Brett Savoie

Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering

Dr. Savoie received his B.S. in Chemistry and Physics from Texas A&M; University in 2008, where he researched cold molecular beams in Physics and Hydrogenase biomimetics for fuel cell applications in Chemistry. He received his Ph.D. in 2014 at Northwestern University for developing theoretical methods to study photovoltaic processes in organic semiconductors.

Prior to joining Purdue University, he was a postdoc at Caltech, where he continued to work on energy related materials, developing high-throughput computational methods for discovering and characterizing solid polymer electrolytes for battery applications. Dr. Savoie has published over 20 papers and his postdoctoral work has led to three patent applications related to novel electrolytes.

Dr. Savoie's group focuses on accelerating the design and characterization of energy-related materials using theoretical methods. Burgeoning computational power and algorithm development have made theoretical characterization and screening essential steps in modern materials development. From first-principles predictions of electronic structure, catalytic activity, and even crystal structure—methods development continues to push the frontier of what material properties can be predicted in advance, thus economizing costly synthesis and optimization efforts.