Dr. Shirley Meng

Dr. Y. Shirley Meng, who will serve on our board of directors following the completion of this offering, has served as the Liew Family Professor of the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago since January 2022. In connection with her professorship at the University of Chicago, Dr. Meng is the principal investigator of the research group - Laboratory for Energy Storage and Conversion (LESC), through which several startup companies have formed and spun out, including South 8 Technologies (established in 2017, focusing on LiGasÒ electrolytes for safety and performance), UNIGRID Battery (established in 2020, focusing on high energy safe sodium batteries), and ExPost Technologies (established in 2022, focusing on PRIMEÒ direct recycling of lithium-ion batteries). She is the author and co-author of more than 320 peer-reviewed journal articles, 2 book chapters and over 20 issued and pending patents. Dr. Meng is a world leader in materials science for energy storage. Among her contributions are discoveries of novel electrolyte/electrode materials and solid-state superionic conductors for both lithium and sodium batteries. Dr. Meng pioneered the use of cryogenic microscopy for battery materials and invented a few characterization tools such as titration gas chromatography (TGC) for quantifying “dead” lithium batteries, which significantly enhances the safety of lithium metal battery. Her work has transformed the ways we can design and manipulate energy storage materials for batteries. Dr. Meng is a Fellow of Electrochemical Society (FECS), Fellow of Materials Research Society (FMRS) and Fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). She has served as the Chief Scientist for Energy Storage Science at Argonne National Laboratory and director of the Energy Storage Research Alliance since January 2022. Dr. Meng is also the director of Energy Storage Research Alliance (ESRA), an innovation hub funded in 2024 by US Department of Energy, Office of Science. Dr. Meng served in various professorship roles at the University of California San Diego between November 2009 and January 2021 and serves as a scientific advisory board member for several startups and public companies, including Advano, Ensurge Micropower, SES and Shell.