A few days ago, Dr. Fan Donglei’s research team at Cockrell School of Engineering, University of Texas, Austin, successfully designed and assembled the smallest and fastest nanogenerator with the longest running time by using a patent technology for DC/AC electric fields. Its rotary speed, 18000rpm, equals that of a jet engine.
A paper detailing this nanogenerator has been published on Nature Communications (doi: 10.1038/ncomms4632, published 07 April 2014).
This research solved two major problems in the nanogenerator field: assembly and control. The research team assembled each part of the nanogenerator by using patent technology to be approved (invented by Dr. Fan Donglei during her study at Johns Hopkins University) and AC and DC electric fields and finally achieved a success.
Appendix: Dr. Fan Donglei’s Bio, Awards and Research Results
Fan Donglei won many prizes in national physics, biology, and mathematics competitions even when she was a middle school student.
She was admitted to the intensive class of science at Nanjing University in advance without participating in the National College Entrance Examination in 1995 and won the Freshman Scholarship. During her study at Nanjing University from 1996 to 1999, she won scholarships for excellence every year. She graduated from Department for Intensive Instruction (now renamed as Kuang Yaming Honors School), with a bachelor’s in chemistry, under the tutorship of Professor Wu Xinglong from the School of Physics of the university.
She obtained her master’s in material science from Johns Hopkins University in 2003 and another master’s in electric engineering in 2005, and then she obtained her doctorate in engineering science under the tutorship of Professor Qian Jialing in 2007. From 2007 to 2009, she worked as a post doc research fellow at Johns Hopkins University.
Her research focuses on innovative design and manufacturing of nanometer materials by using the basic performances of materials such as magnetism, optics, chemistry, and dynamics and applying these nanometer materials to biochemical sensing, single living cell stimulation, MEMS/NEMS, energy conversion, and storage devices.
She is the inventor of Electric Tweezers that can precisely control nanometer materials suspending in the water.
The research team under her leadership has achieved a series of attractive results. The team has published many papers on famous journals such as Nature Nanotechnology, PNAS, Nano Today, Physical Review Letters, Advanced Materials, and ACS Nano and has three patents to be approved.
Dr. Fan Donglei won the National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2012 and was selected as one of the 30 young engineers in America. She was invited to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) 2013 EU-US Frontier of Engineering Symposium in France. She was awarded Recognized Mentor by Siemens Foundation in 2012. She won MIT Technology Review’s TR35 award in 2010, which was only awarded talented young science and technology scholars under 35, covering such fields as IT (computers, communications, and networks), biological medicine, and business.
This award sought innovative programs and individuals, many of whom have become “men of the hour.” This award was initially named as TR100, aiming at praising 100 excellent young scholars and researchers. Since 2005, only 35 top young innovators in the world has been awarded.
In 2007, Dr. Fan received a Summer Program Fellowship from National Science Foundation (NSF) at the California Institute of Technology and the scholarship for post doctorate at Johns Hopkins University.
Dr. Fan has also been invited to be an editorial board for Nature Scientific Reports.
