image: Laboratory University Collaboration Initiative (LUCI) Defense-Unviversity
Credit: Daria Bodnaruk
WASHINGTON — Seven U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) researchers were named Laboratory-University Collaboration Initiative (LUCI) fellows for the class of 2025 in a Defense Department (DoD) announcement Nov. 18.
LUCI fellowships engage prominent university researchers and their students, immerse them in the DoD research environment, and support collaborative efforts addressing the DoD's long-term basic research priorities. The program funds scientific research, facilitates shared mentorship for students and junior scientists, and brings the expertise of world-class academic researchers to the DoD laboratories.
“The LUCI grants provide an important avenue for DoD researchers to collaborate with the world’s most forward-thinking, cutting-edge academic research groups in transformative scientific research,” said John Russell, Ph.D., NRL Chemistry Division superintendent. “Engaging with researchers of this caliber will have tremendous impact of the future of DoD research careers and capabilities.”
Adam Dunkelberger
Adam Dunkelberger, Ph.D., is the NRL Materials Dynamics Section head. He received a LUCI grant for his proposal, Highly Anisotropic Materials for Tailored Nonlinear Optical Responses. It focuses on a collaborative effort with Professors Josh Caldwell at Vanderbilt University and Tony Heinz at Stanford University to unravel mysterious aspects of the optical behavior of new nanomaterials designed by Caldwell’s MURI (Multidisciplinary University Initiative) team. Dunkelberger and the MURI team expect that these materials will open radically new paths for photonic and quantum applications.
Dunkelberger began his career at NRL as a National Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow in 2014 after completing his doctorate in Physical Chemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research interests lie at the intersection of chemical physics, photonics, and materials science, focusing on the ultrafast dynamics of optical materials. He was a 2017 Jerome and Isabella Karles Fellow, recipient of the 2017 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, and 2023 recipient of the Sigma Xi NRL-Edison Chapter Young Investigator Award.
John Lyons and Alexander Efros
John (Jack) Lyons, Ph.D., NRL Center for Computational Materials Science, and Alexander (Sasha) Efros, Ph.D., Senior Scientist for Theoretical Materials Science at the Materials Science and Technology Division, received a LUCI grant for their work on Infrared tin-germanium alloys for safe, sustainable, and frequency-tunable quantum materials.
Lyons, a physical scientist, joined NRL in 2016 after a post-doctoral fellowship at the Center for Functional Nanomaterials in Brookhaven National Laboratory. He has a doctorate in Materials at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and his Bachelor of Science in Materials Science and Engineering at University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research interests include understanding the role of defects and dopants in semiconductor materials and elucidating the electronic structure of ultrawide-bandgap semiconductors and other novel electronic materials using first-principles methods. He was previously awarded a LUCI Fellowship with Dr. Sasha Efros in 2018, and also won the NRL-Edison Sigma Xi Young Investigator Award in 2021.
Efros, a senior scientist research physicist, joined NRL as a federal employee in 1999. He received his doctorate from St. Petersburg Technical University in 1978. From 1973 to 1981, he was a junior researcher at the Pozitron Corporation, Leningrad, and from 1981 to 1990 a senior researcher at the A. F. Ioffe Institute of the Russian Academy of Science, Leningrad. From 1990 to 1992 he had a position of a German Physical Society senior researcher at the Physics Department of the Technical University of Munich, and for 1992-1993 he was a Visiting Scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA. From 1993 to 1998 he was a scientist with SFA located at NRL.
Efros is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and Material Research Society. He is recipient of E. O. Hulburt Annual Science Award, awarded by the NRL; E. F. Gross Medal, awarded by the D. S. Rozhdestvensky Optical Society; Dolores M. Etter Top Navy Scientists and Engineers of the Year Award; Humboldt Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists; and R.W. Wood Prize of the Optical Society of America (with L. E. Brus and A. I. Ekimov) for the “discovery of nanocrystal quantum dots and pioneering studies of their electronic and optical properties.”
Kirubel Teferra
Kirubel Teferra, Ph.D., NRL System Design and Integration Section head, received a LUCI grant for his work titled Multiscale, Multifidelity Models for Control and Optimization in Additive Manufacturing. His research focuses on improving the predictive capability and reliability of physics-based modeling and simulation methods that solve the governing system of equations describing the mechanics of material response to environmental forces.
Teferra, a mechanical engineer, works on a breadth of applications pertaining to computational mechanics with a focus on theory and algorithm development to improve predictability and reliability of simulations. His areas of expertise include micromechanics, biomechanics, and probabilistic methods. He received his doctorate from the department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at Columbia University in 2011. Before joining NRL, he held positions as a research engineer at Weidlinger Associates and a postdoctoral fellow in the department of Civil Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Edwin Antillon and Noam Bernstein
Edwin Antillon, Ph.D., and Noam Bernstein, Ph.D., both from NRL Theory of Advanced Functional Materials Section, received a LUCI grant for their work titled Atomistic Mechanisms of Hysteresis in Shape Memory Materials. Their collaboration will focus on the atomic-scale processes that dissipate energy during the transformation, preventing them from changing shape or causing damage after multiple cycles. Understanding these limitations from the atomic scale will allow for the improvement of the properties of shape-memory materials, leading to entirely new classes of materials
Antillon, a research physicist, earned his doctorate from Purdue University in 2012, focusing on systems near criticality. Before joining NRL in 2019, he worked at the Air Force Research Lab under the Materials and Manufacturing Directorate, where he studied fundamental deformation mechanisms in metallic alloys using atomistic simulations. His research interests include developing atomistic-scale computational methods for phase exploration and design of novel structural and functional materials.
Bernstein, a research physicist, received a Bachelor of Science in Applied Physics and Engineering and Applied Sciences from Caltech in 1992 and a doctorate in Applied Physics from Harvard University in 1998. He spent two years at NRL as a National Research Council postdoc and remained as a research physicist since 2000. He uses computer simulations to understand a wide range of materials and properties, including functional materials for electronics, optics, and energy storage, as well as strength and fracture of structural ceramics and metals. His current work focuses on the development and application of machine-learning interatomic potentials to chemically and structurally complex materials. He has over 125 publications with over 8500 citations, an h-index of
46, has received four NRL Berman publication awards and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society Office.
Michael Swift
Michael Swift, Ph.D., Theory of Advanced Functional Materials Section received a LUCI grant for his work titled Quantum Embedding for Quantum Defects in Wide-Band-Gap Semiconductors.
Swift, a research physicist, earned his doctorate in physics in 2018 from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and was hired as a staff scientist at NRL in 2023. Swift's research expertise lies in first-principles and multiscale modeling of materials, with a focus on semiconductor defect systems and their potential applications in quantum information science.
“The recognition of our scientists with these prestigious awards underscore their exceptional capabilities and drive to advance our understanding of fundamental science to create innovation for our warfighters,” said Virginia G. DeGiorgi, Ph.D., NRL Materials Science and Technology Division superintendent. “Their achievement highlights NRL’s role as the Navy’s premier performer for transformative discoveries.”
About the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory
NRL is a scientific and engineering command dedicated to research that drives innovative advances for the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps from the seafloor to space and in the information domain. NRL is located in Washington, D.C. with major field sites in Stennis Space Center, Mississippi; Key West, Florida; Monterey, California, and employs approximately 3,000 civilian scientists, engineers and support personnel.
For more information, contact NRL Corporate Communications at (202) 480-3746 or nrlpao@us.navy.mil.