing my Ph.D. degree.
My research is focused on the fabrication and characterization of ferromagnetic Ni-Mn-Ga shape memory foam. Recently, our research group has demonstrated that polycrystalline Ni-Mn-Ga foams show medium to large Magnetic field-induced strain (MFIS, ~0.1-3%), because pores reduce incompatibility strains and facilitate the mobility of martensitic twin boundary, especially if struts in the foam are nearly monocrystalline (bamboo structure). Our Ni-Mn-Ga foams are fabricated by the infiltration method. Their MFIS is tested at Boise State University. Neutron diffraction will be done at Los Alamos national lab in order to get a complete determination of the texture and help elucidate the details of the twinning mechanism, eventually allowing us to design optimized foams displaying a high MFIS.
