Dr. Chen’s main research interest is in the fundamental understanding of the thermodynamics and kinetics of phase transformations and mesoscale microstructure evolution in bulk solid and thin films using computer simulations. Microstructure is a general term that refers to a spatial distribution of structural features that can be phases of different compositions and/or crystal structures, or grains of different orientations, or domains of different structural variants, or domains of different electrical or magnetic polarization, as well as structural defects such as dislocations. Essentially all engineering materials contain certain types of microstructures, and our success of designing new materials is largely dependent on our ability to control them. It is the size, shape, and spatial arrangement of the local structural features that determine the physical properties of a material such as mechanical, electrical, magnetic and optical properties.

For the last two decades, Dr. Chen’s group at Penn State is particularly active in developing phase-field models for microstructure evolution during various materials processes including grain growth, coherent precipitation, ferroic domain formation, particle coarsening, domain structure evolution in thin films, phase transformation in the presence of structural defects, and effect of stress on microstructure evolution. Current research focus is on the effect of stress/strain on ferroelectric phase transitions and domain structure evolution in ferroelectric and multiferroic thin films, domain structures in ferromagnetic shape memory alloys, electrode microstructure evolution in solid oxide fuel cells and batteries, precipitate microstructure evolution in Al-, Mg-, Ti- and Ni-alloys, microstructure evolution during additive manufacturing, growth morphology of two-dimensional materials, and effect of defects such as dislocations on microstructure evolution.

Dr. Chen’s group collaborates extensively with experimentalists and with industry and national labs.