Leading MIT energy scientist to leave US after over three decades for Singapore's NTU

Shao-Horn will become NTU's vice president of research and a Distinguished University Professor, its highest faculty rank, the university announced Thursday.

As vice president of research, she will oversee NTU's research agenda and help shape its strategic research priorities.

"I am deeply honored and excited to join NTU and to have the opportunity to serve its research community," Shao-Horn said in a statement released by NTU. "I am grateful to MIT, which has been my academic home for over 24 years, and to the many students, colleagues and collaborators who have shaped my journey as a researcher, educator and leader."

She is currently the JR East Professor of Engineering at MIT, with appointments in mechanical engineering, materials science and engineering, and chemistry. Her research focuses on materials for energy storage and conversion, including rechargeable lithium-ion and lithium-air batteries, as well as technologies for producing sustainable fuels and chemicals.

Her work combines physics, chemistry and materials science to study processes at the molecular and atomic levels. More recently, she and her colleagues have used automated experiments, machine learning and artificial intelligence to accelerate the discovery of new molecules and materials.

Leading energy scientist Yang Shao-Horn. Photo courtesy of MIT

From faculty rejection to MIT

Shao-Horn recounted her unlikely path to MIT at "FAIL! — Inspiring Resilience," a storytelling event at the university, in 2020. Growing up in Beijing, China, she said she was "not a smart kid but always curious," adding that she finished near the bottom of her high school class.

She enrolled in metallurgical and materials engineering at Beijing University of Technology, graduating in 1992 then moved to the U.S. to pursue a doctorate at Michigan Technological University, where she chose lithium-ion batteries as her research field when the technology was still relatively new, according to MIT.

After receiving her PhD in 1998, she joined battery maker Eveready as a staff scientist in Ohio. She initially believed industry would provide a long-term career but soon decided it was not the path she wanted.

Her first attempt to enter academia ended in rejection. She said a highly ranked U.S. engineering program interviewed her for a tenure-track position but ultimately told her that it did not believe she could become a world leader in her field.

She recalled being told that she lacked the confidence to challenge established authorities and that interviewers were unconvinced by the research program she proposed. She quit her job and took a postdoctoral position at the Institute of Condensed Matter Chemistry in Bordeaux, France, despite taking a substantial pay cut and leaving her husband in the U.S.

After about a year in France, she applied for 20 faculty positions in the U.S. MIT invited her to interview in March 2002, even though she had never studied there and did not have a degree in mechanical engineering. She got the job.

She has remained at MIT since then, building a research career spanning electrochemistry, batteries, energy conversion and sustainable fuels.

She was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Engineering in 2018 and is a fellow of the U.S. National Academy of Inventors. She has also been named a Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate.

According to NTU, she has mentored about 150 students and postdoctoral researchers, around 50 of whom have gone on to academic positions worldwide. She has also co-founded startups and worked with companies to turn research discoveries into technologies.

Her move to Singapore will not mark her first involvement with the country's research sector.

She has longstanding collaborations there, including through the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology, while several former members of her research group have joined NTU and the National University of Singapore as faculty members.

In NTU's announcement, President Ho Teck Hua described Shao-Horn as "an outstanding and internationally respected scientific leader" with decades of experience in interdisciplinary research and collaboration between academia and industry.

He said her appointment would help advance the university's research excellence, partnerships and global reputation.