Shirley Meng, Director

Y. Shirley Meng is a professor of molecular engineering at the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering at The University of Chicago. She also serves as chief scientist for the Argonne Collaborative Center for Energy Storage Science (ACCESS) at Argonne National Laboratory. Meng’s research focuses primarily on energy storage materials and systems – including rechargeable batteries for electric vehicles and trucks, power sources for Internet of Things (IOTs), as well as grid-scale storage for deep renewable energy penetration.

Her work pioneers in discovering and designing better materials for energy storage by a unique combination of first principles computation, guided materials discovery and design, and advanced characterization with electron/neutron/photon sources.

Bryan McCloskey, Deputy Director

Bryan McCloskey is a faculty engineer in the Energy Storage and Distributed Resources Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and the Department Chair and Warren & Katharine Schlinger Distinguished Professor in Chemical Engineering in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley.

His laboratory explores numerous applications of electrochemistry to energy sustainability, conversion, and storage. Current projects focus on elucidating the fundamental electrochemistry of metal-air batteries, and understanding a variety of challenges facing Li-ion batteries, including high voltage cathode stability, advanced cathode material development, extreme fast charging, and low temperature and high transference number electrolyte formulations.

Wei Wang, Deputy Director

Wei Wang is a recognized expert in the field of grid energy storage for his innovative work on the redox flow battery technologies. He is a Laboratory Fellow and currently the director of the Energy Storage Materials Initiative, a multi-million-dollar and multi-year project at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) to fundamentally transform energy material R&D through a physics-informed data-driven approach. He also serves as the chief scientist and technical lead on grid energy storage R&D at PNNL. Wang joined PNNL in 2009 after receiving a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.

Elmie Peoples-Evans, Chief Operating Officer

Elmie Peoples-Evans is responsible for all operational aspects of ESRA, including financial operations; project management integration; procurement; property; environmental, safety, health and quality assurance; communications; and security. Based at Argonne National Laboratory since 2012, Elmie is also a project manager of the Advanced Photon Source (APS) Upgrade (APS-U) project, managing operational functions of a year-long storage ring installation period beginning in April 2023 and concluding with first light at the APS in April 2024. With over ten years of large-scale project management experience, she was part of the inaugural cohort of the Department of Energy’s Project Leadership Institute in 2017. Elmie holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Northwestern University, and an Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago. Prior to joining Argonne, she worked at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.

James Burrow, Deputy Assistant Director

James Burrow serves as the deputy assistant director and the DOE Basic Energy Sciences Early Career Network representative for ESRA. After receiving his bachelor of science degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and his PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, he worked as a postdoctoral scholar at the UChicagoo Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago and as a resident associate at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory. His research interests are in materials discovery, and in application of X-ray scattering and imaging techniques for emerging all solid-state battery chemistries.