2025 | Looking Back

2025 was a year of quiet consolidation for the MAVENs group — not loud in numbers, but meaningful in direction.

We worked across electrocatalysis, 2D materials, and magnetic alloys, asking how chemistry, electronic structure, and magnetism can be engineered rather than merely reported. The problems were diverse, but the thread was common: using fundamental understanding to guide materials design.

The Research: Beyond publication metrics, the group focused on careful, physics-driven ab initio work in an era increasingly dominated by speed.

The Mentorship: On the mentoring side, this year marked a historic milestone for the lab. Dr. Karunakaran M completed and successfully defended his PhD thesis, marking MAVENs’ first doctoral graduate.

New Directions: The group has also begun moving deliberately into an interdisciplinary regime, where condensed-matter physics meets materials chemistry, catalysis, and data-driven methods. Exploring these interfaces is where the most compelling materials problems lie.

We are deeply grateful to the collaborators and students who contributed to our work this year, and look forward to deeper questions and broader collaborations ahead.