Reza Ghodssi
Herbert Rabin Distinguished Chair in Engineering
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Institute for Systems Research
Fischell Institute for Biomedical Devices
Clark School of Engineering MATRIX Lab

Reza Ghodssi is a Distinguished Scholar-Teacher, director of the MEMS Sensors and Actuators Lab at UMD, and inaugural executive director of research and innovation for the Clark School at the University System of Maryland at Southern Maryland. Ghodssi’s research interests focus on the design and development of micro/nano/bio devices and systems for chemical and biological sensing, small-scale energy conversion, and harvesting, with applications in health care. Ghodssi is a Fellow of IEEE, American Vacuum Society, and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, has 175 journal publications and 372 refereed conference papers, and is the co-editor of the MEMS Materials and Processes Handbook published in 2011. He has nine U.S. patents issued, nine U.S. patents published, and another nine pending. Ghodssi is president of the Transducer Research Foundation, and he was the director of the Institute for Systems Research for eight years (2009–2017) and founding co-director of the Brain and Behavior Initiative—now an institute—for six years (2015–2021). Ghodssi served as chair and technical program chair of several national and international conferences, including the inaugural Denice Denton Emerging Leaders Workshop 2016, focused on helping mid-career faculty develop knowledge, skills, strategies, and critical networks.

Reinhard Radermacher, posthumous
Minta Martin Professor
Director, Center for Environmental Energy Engineering
Department of Mechanical Engineering

Reinhard Radermacher (1952–2025) was an internationally recognized expert in energy conversion systems, specializing in heat pumps, air conditioners, refrigeration, and integrated cooling, heating, and power systems. During his 42 years at UMD, his scholarship generated over 600 publications, including three books. He consistently ranked in the top 2 percent of researchers worldwide based on the number of career-long citations of his work. Radermacher disclosed 150 inventions and had 17 U.S. patents granted, making him the most prolific inventor in UMD history. In 1991, he co-founded the Center for Environmental Energy Engineering to conduct pre-competitive research in sustainable heating and cooling solutions and to empower students with the tools to succeed in the workforce. A Fellow of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), he chaired several ASHRAE committees and panels and was editor-in-chief of ASHRAE Science and Technology for the Built Environment. In 2015, he received both the Institute of Refrigeration’s J&E Hall Gold Medal and the International Institute of Refrigeration’s Gustav Lorentzen Medal.

Chunsheng Wang
Robert Franklin and Frances Riggs Wright Distinguished Chair and Professor
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering

Chunsheng Wang holds affiliations in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, the Maryland Energy Innovation Institute, and the Robert E. Fischell Institute for Biomedical Devices. He directs the Center for Research in Extreme Batteries, a research consortium that brings together U.S. government, academia, and industry partners to study batteries for extreme performance, environments, and applications. His lab studies solid-state, aqueous, and non-aqueous lithium and sodium batteries for wide applications including grid power, electric rail, and maritime transportation. He has published roughly 390 research papers, including seven in the Science and Naturejournals, with an H-index of 141 (Web of Science).

His UMD and Clark School awards include the Senior Faculty Outstanding Research Award, Invention of the Year (twice), and the Junior Faculty Outstanding Research Award. Other accolades include: The Highly Cited Researchers list by Clarivate Analytics (2018–2025) in Chemistry and Materials, the Electrochemical Society’s Battery Division Research Award, and his fellowship to the same society. Additionally, Wang is a co-founder of the energy storage company WH-Power, serves as the associate editor of the ACS Applied Energy Materials, and is a member of the advisory board for the journal Energy & Environmental Materials.

Yunho Hwang
Research Professor
Center for Environmental Energy Engineering
Department of Mechanical Engineering

Yunho Hwang is a globally recognized expert in energy efficiency and innovative energy conversion technologies within the refrigeration and air-conditioning field. In his 30-plus years at the University of Maryland, he has secured more than $25 million in research funding, mentored 67 graduate students, and advised UMD student teams in national and international collegiate design competitions, guiding them to first- and second-place finishes. Prior to joining the faculty at Maryland, he worked as a senior researcher for Samsung Electronics. Over his career, Hwang has authored 396 publications and received 21 patents. He is among the top 1% most cited in his field (Web of Science, 2016) and ranks 9th worldwide in refrigeration research (ScholarGps.com, May 2025). An ASME and ASHRAE Fellow, he served as President of Commission B1 for the International Institute of Refrigeration and subject editor for Energy. In 2023, he received the prestigious Gustav Lorentzen Medal from the International Institute of Refrigeration.

Katrina Groth
Professor, Reliability Engineering
Associate Director, Center for Risk and Reliability
Department of Mechanical Engineering

Katrina M. Groth specializes in safety, risk, and reliability analysis of energy systems. Her portfolio of research includes development of quantitative risk assessment methods to provide insights into dominant failure causes in novel hydrogen technologies, investigating prognostics and health management techniques to support reliability monitoring and diagnosis of complex systems, and creating reliability data collection frameworks and algorithms. Her work has influenced safety practices and codes and standards for hydrogen fueling stations, hydrogen storage and electrolyzers, fuel cell forklifts, gas pipelines, nuclear power plants, and more. She has been recognized with numerous awards including an NSF CAREER award, a U.S. Frontiers of Engineering award, the ASME Rising Star of Mechanical Engineering award, the Landis Young Member Engineering Achievement Award from the American Nuclear Society, and the David Okrent Award for Nuclear Safety. She has published more than 175 papers and archival technical reports, created multiple software packages, and holds two patents.

Groth is an active and engaged educator, committed mentor for her students, and an advocate for women and first-generation students in engineering. She is also a trustee for the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History in Albuquerque, NM. She brings a combination of passion, clarity, and deep real-world experience to her classes, and believes that risk assessment needs to be in every engineer's toolbox.