People
Principal Investigator
Renata Wentzcovitch is a Columbia University professor whose research bridges materials science and geophysics through high-pressure quantum simulations of planetary materials.
Göran Ekström
Co-Principal Investigator
Göran Ekström is a seismologist at Columbia University known for pioneering studies of Earth’s deep interior and seismic signals from natural and anthropogenic events.
Jacqueline Austermann
Co-Principal Investigator
Jacqueline Austermann is an Assistant Professor at Columbia University who investigates sea level change, ice sheet stability, and geodynamic processes.
Kui Ren
Co-Principal Investigator
Kui Ren is a Columbia professor specializing in applied mathematics, inverse problems, and computational modeling across biomedical imaging and physical systems.
Vishal (Vishy) Manve
Project Coordinator
Vishy Manve is the Project Coordinator for the MINERALS initiative, supporting interdisciplinary collaboration across Earth science and materials modeling.
Timothy Liao
Postdoctoral Researcher
Debanjan Pal
Postdoctoral Researcher
Debanjan Pal is a postdoctoral researcher specializing in computational geodynamics, using numerical mantle convection models to study deep Earth processes and their surface expressions.
Raj Moulik
Postdoctoral Researcher
Raj Moulik is a geophysicist developing 3D models of Earth’s interior to better understand planetary-scale dynamics and deep Earth structure.
Chenxing Luo
Postdoctoral Researcher
Chenxing Luo is a postdoctoral researcher studying the physical properties of Earth-forming materials at high pressures and temperatures using ab initio calculations, machine-learning methods, and atomistic simulations to better interpret deep-Earth seismological observations.
Abin Shakya
Incoming Postdoctoral Researcher
Yan Cheng
PhD Candidate
Yan Cheng is a PhD candidate in Applied Mathematics at Columbia University, researching computational inverse problems in wave propagation. He formulates problems in seismic imaging and optical phase retrieval as PDE-constrained optimization, with work spanning phase retrieval in nonlinear optics, cryptanalysis of optical encryption systems, and multiscale full waveform inversion methods. His computational toolkit includes high-performance computing, CUDA, and fast PDE solvers.
Dominica Wilson
Intern
Dominica Wilson is a Computer Engineering student at Tuskegee University, from Birmingham, Alabama. Through a work-study position in Tuskegee’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, she has researched machine learning applications in computer vision and image processing. She is excited to explore new computational methods and the applications of machine learning in geophysics.
Noah A. Proctor
Intern
Noah Proctor is a second-year student at Columbia studying Operations Research and Computer Science. At Columbia’s Kelly Laboratory, he researched multiphase reactive transport in sandstone for carbon mineralization, and he has built neural network models forecasting harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie. He is drawn to MINERALS for its ambition to model Earth from the atomic to the global scale.
Wilson Samuels
Intern
Wilson Samuels is a sophomore at Tuskegee University studying Computer Engineering. She is from Tampa, Florida.
Gioia Marchi
Intern
Gioia Marchi is a first-year undergraduate student at Columbia University, where she is studying Computer Engineering. Originally from New York, she is interested in how data science and computational modeling can be applied to complex real-world challenges, particularly in Earth and environmental systems.
Lucrezia Giubila
Ph.D. student
Lucrezia Giubila is a first-year PhD student in Materials Science and Engineering with a background in mechanical engineering.
Alumni
Jessica Santos Rego
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Jessica Santos Rego was a postdoctoral researcher studying mineral–fluid interfaces and the thermoelastic properties of geological materials using atomistic simulations.
Tianqi Wan
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Tianqi Wan is a computational mineral physicist modeling lower mantle minerals using first-principles calculations, molecular dynamics, and machine learning.
Hongjin Wang
Former PhD student
Hongjin Wang was a PhD candidate in Columbia’s Applied Physics & Applied Mathematics Department whose research uses first-principles simulations, molecular dynamics, and machine-learning potentials to investigate hydrous minerals—such as serpentines—under extreme conditions relevant to subduction zones.
Jose Maria Osa
Former Intern
Jose Osa is a current Columbia undergraduate in Physics and Engineering with a strong interest in astrophysics and the structural properties of matter.
Israa Draz
Former Intern
Israa Draz is a materials science intern with expertise in computer science, machine learning, and mineral physics, exploring materials under extreme conditions.