Suzhi Li received his Ph.D. degree in Materials Science and Engineering from Xi'an Jiaotong University in 2013. He also visited the University of Pennsylvania (2010) and MIT (2011) in US. He then held a postdoctoral position at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany. In 2018, he joined Xi'an Jiaotong University. He used the combined atomistic simulations and experiments to study mechanical processes at the atomic scales, such as interfacial friction in 2D materials, mechanical behavior of refractory alloys. Until now, he has published more than 50 papers in the top journals such as Nature, Science, PNAS, Nature Communications, Acta Materialia etc. He was award as the Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship (2013), Young Scientist Award by the Ministry of Education (2022).

Mechanical properties of materials: From mechanisms to tuning strategies

Dr. Suzhi Li focuses on the study of tribology and the mechanical behavior of materials. He proposed new strategies to elevate mechanical properties of materials and help to develop high-performance materials. He revealed the mechanism governing the frictional behavior of graphene, which exhibits traits unlike those of conventional bulk materials. He found that while the quantity of atomic-scale contacts (true contact area) evolves, the quality (in this case, the local pinning state of individual atoms and the overall commensurability) also evolves in frictional sliding on graphene. He further demonstrated that the friction on a graphene sheet can be actively modulated by in-plane straining. In particular, by applying an adequate tensile strain, the surface friction of monolayer graphene could reach a superlubricating state. He also found that ferroelectric BaTiO3 membranes can undergo a novel superelasticity induced by bending. The strain gradient could induce the formation of a continuous transition zone, which could accommodate the variant strain and avoid high mismatch stress that usually causes fracture. Recently, he demonstrated that the strong lattice distortion in refractory high-entropy alloys could lead to an unconventional rate-controlling mechanism that governs dislocation mobility. Their sluggish mobility explains the elevated strength and strain hardening in these compositionally complex alloys. The lattice distortion can be then taken as an indicator to correlate with the brittleness of refractory alloys.