07/16/25 Dr. Yu has been awarded the Postdoctoral Fellowship by Office of China Postdoc Council (OCPC). Congratulations to Yikang！

06/10/25 Due to Yikang's excellent Ph.D. achievements in both research and studies at Purdue University, he received the Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-financed Students Abroad (Category B) from the China Scholarship Council (CSC), which is the highest government award granted by the Chinese government to Chinese students overseas. Congratulations!

02/17/25 Dr. Yu started his Postdoc position at College of Chemical & Biological Engineering, Zhejiang University. He will work with Prof. Liguang Wang and Prof. Jun Lu for advanced graphite anode for lithium ion batteries. Good luck to Yikang's Postdoc journey!

11/01/24 Congratulations to Yikang for his passing of the Ph.D. Final Exam! Yikang is grateful to all of his Ph.D. committee members including Prof. Jian Xie@Purdue ME, Prof. Steven F. Son@Purdue ME, Prof. Jeffery P. Youngblood@Purdue MSE, Prof. Lia Stanciu@Purdue MSE, Dr. Chengjun Sun@Argonne, and Dr. Wenquan Lu@Argonne. 

09/11/24 Yikang's manuscript, titled 'Stabilizing Graphite Anode in Electrolyte with Nanoscale Anion Network for High-Rate Lithium Storage,' has been accepted for publication in ACS Energy Letters. Congratulations! This work discusses the stability of graphite in electrolytes, emphasizing how nanoscale electrolyte structures inhibit graphite exfoliation in organic solvents. We extend our gratitude to all co-authors for their support, especially Dr. Tao Li and Dr. Cong Liu from Argonne National Laboratory. 

03/18/24 Due to the consistenty useful reviews that significantly helped the Insitute of Physics (IOP), Yikang has been awarded as IOP Trusted Reveiwer. Congratulations to Yikang!

11/10/23 Yikang's manuscript entitled "Kinetic pathways of fast lithium transport in solid electrolyte interphases with discrete inorganic components" has been accepted for publication in Energy & Environmental Science. Yikang is grateful to all of the co-authors, especially H. Koh & Prof. E. A. Stach from UPenn for their cryo-TEM input and Z. Zhang & Prof. A. N. Alexandrova from UCLA for their DFT calculations help. Moreover, our paper has been highlighted in Rare Matels due to the recoginized great contribution for developing fast-charging batteries

05/27/23 Yikang attended the 243rd ECS Meeting at Boston, and gave two oral preseantions regarding the cryo-TEM characterzation of Li transport across the SEI structure and high capacity FeOF cathode material for Lithium ion batteries. 

02/09/23 Yikang attended and gave a poster presentation at 1st Modeling, Characterization & Analytics in Electrochemical Sciences & Engineering (MochA) Symposium, which was organized by Purdue ECS Student Chapter and Purdue ME School. 

12/16/22 Yikang has finished all of his courseworks (12 courses) for his Ph.D journey with a excellent record (3.93/4.00). He will dedicate more efforts to research activities in the future.

05/16/2022 As the invitation from the Editorial Office, Yikang is pleased to serve as the Review Editor for the Electrochemistry section of the Frontiers in Chemistry. 

05/11/2022 Congratulations to Yikang's recent manuscript acceptance on Carbon: "Achiving SEI preformed graphite in flow cell to mitigate initial lithium loss". In this paper, a "Pre-SEI graphite" concepts has been proposed to mitigate the initial lithium loss of the lithium ion batteries. 

12/17/2021 The Direct Ph.D students from Purdue ME School have the option of seeking a Master's degree "along the way" to the PhD. After 2021 Fall Semester, Yikang has met the Purdue Graduate School's requirements for a Master's degree with a excellent coursework performance (GPA=3.90/4.0) and is expected to receive this Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering (MSME) degree this winter. Congratulations!

09/30/2021 Congratulations! Yikang's idea of Graphite Technologies to fully unlock lithium ion batteries capacity has been announced to move on Moonshot Pitch Competition finals (1 of 15 teams), which is a fast-paced competition challenges student to think big in terms of their ideas. This competition is organized and sponsored by Purdue Burton D. Morgan Center for Entrepreneurship and the student entrepreneurship fraternity, Delta Mu Kappa (DMK).

06/09/2021 Yikang has attended the 13th annual Beyond Lithium-Ion Symposium on the Future of Energy Storage, which is hosted by U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) from June 9-11.

05/28/2021 Congratulations on Yikang's acceptance to the 2021 APS/IIT XAFS Summer School, which will be hosted by Argonne's Advanced Photon Source (APS) and Illinois Intitute of Technology (IIT) from August 1-4. In this Summer School, advanced X-ray technique of X-ray Absoption Fine Structure Spectrosocpy (XAFS) will be particularly introduced.

12/17/2020 Yikang's paper entitled "Builiding Better Li Metal Anode in Liquid Electrolyte: Progress and Challenges" is accepted for publication by ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces. It is a comprehensive review paper focues on the Li metal anode progress and challenges.

08/28/2020 Yikang's Ph.D degree Plan of Study has been approved by Purdue Graduate School. Yikang is grateful to all of the Professors/Specialists who serves as his Advisory Committee Members. They are: Prof. Jian Xie@Purdue ME, Prof. Steven F. Son@Purdue ME, Prof. Jeffery P. Youngblood@Purdue MSE, Prof. Lia Stanciu@Purdue MSE, Dr. Chengjun Sun@Argonne, and Dr. Wenquan Lu@Argonne. Their expertise and suggestions will do help Yikang's career development. 

05/08/2020 Yikang's paper entitled "Dendrite-Free Lithium Electrode Enabled by Graphene Aerogels with Gradient Porosity" is accepted for publication by Energy Storage Materials. It is a collaboration achievement with Prof. Yi-Chun Lu and Mr. Wei Huang at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Congratulations! 

04/14/2020 Congratulations! Yikang has passed all of the three Area Exams (Dynamics, 91.25/100 ) at the first attempt, and now is a Ph.D candidate at  School of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University. It is definitely a "Giant Leap" for Yikang's Ph.D career.

02/28/2020 Yikang has passed the Area Exam of Mathematics (84/100), congratulations!

02/11/2020 Yikang has passed the Area Exam of Solid Mechanics (91/100), congratulations!

08/19/2019 Yikang started his studies as a Ph.D student at School of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University.