When NASA’s PRIME-1 Mission landed on the moon in March, an Intuitive Machine’s lander named Athena ended up on its side. The faulty landing meant the instruments couldn’t drill into the moon to measure water and other resources, as intended. But the mission wasn’t a total loss: PRIME-1’s The Regolith Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain (TRIDENT) and Mass Spectrometer Observing Lunar Operations (MSOLO) could still operate and gather some data. The mission, led by Georgia Tech alumni who collaborated with Georgia Tech faculty, is already pivotal to future NASA missions.

PRIME-1, or Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment-1, is a combination tool of two instruments: TRIDENT and MSOLO. PRIME-1’s objective is to help scientists determine resources available on the moon, with the eventual goal of sending humans to live there. TRIDENT is a space-rated drill designed and built by Honeybee Robotics that can extract lunar soil up to 3 feet deep. MSOLO is a mass spectrometer that can analyze TRIDENT’s soil samples for water and other critical volatiles. Together, this data can show how viable living on and mining from the moon could be.

Two Georgia Tech alumna, Jackie Williams Quinn and Janine E.  Captain, led the PRIME-1 team for NASA. They had help with computer modeling of PRIME-1’s mass spectrometer data from Georgia Tech’s Regents’ Professor Thom Orlando and Senior Research Scientist Brant Jones in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry. 

Georgia Tech to the Moon

Georgia Tech’s expertise influenced all areas of developing PRIME-1, but perhaps their biggest contribution was the collaboration across disciplines. 

Quinn, a civil engineering graduate, wrote the initial proposal. She also managed TRIDENT’s development, through a contract with Honeybee Robotics, ensuring it was also built to operate in the harsh lunar environment (a process known as ruggedizing). The team worked with Honeybee’s Jameil Bailey, fellow Tech alumnus.

Captain, the MSOLO principal investigator and chemistry Ph.D. graduate, never planned to work at NASA. But her advisor, Orlando, got her interested. 

“What drew me to NASA’s In-Situ Resource Utilization team is that I could apply the instrumentation techniques that I learned in my Ph.D.  to measuring vital things like oxygen on the moon,” Captain said. 

Ruggedization Redux

When it was confirmed in 2008 the moon had water, NASA wondered if humans could one day live there. Having a functional mass spectrometer on the moon was paramount to determining where the water was and how much of it existed. Captain’s team modified a commercial mass spectrometer and tested it in a harsh environment comparable to the moon: Hawaii’s dormant shield volcano, Mauna Kea. Once they demonstrated the mission operation in this environment, they worked to ruggedize an existing one manufactured by instrumentation company INFICON. The team worked with INFICON and through lab tests, they showed that all components of the mass spectrometer functioned in a lunar vacuum environment.  

In Orlando’s lab, his team experimented with lunar material to determine how water interacts with lunar soil. From there, they created a theoretical model that simulated how much water they might find from what PRIME-1 sampled.  

“To create the model, we used the data of how water sticks to the lunar surface — from controlled experiments carried out in our ultra-high vacuum chambers at Georgia Tech,” Orlando said. “We approached the problem from a surface physics point of view in these lab experiments, but then in our model, we were able to connect to the actual mission activity.”

Once PRIME-1 hardware validation testing was finished, NASA was ready to launch.  That’s when things got hairy.

“We don't fully understand everything that happened during the landing, but the fact that PRIME-1 was fully functional is pretty amazing,” Captain said. “We got the data. It was so cool to know that all this work we did was worth it.” 

Moon Milestones

Although they didn’t get the chance to drill into the moon as planned, they can still analyze the data PRIME-1 pulled from the lunar atmosphere. This data includes how the spacecraft may have contaminated the local atmosphere.

“PRIME-1 was the only instrument that got to fully run and check out everything because when the lander fell over, the instrument was on top,” Quinn noted. “They were able to extend the drill all the way out a meter. It was drilling into empty space, but we were able to show that the drill got the signal from Earth, fully extended, and was able to auger and percuss. We were also able to fully operate MSOLO and gather data on gases coming off the lander in its final resting orientation.” 

Lithium-ion batteries power everything from electric cars to laptops to leaf blowers. Despite their widespread adoption, lithium-ion batteries carry limited amounts of energy, and rare overheating can lead to safety concerns. Consequently, for decades, researchers have sought a more reliable battery. 

Solid-state batteries are less flammable and can hold more energy, but they often require intense pressure to function. This requirement has made them difficult to use in applications, but new research from Georgia Tech could change that. 

The research group of Matthew McDowell, professor and Carter N. Paden Jr. Distinguished Chair in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the School of Materials Science and Engineering, has designed a new metal for solid-state batteries that enables operation at lower pressures. While lithium metal is often used in these batteries, McDowell’s group discovered that combining lithium with softer sodium metal results in improved performance and novel behavior.

McDowell and his collaborators presented their findings in the paper, “Interface Morphogenesis with a Deformable Secondary Phase in Solid-State Lithium Batteries,” published in Science on June 5.

Stackable Solution

Lithium-ion batteries have been the industry standard because they combine compact size, reliability, and longevity. However, they contain a liquid “electrolyte,” which helps lithium ions move in the battery but is also flammable. In solid-state batteries, this electrolyte is a solid material that is less flammable. The challenge is that when the battery is used, the lithium metal in the battery changes its shape, potentially losing contact with the solid electrolyte, which degrades performance. A common way to ensure the metal doesn’t lose contact is to apply high pressure to these batteries.

“A solid-state battery usually requires metal plates to apply this high pressure, and those plates can be bigger than the battery itself,” McDowell said. “This makes the battery too heavy and bulky to be effective.”

The researchers, led by Georgia Tech research scientist Sun Geun Yoon, sought a solution. The solid-state batteries would still require some pressure to function, but they found that by also using a softer metal, less pressure is required. The researchers decided to pair the commonly used lithium metal with a surprising element: sodium. 

“Adding sodium metal is the breakthrough,” McDowell noted. “It seems counterintuitive because sodium is not active in the battery system, but it’s very soft, which helps improve the performance of the lithium.”

How soft can sodium be? In a controlled environment, a person could stick their gloved finger into sodium metal and leave an imprint. 

From Biology to Battery

To understand the enhanced performance of their battery, the researchers borrowed a concept from biology called morphogenesis. This concept explains how tissues or other biological structures evolve based on local stimuli. Morphogenesis is rarely seen in materials science, but the researchers found that the combination of lithium and sodium behaves according to this concept. 

McDowell’s research group has been working on applying morphogenesis to battery materials as part of a project funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in collaboration with several other universities. Their battery is among the first viable demonstrations of this concept — effectively, the sodium deforms readily at the low pressures needed for solid-state batteries to function. 

Battery Boon

The possibilities of a viable, smaller solid-state battery are vast. Imagine a phone battery that could last much longer or an electric vehicle that could drive 500 miles between charges. With this in mind, McDowell and his team have filed for a patent for this battery system.

While solid-state batteries still have some way to go before commercial use, results like these could mean that solid-state batteries can compete with lithium-ion. McDowell’s lab continues to experiment with other materials to further improve performance. 

Funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Space researcher. Materials scientist. Entrepreneur. And Yellow Jacket. The only thing missing on Jud Ready’s resume is “astronaut.” Not for lack of trying, though. Ready had hoped earning his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in materials science and engineering at Georgia Tech would lead him to a spot in NASA’s Astronaut Corps. Instead, it’s led him to the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), where his passion for space is alive and well.

1. What about space fascinates you? 
It all goes back to my dad being interested in space. In first grade, we went to a how-to-use-the-library class, and I came across a book about the Mercury and Apollo astronauts. I checked it out and renewed it over and over again. I eventually finished it in second grade. So, I’ve had a lifelong commitment since then to space.

2. What drew you to engineering? 
I grew up in Chapel Hill. In that same first grade class, we went to the University of North Carolina chemistry department. My mom is really into roses, and they froze a rose in liquid nitrogen then smashed it on the table. It broke into a million bits, and I was like, “What?!” The ability of science to solve the unknown grabbed me. And I had a series of very good science teachers — Mr. Parker in fifth grade, in particular. Then I took a soldering class in high school. We built a multimeter that I still have and still use, and various other things. And I suddenly discovered and started exploring engineering. Plus, I just like making things.

3. How did your career change from hoping to be an astronaut to being an accomplished materials engineer? 
When I started looking at colleges, that was my primary interest: What school would help me become an astronaut the quickest. I applied to Georgia Tech as an aerospace engineer, but was admitted as an undecided engineering candidate instead. It was the best thing that could have happened. Later, I got hired as an undergrad by a professor who was doing space-grown gallium arsenide on the Space Shuttle. Ultimately, they offered me a graduate position. I accepted, because I knew you needed an advanced degree to be an astronaut — and for a civilian, a Ph.D. in a relevant career such as materials science.

I applied so many times to be an astronaut — every time they opened a call from 1999 until just a few years ago. Never got in. But I was successful at writing proposals and teaching. So I started doing space vicariously through my students, writing research proposals on energy capture, such as solar cells; energy storage, such as super capacitors; and energy delivery like electron emission. They’re all enabled by engineered materials.

4. What makes Georgia Tech and GTRI a key contributor to the future of humans and science in space? 
Georgia Tech offers us so many unfair advantages over our competition. The equipment we’ve got. The students. You’ve got the curiosity-driven basic research coupled with the GTRI applied research model. We’ve had VentureLab and CREATE-X. Now we’ve got Quadrant-i to foster spinout companies from research.  

5. One of your solar cell technologies is headed to the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum. What is it? 
Early in my career, we developed a way to texture thin film photovoltaics to allow for light trapping. Inverted pyramids are etched into silicon wafer-type solar cells so a photon of light has a chance to hit different surfaces and get absorbed. But thin film solar cells typically don’t etch well. I thought we could use carbon nanotubes to form a scaffolding, a structure like rebar. It’s mechanically reinforcing, but also electrically conductive. We coat the thin film solar cell material over the carbon nanotube arrays. You’ve got these towers, and you get this photon pinballing effect. Most solar cells perform best when perpendicular to the sun, but with mine, off angles are preferred. That’s great for orbital uses, because the faces and solar panels of spacecraft are frequently off-angle to the sun. And then you don’t have the complexity of mechanical systems adjusting the solar arrays. So, we got funding to demonstrate these solar cells on the International Space Station three times, and those are some of the cells we provided to the Smithsonian. 

Read more on the CoE Webpage

You’re managing the Texas Panhandle’s power grid. Heavy winds are blowing, and a worn-out utility pole ignites a fire by crashing onto a transmission line. Luckily, the fire department arrives quickly, putting out the fire before it spreads to nearby cities. But the same thing may happen again with gusty conditions predicted for the next 24 hours. Should you shut off miles of power lines to reduce that risk, causing outages for thousands of residents? Should you add batteries to the grid or move some power lines underground to lessen the impact of future fires? That sounds useful, but paying for these upgrades would require raising electricity rates.

Players of the Current Crisis video game are pondering these questions, similar to professional grid managers during the Texas Smokehouse Creek fire in 2024. But the players did not purchase Current Crisis at a run-of-the-mill gaming store. They might have played it at Georgia Tech’s Dataseum, which featured the game in a recent exhibition. Or they might have helped develop it in weekly meetings with Daniel Molzahn, associate professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and EPIcenter initiative lead. 

“Current Crisis started as a computer simulation I programmed in Summer 2020 for a senior-level course I taught that fall,” says Molzahn. “My students had to dispatch crews to maintain or repair a simplified model of the Georgia power grid. In the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, each dispatch had a risk of infection and quarantine, which meant losing the crew for the rest of that round. The students had a fixed budget to balance two competing goals: operating a power system with minimal outages and keeping the repair crews healthy.” 

The class project was popular, and its scope began to grow. Molzahn proposed turning his simulation into a video game in a July 2021 grant application to the National Science Foundation. He received the five-year award that fall and launched his “Vertically Integrated Project” on power grid gaming the following spring. It soon attracted about 35 students per semester, from sophomores to those pursuing graduate degrees in various disciplines. Most students stay for three to four semesters.

Tristan Ziegler joined the VIP as a computational media sophomore in Spring 2022 — and still works on it three years later as a professional programmer. “I found the project by searching for ‘game’ on the VIP website,” says Ziegler, who graduated in 2024. “It offered much more freedom than traditional classes but still allowed me to earn credits and grades, unlike a student organization where you volunteer your time.”

The students quickly discovered the benefits of working toward a shared goal in smaller groups, focused on coding, grid modeling, graphic design, or artistic creativity. Some volunteered to lead initiatives, such as organizing the Dataseum exhibition or the 2025 Seth Bonder summer camps, where they will teach high schoolers the basics of game programming. 

Another long-term member of the VIP team is Ryan Piansky, a doctoral student, who studies the resilience of power grids to wildfires. He combines well-known engineering tools — algorithms for finding a mathematically optimal problem solution — with historical wildfire data to evaluate grid management decisions.

“I have examined if policies based on established engineering principles help the people who need the most help, reduce the risk of outages broadly across the whole grid, and optimally allocate limited resources,” explains Piansky, who works in Molzahn's research lab. “To do that, I combine power grid models with realistic wildfire simulations to assess if those policies would likely generate desirable outcomes in a range of plausible scenarios.”

The VIP work on grid modeling has informed Piansky’s research, but the climate models he uses to mimic the spread of wildfires are too complex for a fast-moving video game. That’s why he has helped the students develop simplified versions of these models. Humidity and vegetation, for example, influence both real fires and those popping up in Current Crisis. 

Piansky’s research is part of Molzahn’s long-term goal: developing computer tools that help professional grid managers improve the grid’s resilience to natural disasters — from pandemics and wildfires to hurricanes, heat waves and floods. 

“We plan to record the choices made by Current Crisis players in crowdsourced datasets that will support our research,” says Molzahn. “By using these datasets to train machine-learning algorithms, we can harness the power of AI to develop better disaster response policies.” (The European Space Agency uses a similar gamification strategy to map moon craters.) 

The project’s benefits go well beyond these research contributions. Its educational value includes experience working in multidisciplinary teams of students at different levels and leadership development. Molzahn also hopes the game will help build public acceptance of disruptive actions during real disasters. 

“Recognizing the tradeoffs inherent in grid management is important, whether it’s understanding why power shutoffs reduce fire risks or why service restorations are time-consuming,” says Molzahn. “This may also generate broader public support for electricity rate increases and tax allocations to pay for infrastructure hardening.”

Written by: Silke Schmidt

Gaurav Doshi, assistant professor in applied economics and a faculty affiliate of the Georgia Tech Energy Policy and Innovation Center researches, among other topics, ways to make the benefits of large electrification projects more transparent.

It’s a chicken and egg situation: Should renewable energy projects launch first hoping that transmission lines to pipe generated power to distant places will follow on their heels? Or should the transmission lines be stood up first as a way to attract investments in renewable energy projects? Which comes before the other? It’s a question that has intrigued Gaurav Doshi, assistant professor at the School of Economics at Georgia Tech, for a while now. His award-winning paper about this research explores the downstream effects of building power lines.

After a bachelor’s and master’s degree in applied economics from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur, Doshi earned his doctorate in the same field from the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 2023. He explored questions about environmental economics as part of his doctoral work.

“Once I started researching energy markets in the U.S., I kept getting deeper and coming up with new questions,” Doshi says. Among the many his work explores: What are the effects of infrastructure policies and how can they help decarbonization efforts? What are some of the unintended consequences policy makers need to think about?

One of his current research projects has roots in his doctoral work. It explores how to quantify the benefits of difficult-to-quantify environmental infrastructure projects. Case in point: Decarbonization will likely lead to more electrification from renewable energy resources and will need power lines to transport this energy to places of demand. The costs for such infrastructure are pretty transparent as part of government project funding. But the benefits are less so, Doshi points out. To develop effective policy, both the costs and benefits need clear visibility. “Otherwise the question arises ‘why should we spend billions of dollars of taxpayer money if we don’t know the benefits?’”

Read Full Story on the EPIcenter Webpage

On April 29, nearly 70 attendees representing 36 organizations from industry, government, academia, and nonprofits gathered at the Middle Georgia Regional Commission for the third Georgia Partnerships for Essential Minerals (GEMs) Workshop, held jointly with the Growing Resilience for America’s Critical Mineral Economy (GRACE) Engine initiative. The workshop marked a pivotal step in the region’s critical mineral strategy, bringing together leaders across sectors to align priorities and accelerate ecosystem development.

Hosted by the Center for Critical Mineral Solutions and Strategic Energy Institute at Georgia Tech in partnership with the Middle Georgia Regional Commission, GEMs-3 highlighted the economic development potential of critical minerals through production and recycling. Critical Minerals such as rare earth elements, gallium, and graphite are materials essential for technologies ranging from electric vehicles, permanent magnets to national defense systems. Building on the industry-led conception of GEMs-1 and road mapping efforts at GEMs-2, this workshop focused on translating strategy into action, with particular emphasis on use-inspired innovation, commercialization, workforce development, community engagement, and strategic investment. 

Keynote speaker Costas Simoglou, director of the Center of Innovation for Energy Technology at the Georgia Department of Economic Development, emphasized the state’s leadership in advanced energy manufacturing and innovation. Sessions highlighted ecosystem capabilities and insights from experts at Southern Company, Chemours, Ginn Technology Group, Savannah River National Laboratory, Georgia Research Alliance, Georgia Cleantech Innovation Hub, Georgia Artificial Intelligence in Manufacturing, Technical College System of Georgia, University of Georgia, Partnership for Innovation, the Supply Chain and Logistics Institute and the Advanced Battery Center.

Yuanzhi Tang, professor at Georgia Tech and director of the Center for Critical Mineral Solutions, shared an update on the GRACE Engine initiative, which aims to develop a co-located innovation ecosystem that integrates extraction, processing and advanced manufacturing across Georgia. “The GRACE vision is to move from potential to practice,” said Tang, “by building a regional supply chain that is resilient, sustainable, built for speed and benefits all stakeholders.”

Afternoon breakout discussions brought participants together into focused groups to explore commercialization models, community advisory board structures, and pilot program priorities. Participants emphasized the importance of fast-start strategies, shared economic development, and leveraging existing regional strengths and infrastructure.

As Georgia continues to lead in kaolin mining and advanced manufacturing, the GEMs-GRACE platform stands as a model for how states can turn mineral resources and waste streams into new engines of economic opportunity.

For more information, visit gems.research.gatech.edu.

The Energy Policy and Innovation Center (EPIcenter) at Georgia Tech has announced the selection of six students for its inaugural Summer Research Program. The doctoral candidates, pursuing degrees in electrical and computer engineering, economics, computer science, and public policy, will be on campus working full-time on their dissertation research throughout the summer semester and present their findings in a final showcase. 

EPIcenter will provide a full stipend and tuition for the 2025 summer semester to support the students.

“I look forward to hosting a fantastic cohort of early-career energy scholars this summer,” said Laura Taylor, EPIcenter’s director. “The summer research program will not only help the students advance their research while engaging in interdisciplinary dialogue but also offers professional development opportunities to position them for a strong start to their careers.”

The students will work with EPIcenter staff and be provided with on-campus workshops on written and oral communications. Biweekly meetings over the summer will offer the students an opportunity to share their work, progress, and ideas with each other and the EPIcenter faculty affiliates. In addition, the students will have the opportunity to engage with programs and distinguished guests of the center. 

For students interested in presenting their research at a conference, EPIcenter also will provide travel grants of up to $600 pursuant to having their paper/presentation posted on the EPIcenter website.

"I applied to the Summer Research Program because its structure and community aligned perfectly with my summer plan on dissertation work in energy policy,” said Yifan Liu. “I aim to finalize key dissertation chapters and engage closely with peers and mentors to prepare me for the job market." 

The program offers students an opportunity to promote their work through the EPIcenter communication channels including the website, news feeds, blogs, and the SEI newsletter.

“I am very excited to spend my summer at EPIcenter exploring how battery storage entry affects competition in the electricity market,” said Maghfira “Afi” Ramadhani, one of the student affiliates selected for the summer research program. “Specifically, I look at how the rollout of battery storage in the Texas electricity market impacts renewable curtailment, fossil-fuel generator markup, and generator entry and exit.”

With a variety of backgrounds and perspectives on energy, each of the students in the summer program brings something unique to EPIcenter.

La’Darius Thomas: “My project explores the potential of peer-to-peer energy trading systems in promoting decentralized, sustainable energy solutions. I aim to contribute to the development of energy models that empower individuals and communities to directly participate in electricity markets.”

Niraj Palsule: “I intend to gain interdisciplinary insights interfacing energy transition technology and policy developments by participating in the EPIcenter Summer Research Program.”

John Kim: “I believe the EPIcenter Summer Research Program will deepen my investigation of how environmental hazards disproportionately affect vulnerable communities through research on power outage impacts and lead contamination. This summer, I hope to refine my analysis and complete research on the socioeconomic dimensions of power reliability and environmental resilience.”

Mehmet “Akif” Aglar: "I applied to the EPIcenter Summer Research Program because it offers the chance to work alongside and learn from a community of highly qualified researchers across various fields. I believe the opportunity to present my work, receive feedback, and benefit from the structure the program provides will be invaluable for advancing my research."

About EPICenter

The mission of the Energy Policy and Innovation Center is to conduct rigorous studies and deliver high impact insights that address critical regional, national, and global energy issues from a Southeastern U.S. perspective. EPICenter is pioneering a holistic approach that calls upon multidisciplinary expertise to engage the public on the issues that emerge as the energy transformation unfolds. The center operates within Georgia Tech’s Strategic Energy Institute.

Daniel Molzahn will readily admit he’s a Cheesehead.  

Born and brought up in Wisconsin, the associate professor at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering attended the University of Wisconsin, Madison, for undergraduate and graduate studies. It was also at Madison that he decided to go into the family business: power engineering. 

Molzahn’s grandfather was a Navy electrician in World War II and later completed a bachelor’s in electrical engineering. He eventually was plant director at a big coal plant in Green Bay. Molzahn’s dad was also a power engineer and worked at a utility company, focusing on nuclear power.  

It was not uncommon for family vacations to include a visit to a coal mine or a nuclear power plant. Being steeped in everything power engineering eventually seeped into Molzahn’s bones. “I remember seeing all the infrastructure that goes into producing energy and it was endlessly fascinating for me,” he says.  

That endless fascination has worked its way into Molzahn’s research today—at the intersection of computation and power systems. 

Read Full Story on the EPIcenter Webpage