Professor Christopher Ellison

The research in this group is motivated by a combination of fundamental and practical implications with a focus on the design, synthesis, characterization, and processing of nano- and micro-structured polymeric systems. An important aspect of the laboratory is the use of well-established synthetic chemistries (various polymerizations, functional monomer syntheses, reactive processing, etc.) to control all aspects of molecular architecture. This critical framework is required for establishing quantitative relationships in complex multi-scale materials. They use MSI for computing mechanical properties/deformations of soft elastomers, primarily through use of Comsol and other first-principles mechanical models.