Rate My Professor Yan Wang

Yan Wang is the William Smith Foundation Dean’s Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, with an affiliation in Materials Science and Engineering. He earned his B.S. in 2001 and M.S. in 2004 from Tianjin University in China, a Ph.D. in 2009 from the University of Windsor in Canada, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2010. Since joining Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Professor Wang has directed the Electrochemical Energy Laboratory, where he conducts research on fundamental electrochemistry and electrochemistry-based technologies. His academic interests include developing new electrodes and materials for energy storage devices such as lithium-ion batteries, sodium-ion batteries, solid-state batteries, flow batteries, and supercapacitors. Additional focuses encompass battery manufacturing, safety, recycling of batteries, solar panels, fuel cells, and electrolyzers, as well as industry sustainability.

Professor Wang has significantly impacted the field through innovative commercialization efforts, co-founding Ascend Elements Inc. (previously Battery Resourcers Inc.) in 2015 and AM Batteries Inc. in 2016 based on his laboratory technologies. His key publications include “Self-driven aldol condensation enabling high-purity Li2CO3 recovery from spent lithium metal anodes” published in Joule (2025), “Etching-assisted Upcycling of Ni-lean to Ni-rich Cathode Materials” in Journal of Power Sources (2025), “Rethinking Graphite Recycling” in Chem Circularity (2026), and book chapters such as “Energy Conversion and Storage Through Nanoparticles” in the RSC Handbook on Nanomaterials (2012). He holds patents including “Developing Additive Manufactured Battery Electrodes.” Professor Wang’s achievements have been recognized with awards such as Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (2025), Tech Power Players 50 (2024), Faces of American Innovation from the Bayh-Dole Coalition (2023), Manufacturing Champion from the Worcester Business Journal (2023), Better World Project Award (2022), Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (2022), and the Board of Trustees’ Award for Outstanding Research and Creative Scholarship (2019). His work advances clean energy, renewable technologies, and sustainable manufacturing practices.