About

Professor Laurent Pilon is a faculty member at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he has served as a professor since 2012, following appointments as associate professor from 2008 to 2012 and assistant professor from 2002 to 2008. He earned his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University in 2002, and holds both a master's and bachelor's degree in Applied Physics from the Grenoble Institute of Technology in France, completed in 1997. Over his career, Professor Pilon has been recognized with numerous honors and awards, including the 2023 Outstanding Mechanical Engineering Award from Purdue University, the 2021 ASME Heat Transfer Memorial Award, and election as an ASME Fellow in 2015. He has also received accolades for his service to the ASME Journal of Heat Transfer and has been elected to the Scientific Council of the International Center for Heat and Mass Transfer. His teaching excellence has been acknowledged with awards such as the Henry and Susan Samueli Teaching Award from UCLA's MAE Department and the Northrup Grumman Excellence in Teaching Award from UCLA Engineering. Professor Pilon's research contributions have been recognized with awards including the National Science Foundation CAREER Award and the Bergles-Rohsenow Young Investigator Award in Heat Transfer from ASME. Throughout his tenure at UCLA, he has mentored numerous graduate and undergraduate students, as well as post-doctoral and visiting scholars, contributing significantly to the academic and research community in mechanical engineering and heat transfer.

Research topics

• Electrical engineering
• Physics
• Computer Science
• Materials science
• Condensed matter physics
• Environmental science
• Atmospheric sciences
• Meteorology
• Optoelectronics
• Optics
• Nanotechnology
• Composite material
• Engineering physics
• Chemistry
• Engineering

Selected publications

• Intrinsic controls on the kinetics of calcium extraction from crystalline slags: Implications on CO2 mineralization

  Resources Conservation and Recycling · 2026-02-11

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  PublisherDOI

• Population- and Species-Level Variation in Near- and Mid-infrared Radiation in Birds: A Preliminary Analysis

  Integrative Organismal Biology · 2026-01-01

  articleOpen access

  Animal coloration has diverse functions, such as camouflage, communication, thermoregulation, and protection from UV damage and more, and can be shaped by environmental selective pressures. Some climatic selective pressures are strong enough to produce consistent patterns in many species across large-scale geographic gradients, leading to the creation of macrophysiological rules such as Gloger's rule, which predicts that endothermic populations in hot, humid areas will be visibly darker than those in cool, dry areas, and the thermal melanism hypothesis, which predicts that ectothermic animals will be visibly darker in cooler areas. While these rules often capture trends in animal absorptance in the visible spectrum, wavelengths of visible light are not the only relevant wavelengths to an animal's energy budget: solar radiation extends beyond the visible spectrum [0.4-0.7 μm] into the near-infrared; thus, thermal pressures may result in changes in surface reflectance characteristics beyond the visible [e.g., 0.7-2.5 μm] in birds. Further, heat exchange with the environment extends into the mid-infrared (MIR), including heat loss through the atmospheric transparency window [8-14 μm]. It is unknown whether animal absorptance in the NIR or emittance in MIR might also follow macrophysiological rules, as seen in the visible spectrum, such as more absorptance of NIR and less emittance of MIR in cooler areas for ectotherms under the thermal melanism hypothesis. Here, we examine both UV-NIR absorptance and MIR emittance in five species of birds: the Great Horned Owl, Northern Bobwhite, Steller's Jay, Song Sparrow, and Common Raven. We show that NIR absorptance varies by species and population, corresponding to their habitat and thermoregulatory strategies. MIR emittance, in contrast, was stable across species and populations but differed slightly across populations of Northern Bobwhites. We conclude by highlighting the importance of considering the full spectrum from UV to MIR in research on animal adaptation. Further consideration of infrared radiation is necessary for a complete view of animals' phenotypic diversity and possible responses to thermal challenge.

  PublisherDOI

• Probing the effect of atomic and morphological arrangements in the pseudocapacitive properties of TT-Nb2O5 nanostructures

  Solid State Ionics · 2025-08-05

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  PublisherDOI

• Machine Learning for the Screening of Fast Energy Storage Pseudocapacitive Materials

  ECS Meeting Abstracts · 2025-07-11

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  Pseudocapacitance represents an alternative mechanism for capacitive energy storage, complementing electrical double-layer capacitance (EDLC). By relying on fast, battery-like redox reactions, pseudocapacitors achieve battery-like energy densities while maintaining the high power density and long cycle life of EDLCs. This study aims to discover novel high-performance pseudocapacitive materials by integrating first-principles calculations with machine learning. Specifically, it focuses on lithium intercalation-based pseudocapacitance. The initial dataset comprises a combination of existing battery and pseudocapacitive transitional metal oxides and sulfides. A descriptor-performance model is developed using machine learning and discriminative descriptors are identified using feature engineering. The descriptors encompass compositional, structural, electronic, and lithium intercalation attributes, derived from existing literature and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. This computational framework enables rapid screening of an extensive materials database, systematically narrowing the pool of potential candidates. Promising materials are experimentally validated and incorporated into the model to enhance predictive accuracy, offering a scalable pathway for optimizing the search for pseudocapacitive materials. Figure 1

  PublisherDOI

• Dependent scattering and fractal microstructure determine the transparency of aerogel monoliths

  APL Photonics · 2025-04-01 · 3 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  This study reveals how dependent scattering and microstructure significantly affect electromagnetic wave propagation through aerogel monoliths, contributing to their transparency. Light scattering by particle ensembles is considered “dependent” when the scattering properties rely not only on particle size and optical constants but also on their spatial distribution, typically occurring when the average interparticle distance is small in comparison with the wavelength of incident radiation. Addressing dependent scattering requires solving Maxwell’s equations for complex heterogeneous structures, which is computationally demanding and usually limited to sample thicknesses on the same scale as the wavelength. This study combines computer-generated ambigel microstructures of fractal aggregates of polydisperse nanoparticles and the radiative transfer with reciprocal transaction method to predict the transmittance of thick ambigel slabs. Transmittance measurements of ambiently dried aerogel monoliths (ambigels) with porosities from about 50% to 90% closely matched the predicted values for their digital twins. However, ignoring dependent scattering or particle aggregation led to inaccurate predictions. This study validated the computational framework, and its findings offer insights for designing photonic metamaterials and analyzing their interactions with electromagnetic waves.

  PublisherDOI

• Metallicity, Atomic Disorder, and Li-Ion Storage in Fast-Charging Anodes

  Journal of the American Chemical Society · 2025-09-02

  articleOpen access

  Oxides of Nb with Wadsley-Roth shear structures comprise a family of stable, high-rate anode materials for Li-ion batteries. A particular pair of them offers the unusual opportunity to test how important metallic conduction of the starting electrode is for electrode performance. The selected pair of compounds with similar 4 × 3 Wadsley-Roth block structures are insulating Ti2Nb10O29 and metallic Nb12O29. A combination of diffraction, electrochemistry, magnetic measurements, and entropic potential measurements is employed to establish key findings for these two anode materials. We find that starting with a metallic oxide is not especially advantageous over a comparable material that readily transitions into a metallic state upon lithiation. Second, the rate performance appears to be dictated by ion mobility, and atomic Ti/Nb disorder in Ti2Nb10O29 contributes to improved capacity retention at high rates by suppressing Li-ion ordering. However, subtle details in the nature of redox processes make Nb12O29 a slightly better electrode material for long-term cycling at slower rates.

  PublisherDOI

• Ballistic transport from propagating vibrational modes in amorphous silicon dioxide: Thermal experiments and atomistic-machine learning modeling

  Materials Today Physics · 2025-01-24 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Understanding thermal transport in amorphous materials is critical for a wide range of applications, including buildings, vehicles, aerospace, and acoustic technologies. Despite its importance, the fundamental behavior of heat carriers in amorphous structures remains poorly understood and is often attributed to localized vibrational modes with mean free paths of about 1 nm, posing significant challenges for engineering their thermal functionalities. In this study, we present experimental measurements on mesoporous silica and atomistic analyses using Monte Carlo simulations and machine learning models to quantify the relationship between nanoarchitecture and effective thermal conductivity. Through rational chemical synthesis and ultrafast spectroscopy measurements, a strong size dependence within the sub-10 nm regime is observed, where the classical Fourier heat conduction theory fails to account for the effects of porosity and pore size. This deviation from diffusive transport is attributed to the significant contribution of propagating vibrational modes, in addition to non-propagating modes, revealing unexpectedly long mean free paths and ballistic thermal transport for heat carriers in amorphous silica. The fundamental vibrational modes in amorphous silica are further investigated using spectral-dependent Boltzmann transport equation simulations and molecular dynamics with machine learning potentials, showing good agreement with experimental results. This study provides valuable insights into nanoscale-modulated thermal transport properties in mesoporous silica and opens new opportunities for the rational design of thermally insulating materials.

  PublisherDOI

• Fast Charging from Low Li-Ion Migration Barriers in Wadsley–Roth NaNb₇O₁₈ Anodes

  Chemistry of Materials · 2025-02-06 · 3 citations

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  While current electric vehicles are approaching internal combustion engine vehicles in terms of driving range, the relatively long charging time of batteries represents a fundamental challenge. Materials used as anodes show slow ion insertion, which is usually responsible for the inability of automotive batteries to charge rapidly. To address this challenge, research into the kinetics of solid-state ion insertion is needed. The essential properties of fast-charging electrodes include high electronic and ionic conductivities, mechanical and chemical stability, and a 3D framework with channels for ion transport, especially when the added cost of nanostructuring is not desirable. In recent years, there has been increasing recognition that Nb-based shear-structured oxides, many belonging to the Wadsley–Roth class of compounds, show fast insertion. We focus here on NaNb7O18, a member of this Wadsley–Roth family that has not been previously studied as an anode material for Li-ion batteries. Bulk NaNb7O18 is shown to demonstrate high cyclability, retaining over 90% capacity even after 1000 cycles at a relatively rapid 2C rate. Potentiometric entropy measurements support the presence of two-phase reaction mechanisms (which is usually contraindicated for fast charging) and point to the role of intralayer ion ordering. The energy barrier between Li sites is found to be low, which is likely to be an important contributor to the fast lithiation kinetics in this compound. The electrochemical analysis points to apparent diffusion coefficients in the range of 10–12 cm2 s–1 and a low overpotential close to 130 mV. An analysis of the lithiation kinetics of related Wadsley–Roth compounds finds that fast intercalation/deintercalation is robust across this family of compounds, regardless of the details of the intercalation mechanism.

  PublisherDOI

• Thermo-electrochemical characterization of a commercial LiNi0.8Co0.15Al0.05O2 /Graphite+Si 18650 cell

  Journal of Power Sources · 2024-12-12 · 7 citations

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  PublisherDOI

• Three-dimensional step potential electrochemical spectroscopy (SPECS) simulations of porous pseudocapacitive electrodes

  Electrochimica Acta · 2024-08-23 · 2 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  This study validates the step potential electrochemical spectroscopy (SPECS) method and refines the associated analysis for differentiating the contributions of electrical double layer (EDL) formation and Faradaic reactions to the total charge storage in three-dimensional porous pseudocapacitive electrodes. The modified Poisson–Nernst–Planck (MPNP) model coupled with the Frumkin–Butler–Volmer theory were used to numerically reproduce experimental data obtained from the SPECS method accounting for interfacial, transport, and electrochemical phenomena in porous electrodes consisting of monodisperse spherical nanoparticles ordered in face-centered cubic (FCC) packing. The fitting analysis of the SPECS method was modified for the Faradaic current. The new model can accurately predict the individual contributions of EDL formation and Faradaic reactions to the total current. Moreover, the contributions of EDL formation at the electrode surface or at the electrode/electrolyte interface within the porous electrode can be identified. Similarly, the Faradaic reactions due to surface-controlled or diffusion-controlled mechanisms can be distinguished. Furthermore, the capacitance associated with EDL formation obtained from SPECS was in good agreement with that obtained from cyclic voltammetry. Finally, cyclic voltammograms were reconstructed using the multiple potential step chronoamperometry (MUSCA) method, and the integral capacitance associated with each charge storage mechanism was calculated for a range of scan rates. • SPECS and MUSCA methods were reproduced numerically using continuum modeling. • SPECS fitting was modified for Faradaic current limited by kinetics or diffusion. • Modified analysis was validated numerically in 3D porous pseudocapacitive electrodes. • It can identify contributions of surface-controlled or diffusion-controlled reactions. • It can distinguish EDL formation at electrode surface or within the porous structure.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• CAREER: Synthesis, Characterization and Modeling of Closed-Cell Nanoporous Media

  NSF · $408k · 2005–2010

Frequent coauthors

• Bruce Dunn

  125 shared

• Sarah H. Tolbert

  University of California, Los Angeles

  82 shared

• Gaurav Sant

  University of California, Los Angeles

  79 shared

• Obaidallah Munteshari

  77 shared

• Matevž Frajnkovič

  Samueli Institute

  70 shared

• Sun Woong Baek

  Samueli Institute

  59 shared

• Yucheng Zhou

  52 shared

• Razmig Kandilian

  University of California, Los Angeles

  50 shared

Labs

• Morrin-Martinelli-Gier Memorial Heat Transfer LaboratoryPI

Education

• Ph.D., Environmental Science and Engineering

  University of California, Los Angeles

  2009

• M.S., Environmental Science and Engineering

  University of California, Los Angeles

  2005

• B.S., Environmental Science

  University of California, Los Angeles

  2003