Uri Shumlak
Principal Investigator
Professor Shumlak enjoys working with his students to explore plasma behavior by developing high fidelity and reduced plasma models and then applying high-order numerical method to solve the associated partial differential equations. When he is not in the lab or in lecture, he can often be found on the squash court.
Graduate Students
John Coughlin
Graduate Researcher
Jack is a PhD student in Applied Mathematics. He studies spectral moment methods for the collisional Boltzmann equation. He also enjoys cooking, learning both programming and natural languages, and walking with his dog around his native Seattle.
Daniel Crews
Graduate Researcher
Daniel works on model reduction in collisionless plasmas. His favorite research topics are high-order finite element methods, waves in plasmas, Hamiltonian mechanics, and turbulence theory. Besides research, he enjoys playing guitar, astronomy, looking at clouds, and growing plants.
Iman Datta
Graduate Researcher
Iman works on the development of discontinuous Galerkin finite element algorithms for fluid and continuum kinetic descriptions of plasmas. His work also involves development of a hybrid model allowing for incorporation of physics from either model in different regions of a simulation.
Tigre Falla
Undergraduate Researcher
Andrew Ho
Graduate Researcher
Andrew researches adaptive numerical methods for modeling the behavior of plasma dynamics. He is currently focused on improving the efficiency of the numerical discretization by utilizing high-order accurate hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin and mixed implicit-explicit Runge-Kutta temporal discretization methods. He also studies methods for utilizing adaptive feedback systems to guide the progress of simulation codes as they run.
Aria Johansen
Graduate Researcher
Aria studies plasma optimization. Working with collaborators from Google and X, her goal is to increase performance and understanding of Shear Flow Stabilized Z-Pinches using multiple diagnostics, data science, and machine learning techniques. In her spare time, she likes to retreat to the mountains to climb, backpack, and ski.
Matt Russell
Graduate Researcher
Matt’s interests are in plasma chemistry, partially-ionized plasmas, writing code, and having a planet with clean air and water. There are a number of critical problems, e.g., atmospheric carbon removal, water purification and access, food safety, clean energy production, etc. that humanity needs to solve where he thinks that devices which leverage the unique advantages of plasma-based processes will be the answer. When not thinking about these kinds of devices and how to model, analyze, simulate, and design them he likes to learn computer science, watch Kitchen Nightmares, and play basketball.
Sina Taheri
Graduate Researcher
Sina works on plasma-neutral modeling in fusion devices such as Z-pinches and Tokamaks. He analyzes different time-dicretization methods with semi-implicit leap-frog algorithm in NIMROD code. As a part of his research, he studies the effects of plasma-neutral interaction in Z-pinch acceleration and Tokamak edge fueling problems.
Yu Takagaki
Graduate Researcher
Yu studies the physics of the Sheared-Flow Stabilized Z-pinch fusion reactions via WARPXM code by developing the multi-component (e.g., deuterium-tritium-helium-
Whitney Thomas
Graduate Researcher
After finishing her B.S. in mechanical engineering at the UW in ’08, she spent eight years in the marine industry doing mechanical systems design and sailing in the Merchant Marine as an engineer. She joined the CPDL in 2016, where she researches plasma-based photonic crystals in high powered applications using high fidelity plasma models.
Previous Graduate Students
- Chris Aberle
- Dr. Ammar Hakim (PPPL)
- Dr. Ogden Jones (LLNL)
- Robert Lilly (AFRL)
- Dr. John Loverich (Tech-X)
- Dr. Wes Lowrie (Albuquerque Research Associates)
- Dr. Eric Meier (William and Mary)
- Dr. Sean Miller (Sandia National Lab)
- David Osburn
- Dr. Noah Reddell (Cray)
- Dr. Eder Sousa (AFRL)
- Prof. Bhuvana Srinivasan (Virginia Tech)
- Andree Susanto (University of Waterloo)
- Prof. Bogdan Udrea (Embry-Riddle University)
- Dr. Genia Vogman (UC – Berkeley) (LLNL)
- Ward Vuillemot (Boeing)
Collaborator
Dr. Eric Meier
After earning his PhD from UW Aeronautics and Astronautics in 2011, Eric completed a postdoc at LLNL, modeling novel divertor concepts for mitigating tokamak plasma exhaust challenges. He then held research scientist positions at William and Mary and the University of Washington, studying drift effects on the tokamak edge and divertor plasma. Eric then joined Zap Energy Inc. in 2020 to participate in development of Z-pinch technology for fusion energy.