Earth and Mineral Sciences

Professor named fellow of the Minerals, Metals and Materials Society

Zi-Kui Liu, Dorothy Pate Enright Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Credit: Penn State All Rights Reserved.

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Zi-Kui Liu, Dorothy Pate Enright Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, has been named a fellow of the Minerals, Metals and Materials Society (TMS), the society's highest honor.

TMS fellows are recognized as leading authorities and outstanding contributors to the practice of metallurgy, materials science and technology, and for outstanding service to society. Liu is renowned for his seminal contributions to the fundamentals of thermodynamics and for developing computational approaches and tools for predictions of properties and design of materials.

“I feel greatly honored,” Liu said. “Many of my mentors were elected as TMS fellows, such as Mats Hillert, Greg Olson, and the late Austin Chang, who all inspired me immensely over the years. I am also excited in joining a number of my long-time collaborators as TMS fellows and thank them for their continued support.”

Liu is a leader in computational materials design, which utilizes computational tools such as databases and machine learning to help design the materials of tomorrow. He coined the term “Materials Genome” in 2002 and co-founded the NSF Center for Computational Materials Design in 2005, focusing on the important building blocks of engineered materials. Liu has published more than 590 papers, given more than 550 invited presentations, and graduated 30 doctoral students.

In 2018, Liu was named distinguished professor of materials science and engineering at Penn State and in 2020 became the inaugural Dorothy Pate Enright Professor. His other awards include the J. Willard Gibbs Phase Equilibria Award from ASM International; the William Hume-Rothery Award from TMS; the Spriggs Phase Equilibria Award from the American Ceramic Society; and the Lee Hsun Lecture Award from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Metal Research.

In addition, he served on the TMS board of directors from 2008 to 2011 and was president of ASM International from 2019 to 2020. Liu has been the editor-in-chief of the CALPHAD journal since 2001 and since 2013 has served as president of CALPHAD, Inc., a nonprofit foundation that promotes computational materials science and young scholars.

“Right before coming to Penn State, I received the TMS Young Leader Award in 1998 and became active in technical committees and later became a member of the board of directors of TMS,” Liu said. “Many of my students and research fellows have since received the Young Leader Award and become leaders in the society. I think that TMS has an excellent infrastructure for young professionals to network and get involved and inspired.”

Prior to joining Penn State’s faculty in 1999, Liu worked as a research associate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and as a senior research scientist at QuesTek Innovations LLC. He received a bachelor’s degree in metallurgy from Central South University in China, a master’s degree in materials science and engineering from the University of Science and Technology Beijing, and a doctorate in physical metallurgy from the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden.

Last Updated December 13, 2021

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