Karthik Menon is an Assistant Professor with a joint appointment in the Woodruff School and the Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering. Menon graduated with a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University in 2021, where his doctoral work focused on the flow physics of fluid-structure interactions and vortex-dominated flows. Before joining Georgia Tech, he was a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Pediatrics and the Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering at Stanford University. At Stanford, he worked on computational methods for accurate patient-specific cardio­vascular blood flow simulations and uncertainty quantification. Menon’s broad research interests include fluid mechanics, computational modeling, and data-driven methods. His research aims to advance interdisciplinary technology in a wide range of healthcare, engineering and energy applications. Fluid dynamics is central to some of the biggest challenges and opportunities in these domains – such as personalized treatments for cardiovascular disease, extracting renewable energy from flowing water and wind, and developing bio-mimetic flying and swimming robots. Menon’s work tackles these challenges by uncovering new physics and combining high-performance computing with data-enabled techniques.

Anju Toor is a researcher in nanomaterials for energy systems. She was a Bakar Innovation Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, and worked on printed on-chip integrated micro batteries. She earned an M.S. in Electrical Engineering and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at University of California, Berkeley.

Her research focuses on advanced energy materials, printed electronics, energy storage systems, and nanoparticle self-assembly. She has led research on flexible and stretchable batteries for next-generation Augmented/Virtual Reality applications at Meta Reality Labs. She was named EECS Rising Star and selected for The Rising Stars Women in Engineering Workshop in Asia.

As an expert in self-assembly and energy materials, she has published over 20 research publications in the most reputed platforms in the field.

Erin L. Ratcliff is a Full Professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the Georgia Institute of Technology and holds a joint appointment at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.  Prof. Ratliff is also the Associate Director of Scientific Continuity for Director of the currently funded Energy Frontier Research Center (EFRC) entitled “Center for Soft PhotoElectroChemical Systems (SPECS)”, a center which she directed at her prior appointment at University of Arizona.  

Her group “Laboratory for Interface Science for Printable Electronic Materials” uses a combination of applications and devices with electrochemistry, spectroscopies, microscopies, and synchrotron-based techniques to understand fundamental structure-property relationships of next-generation materials for energy conversion and storage and biosensing. Materials of interest include metal halide perovskites, π-conjugated materials, colloidal quantum dots, and metal oxides. Current research is focused on mechanisms of electron transfer and transport across interfaces, including semiconductor/electrolyte interfaces and durability of printable electronic materials.

Her research program has been funded by the Department of Energy Basic Energy Sciences, the Solar Energy Technology Office, Office of Naval Research, National Science Foundation, and the Nano Bio Materials Consortium.

Eunhwa Yang is an associate professor at the School of Building Construction, researching the reciprocal relationship between the built environment and human outcomes across various settings, including workplaces, university campuses, and homes. She employs Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory, which proposes that human outcomes are constantly influenced by the nested structures of environments. Her contributions include workplace studies, facility operation and maintenance, sustainable building practices and operations, and cognitive aging-in-place. Eunhwa's work supports a diverse range of stakeholders, including office workers, university students, and older adults, as well as facility managers/owners, corporate real estate directors, and designers, in identifying optimal spatial design, usage, and operation.

Eunhwa has been actively involved with the International Facility Management Association (IFMA) and CoreNet Global. She has received a young researcher's best paper award and a workshop grant from International Association for People-Environmental Studies (IAPS) and multiple fellowships from the International Facility Management Association (IFMA). Eunhwa has taught and developed facility management-related courses at GT. She is an advocate of utilizing and exploring diverse teaching methods, including active learning, experiential learning, and service learning. She was a fellow at the Center for Teaching and Learning at GT and the Center for Teaching Excellence at Cornell and led workshops on student engagement, collaborative learning, and rubric development. Her master’s and doctoral students have been recognized in the field, winning the IFMA Foundation scholarships and CoreNet Global Academic Challenges. Eunhwa holds an MS in Building Construction and Facility Management from Georgia Tech and a Ph.D. in Human Behavior and Design from Cornell University.

Teaching Interest:

Dr. Yang’s teaching focuses on the principles of facility management service delivery; building operation and maintenance and their associated data analytics; safety and environmental issues that protect and promote occupant health and well-being; and research methods.

Research Interest:

Dr. Yang’s research can be organized into four primary threads: 1) workplace management and strategies for workplace optimization/efficiency, 2) smart facility operation and maintenance through data integration and post-occupancy evaluation (POE), 3) the adoption of sustainable building practices and operations, and 4) design and construction for aging and aging-in-place. Her research has made theoretical, methodological, and practical contributions to these topics, addressing human outcomes and the built environment in various settings, such as workplaces, university campuses, and homes.

List of Recent Scholarly Work:

1. Bilau, I., Koo, B., Fu, E., Chau, W., Kwon, H., & Yang, E. (2025). Visual accessibility through open shelving: Impacts on cognitive load, motivation, physical activity, and user perception in older adults with mild cognitive impairment. Journal of Aging and Environment, 1–28. https://doi.org/10.1080/26892618.2025.2576213

2. Shagar, M., Zeng, Q., Baru, A., Yang, E., & Pishdad, P. (2025). Systematic review of residential indoor environmental quality assessment surveys and the development of an exemplary novel survey identifying and analyzing tool. Building and Environment, 284, 113448. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2025.113448

3. Ma, J.H., Erdogmus, E., & Yang, E. (2025). A user-centered building design approach using immersive virtual reality and discrete choice modeling. Building and Environment, 284, 113400. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2025.113400  

4. Koo, B., Bilau, I., Rodriguez, A. D., Yang, E., & Kwon, H. (2025). Quantifying mild cognitive impairments in older adults using multi-model wearable sensor data in a kitchen environment. medRxiv: the preprint server for health sciences. https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.05.24.25328107

5. Machary, H., Motamed Rastegar, R., Gholami, Y., Yang, E., Little, E., Burke, M. A. M., Bilau, I., DuBose, J., & Zimring, C. (2025). Cognitive-aging-in-place: Home design factors influencing instrumental activities of daily living for older adults facing mild cognitive impairment. Journal of Aging and Environment, 1-27. https://doi.org/10.1080/26892618.2025.2506060

6. Yang, E., Chen, C., Li, K., Guo, K., Hua, Y., & Zhang, L. (2025). Challenges and strategies for energy performance contracting: A critical review. Journal of Building Design and Environment, 3(1), 202510. https://doi.org/10.70401/jbde.2025.0001

7. Zhang, X., Wang, Y., Yang, E., Xu, S., & Yu, Y. (2025). Sale to list ratio, for sale inventory, sale count, and housing value. International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, 18(2), 416-432. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-08-2023-0113

8. Zhang, X., Yang, E., & Wang, Y. (2025). Time series observation of relationship between United States private residential construction spending and its indicators. International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, 18(2), 317-333. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-07-2023-0096

9. Zhang, X., & Yang, E. (2025). Observation of relationship between housing value and the number of building permits in the United States using time series method. International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, 18(1), 106-122. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-06-2023-0085

10. Zhang, X., Yang, E., Huang, L., & Wang, Y. (2025). Incremental population density improvement via missing middle housing under density-based and form-based zoning ordinances. International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, 18(1), 87-105. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-06-2023-0074

11. Ma, J. H., Erdogmus, E., Kangisser, S. J., & Yang, E. (2025). A comparative analysis of the effectiveness of immersive virtual reality on end-user design review. Building and Environment, 267, 112237. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2024.112237

Degrees with Year of Award:

Ph.D. in Human Behavior and Design, Cornell University, February 2016
M.S. in Building Construction and Facility Management, Georgia Institute of Technology, December 2009
B.S. in Architectural Engineering, SungKyunKwan University, February 2005

Areas of Expertise

• Energy efficiency in tenanted properties
• Green leasing
• Stakeholder engagement
• Data analytics and facility management
• Optimization of facility operation and maintenance
• Healthy workplaces: occupant satisfaction, health, and well-being
• Workplace strategies
• Coworking spaces

Laura Taylor is the director of Energy Policy and Innovation Center (EPIcenter) at Georgia Tech. 

Taylor has more than 30 years of experience in economics research, outreach, and policy engagement in the Southeast. Her research focuses on policy evaluation and the valuation of natural resources and the environment, including measuring the broader economic benefits associated with improved air, water, and ecosystem quality. Recent applications include understanding the land-use and community impacts of renewable energy deployment; quantifying the health effects of air pollution; and improving benefits estimation for policies designed to reduce human mortality. Her research has received funding from a variety of sources including the U.S. EPA, USDA, U.S. Department of Interior and the National Science Foundation.    

Prior to her leadership role at the EPIcenter, Taylor served as the chair of the School of Economics at Georgia Tech from 2018-2024. During her time as chair, the School of Economics increased its size significantly, hiring 19 new faculty members, and the number of students pursuing a major in economics increased by more than 50%. Economics also expanded its teaching and research in several areas including health, energy, environment, globalization, theory, and data analytics. The school’s bachelor’s, master’s, and Ph.D. programs achieved federal STEM designation in 2019, reflecting the curriculum’s tech-centered approach to liberal arts education and emphasis on using mathematical and statistical models. The school’s undergraduate economics program is ranked No. 1 among public universities in Georgia and No. 21 among public universities nationally in the 2025 U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings. Prior to joining the faculty at Georgia Tech in 2018, Taylor was director of the Center for Environmental and Resource Economic Policy at North Carolina State University from 2007-2018.  

Taylor is an elected fellow and past president of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists. She has held numerous advisory board positions, including the environmental economics subcommittee of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s science advisory board and the legislative research commission advisory subcommittee on offshore energy exploration for the North Carolina General Assembly. 

I'm an Associate Professor of Biogeochemistry in the School of Earth & Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. 

My research explores the ways in which Earth's biosphere and planetary boundary conditions act to reshape ocean/atmosphere chemistry and climate, how these interactions have evolved over time, and how they might be engineered moving forward. The work I do is inherently interdisciplinary, and utilizes an ensemble of tools including computer models of ocean, sediment, and soil biogeochemistry, stable isotope and trace element tracers, and analysis of modern natural systems.

Elizabeth Qian joined the Daniel Guggenheim School in November 2022. She holds a joint appointment at Georgia Tech as Assistant Professor in the Schools of Aerospace Engineering and Computational Science and Engineering. Her interdisciplinary research develops new computational methods to enable engineering design and decision-making for complex systems. Her specialties are in developing efficient surrogate models through model reduction and scientific machine learning, and in developing multifidelity approaches to accelerate expensive computations in uncertainty quantification, optimization, and control. 

Elizabeth previously held a postdoctoral appointment as von Karman Instructor at Caltech in the Department of Computing + Mathematical Sciences. She has been the recipient of many awards, including a Caltech-wide award for teaching bestowed by the undergraduate student body, the 2020 SIAM Student Paper Prize, the Fannie and John Hertz Foundation Fellowship, and the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. She is also an alumna of the U.S. Fulbright student program. She earned her PhD, SM, and SB degrees from the MIT Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics.

Neu's research involves the understanding and prediction of the fatigue behavior of materials and closely related topics, typically when the material must resist degradation and failure in harsh environments. Specifically, he has published in areas involving thermomechanical fatigue, fretting fatigue, creep and environmental effects, viscoplastic deformation and damage development, and related constitutive and finite-element modeling with a particular emphasis on the role of the materials microstructure on the physical deformation and degradation processes. He has investigated a broad range of structural materials including steels, titanium alloys, nickel-base superalloys, metal matrix composites, molybdenum alloys, high entropy alloys, medical device materials, and solder alloys used in electronic packaging. His research has widespread applications in aerospace, surface transportation, power generation, machinery components, medical devices, and electronic packaging. His work involves the prediction of the long-term reliability of components operating in extreme environments such as the hot section of a gas turbine system for propulsion or energy generation. His research is funded by some of these industries as well as government funding agencies.