My research focuses on developing and applying multiscale numerical modeling and machine learning for analyzing coupled thermal-hydro-mechanical-chemical (THMC) processes from fundamental Earth science to subsurface engineering systems. Those including:
Development of novel computational approaches and computer codes: Numerical manifold method (NMM), extended finite volume method (XFVM)
Fundamental Earth science: Pressure solution, carbonate compaction, clay and shale, fracture alteration and healing, and creep
Nuclear waste disposal in salt, crystalline, argillite rocks
Geologic hydrogen production and storage
Geothermal energy
Machine learning applications in geosciences
Other research interests:
Planetary rock mechanics
Research Projects
2024-2026, PI, Cyclic Injection for Commercial Seismic-Safe Geologic H2 Production, DOE ARPA-E
2020-present, PI, Reactive Mechanics and Transport Modeling, DOE Basic Energy Science
2022-present, PI, Microscale model supervised ML for predicting macroscale properties in Argillite rocks, DOE Office of Nuclear Energy
2020-present, PI, Modeling of fracture development and gas migration in bentonite/clay, DOE Office of Nuclear Energy
2020-2025, PI, Modeling of thermal-slip of crystalline rock fractures, DOE Office of Nuclear Energy
2021-2024, PI, Coupling mechanics with Chombo-Crunch, DOE Exascale Computing Project
2019-2021, PI, Extended Finite Volume Method for Coupled Processes in Complex Fractured Geological Systems, Early Career Laboratory Directed Research Development (LDRD), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA.
Other Projects
2016-2025, Investigator, Evaluation of salt as a host rock for geologic disposal of radioactive waste, DOE Office of Nuclear Energy
2017-2021, Investigator, Comprehensive physical-chemical modeling to reduce risks and costs of flexible geothermal energy production, California Energy Commission (CEC)