Arts and Culture
Research and Creative Activity

Japan
Japan Stories
Faculty Research & Creative Activity in Japan
Donnie Ray Albert
Music Performance
Donnie Ray Albert is a regular guest of opera companies and symphony orchestras globally.
Richard Albert
Government, Law
Richard Albert's research interests are constitutionalism, democracy, and the rule of law, with specific focus on constitutional reform, constitution-making, and comparative constitutionalism.
Daniel Allcock
Mathematics
Daniel Allcock's research areas include algebra, algebraic geometry, geometric topology, geometry, and topology.
Thorsten Becker
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Thorsten Becker's research interests are in geodynamics and seismology, focusing on how planets' interior and surface systems have co-evolved. His team integrates field, laboratory, analog, and numerical approaches into geodynamical models, focusing on the physics of plate tectonics, from grain-scale deformation to earthquakes and global mantle flow.
Donald Blankenship
Institute for Geophysics
Donald Blankenship investigates dynamics of large ice sheets and subglacial geology, using both airborne and ground-based geophysical techniques, including laser altimetry, radar sounding, seismic reflection and refraction, and potential fields methods. Much of his research is focused on understanding the West Antarctic rift system (including the flanking Transantarctic Mountains) and the marine-based West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
Danelle Briscoe
Architecture
Danelle Briscoe has lectured, researched, and written extensively on the topic of Building Information Modeling for architectural and urban design.
Rosemary Candelario
Theater and Dance, Center for Asian American Studies, Center for East Asian Studies, Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies
Rosemary Candelario writes about and makes dances engaged with Asian and Asian American dance, butoh, ecology and site-related performance. Her research interests also arts activism and representations of sex and reproduction in performance and popular culture.
Kirsten Cather
Asian Studies
Kirsten Cather's research and teaching interests center on modern Japanese literature and film, specifically on the topics of censorship, suicide, and death in modern Japan.
Jonathan Chen
Textiles and Apparel, Texas Materials Institute
Jonathan Chen's research focuses are on development of bio-functional micron/nano cellulose fiber for apparel and medical textiles, production and evaluation of biobased nonwoven composites for automotive interiors, fabrication and characterization of activated carbon fiber and conductive fabrics for protective garments, water/air filtration, bio- and chemical-decontamination, noise absorption/insulation, energy storage, and wearable sensing.
Sheena Chestnut Greitens
Public Affairs
Sheena Chestnut Greitens' research focuses on security, East Asia, and authoritarian politics & foreign policy.
Adam Clulow
History
Adam Clulow is a historian of early modern Asia. His work is concerned broadly with the transnational circulation of ideas, people, practices and commodities across East and Southeast Asia.
North Cooc
Special Education
North Cooc's research focuses on three main areas: 1) the role of schools and social institutions in reducing racial and ethnic disparities in academic and social outcomes; 2) the unequal opportunities of children with disabilities in navigating the special education system; and 3) the preparation of a diverse and culturally sustaining teacher workforce.
Leah Crocetto
Music Performance
Leah Crocetto is a grammy award winning, internationally acclaimed soprano. She has performed many great opera works in opera houses across the world.
John Doggett
Management
John Doggett's work focuses on global competition, entrepreneurship, sustainability, and energy.
David Eaton
Public Affairs, Middle Eastern Studies, Geography and the Environment, Center for Russian, Eurasian and East European Studies, South Asia Institute, Jewish Studies, Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies, IC2 Institute
David Eaton's research focuses on sustainable development in international river basins, evaluation of energy and water conservation programs, and prevention of pollution.
Paulo Ferreira
Mechanical Engineering
Paulo Ferreira's research is focused on the study of the atomic structure and defect behavior of nanomaterials, used for alternative energy technologies, through in-situ and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy techniques. Ferreira is interested in understanding the relationships between the structure and the properties of nanomaterials, and the underlying mechanisms of structural and property changes induced by crystalline defects.
Stephen Finn
Psychology
Stephen Finn specializes in collaborative/therapeutic assessment, personality assessment, and other topics in clinical psychology like gender identity.
Benny Freeman
Chemical Engineering
Benny Freeman's research explores the relationship between polymer structure, processing and properties, specifically the effect of polymer structure on the solubility, diffusivity, and permeability of small molecules in polymers and polymer-based materials.
John Fremgen
Jazz Studies, Music Performance
John Fremgen's is a trained bassist in both classical and jazz styles. He has performed, taught, and conducted around the world.
Irene Gamba
Mathematics, Oden Institute
Irene Gamba's research group focuses on modeling of non-linear, coupled systems arising in the physical and biological sciences, engineering, medicine, and the social sciences. Using classical and statistical analysis, the group addresses model formulation, interpretation, approximation, and assessment along with multiple dimensional spatial and temporal scales, direct and inverse problems, and accurate and efficient approximation algorithms.
James Gardner
Earth and Planetary Sciences
James Gardner's research focuses on the physical and chemical aspects of volcanic eruptions and magmatic processes. One side involves studying active centers and their deposits, including understanding the dynamics of caldera-forming eruptions. A second area utilizes experiments to determine the contents of volatiles in magmas, the degassing of those volatiles from magmas, and the control of such behavior on eruptions and formation of ore bodies.
Francisco Gonzalez-Lima
Psychology, Medicine, Pharmacy
Francisco Gonzalez-Lima's lab focuses on the mission to prevent neurocognitive and emotional disorders, understand the underlying brain mechanisms, and advance innovative non-invasive treatments. Areas of research interest include transcranial infrared brain stimulation, near infrared spectroscopy, neurocognitive enhancement, mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase, dementia, bipolar disorder and neurotherapeutics.
Benjamin Gregg
Government
Benjamin Gregg's research focuses on social and political theory, bioethics of human genetic engineering, politics of artificial intelligence, and human rights.
Sean Gulick
Earth and Planetary Sciences, Institute for Geophysics
Sean Gulick focuses on geophysical imaging at nested resolutions and scientific drilling to examine impact cratering, tectonic processes, climate interactions, catastrophism in the geologic record, and planetary habitability. Current foci are the Chicxulub K-Pg impact and terrestrial craters, impact hydrothermal systems and planetary habitability, Lunar/Martian geophysics, tectonic hazards, and hi-res imaging for sedimentary climate records.
Patrick Heimbach
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Patrick Heimbach is a computational oceanographer, climate scientist, and hobby glaciologist. His main research interest is understanding the general circulation of the ocean, the dynamics of the marine (and marine-terminating) cryosphere, and their role in the global climate system.
David Heymann
Architecture
David Heymann specializes in the complex relationships of buildings and landscapes, from cultural to environmental; and the relationship of natural landscapes and sustainable construction.
Gary Hill
Astronomy
Gary Hill's research interests include observational cosmology, radio galaxies and quasars, and astronomical instrumentation.
Simon Humphrey
Chemistry
Simon Humphrey's research involves organometallic chemistry, focusing on nanoparticles as catalysts; phosphine coordination materials for gas storage, separation, and catalysis; noble metal nanoparticles; and composite catalyst materials.
Richard Huntley
Music Performance
Richard Huntley is a professor of percussion whose research includes Afro-Cuban folkloric and Lucumi music and batá drumming.
Brian Hurley
Asian Studies
Brian Hurley is a scholar of modern Japanese literature with interests intellectual history and economics. He has written on the literary dimensions of intellectual history, and the intellectual side of literary aesthetics, in 20th-century Japanese texts and is also examining the nexus of aesthetics and economics in postwar and contemporary Japanese literature.
Junfeng Jiao
Architecture
Junfeng Jiao focuses on smart city/urban informatics and understanding cities through AI and big data. Jiao has investigated 311 calls' spatial distribution, Uber's price surge, Airbnb's spatial clustering, E-scooters' origins, destinations, and routings, and bike sharing system planning. He coined term transit deserts and explored how urban environments affect people's access to grocery stores, transit facilities, and bicycle infrastructures.
Shardha Jogee
Astronomy
Shardha Jogee's research seeks to address central questions on the evolution of galaxies as a function of cosmic epoch, mass, and environment. These include how galaxies grow their stars, black holes, and dark matter halos across cosmic time and vastly different environments, the role played by theoretically predicted growth modes, and how galaxy clusters, some of the largest bound structures in the Universe, form.
Jerry Junkin
Music Conducting
Jerry Junkin is an enthusiastic advocate of public-school music education, having conducted All-State bands and festivals in 48 states and on five continents. Junkin spends his summers in residence at the Interlochen Arts Camp in Michigan and appearing at music festivals around the world.
Brian Korgel
Chemical Engineering, Energy Institute
Brian Korgel's research centers on the development of new methods for synthesizing nanostructured materials, fabricating devices based upon these materials, and studying their properties. The lab group focuses on investigating size-tunable material properties, and the rational self-assembly and fabrication of nanostructures with atomic detail. This research finds applications in microelectronics and photonics, spintronics, coatings, sensors and
Mikiya Koyagi
Middle Eastern Studies
Mikiya Koyagi studies social and cultural history of modern Iran as well as the history of intra-Asian connections since the 19th-century, with a focus on the interactions between Japan and the Muslim world.
Michael Krische
Chemistry
Michael Krische's research lies at the interface of enantioselective catalysis, natural product total synthesis and chemical biology. His laboratory has developed a broad, new family of stereo- and site-selective C-C couplings that merge the characteristics of catalytic hydrogenation and carbonyl addition.
Alan Kuperman
Public Affairs
Alan Kuperman's research focuses on ethnic conflict, peaceful conflict management, military intervention, national security, and nuclear nonproliferation.
Keji Lai
Physics
Keji Lai's group actively studies quantum materials with novel electrical, magnetic, and optical properties.
Karol Lang
Physics
Karol Lang is an experimental particle physicist, whose research focuses on studies of neutrinos. Lang typically conducts research and development on particle detectors, such as those for large water Cherenkov detectors.
Yuliya Lanina
Design
Yuliya Lanina is a multimedia artist whose works exist at the intersection of visual, performing arts, and technological innovation, and explore social issues like gender perception, sexuality, loss, and motherhood. Her work has been exhibited and performed around the world.
Elaine Li
Physics
Elaine Li's research focuses on using laser spectroscopy methods to investigate new materials on the nanoscale or individual nanoparticles, quasiparticles, and collective excitations.
Xiaoqin Li
Physics
Elaine Li's research focuses on using laser spectroscopy methods to investigate new materials on the nanoscale or individual nanoparticles, quasiparticles, and collective excitations.
Jung-Fu Lin
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Jung-Fu Lin's research focuses on understanding the nature of the Earth and planetary interiors as well as material sciences through direct examination of the properties of materials under high-pressure and high/low-temperature conditions. His research group often by conducts high pressure experiments using high-pressure diamond anvil cell techniques combined with in-house and synchrotron-based facilities.
Hung-Wen Liu
Chemistry, Pharmacy
Hung-Wen Liu's research focuses on the crossroads of chemistry and biology. His group researches three general areas with the focus aimed at the elucidation of the mechanisms of novel enzymatic reactions and the design of methods to control and/or regulate their functions.
Nathaniel Lynd
Chemical Engineering
Nathaniel Lynd focuses on fundamental and applied research in polymer science guided by the principles of simplicity, sustainability, and relevance to key technological challenges in chemical engineering for the 21st-century in energy, environment, security, and materials for healthcare. His work is built on a foundation of novel techniques for advanced copolymer structure determination and detailed mechanistic understanding.
Allan MacDonald
Physics
Allan MacDonald’s research interests center on the influence of electron-electron interactions on the electronic properties of metals and semiconductors.
Patricia Maclachlan
Government, Asian Studies
Patricia Maclachlan's research interests include comparative political institutions, and the politics and political economy of East Asia, with a focus on Japan.
Vijay Mahajan
Marketing
Vijay Mahajan's areas of expertise include marketing strategy, product diffusion, research methodology and the Global South.
Deirdre Mendez
Business, Government and Society
Deirdre Mendez’s research interests lie in intercultural management, adaptation, and team building.
Risto Miikkulainen
Computer Science, Neuroscience
Risto Miikkulainen’s research focuses on biologically-inspired computation such as neural networks and evolutionary computation. His goal is to understand biological information processing and to develop intelligent artificial systems that learn and adapt by observing and interacting with the environment.
José del R. Millán
Electrical and Computer Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, Neurology
José del R. Millán is an expert in the field of brain-machine interfaces (BMI), especially based on electroencephalogram signals. In addition to his work on the fundamentals of BMI and design of neuroprosthetics, Millán is prioritizing the translation of BMI to end-users who live with motor and cognitive disabilities. In parallel, he is designing BMI technology to offer new interaction modalities for people without disabilities.
Juan Miró
Architecture, Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies
Juan Miró's research explores the connections between architectural design, place-making, nature, and the relevance of history.
Hitoshi Morikawa
Neuroscience, Medicine
Hitoshi Morikawa's research focuses primarily on investigating neural plasticity in the mesostriatal dopaminergic system underlying reward-based learning and the development of addiction. He aims to link specific signaling processes at the cellular and molecular level to learning processes and addictive behavior in behaving animals.
Philip Morrison
Physics
Philip Morrison is a mathematical and theoretical physicist, who studies basic nonlinear plasma dynamics, Hamiltonian dynamics of few and infinite degree-of-freedom systems, computational algorithms that preserve geometric structure, and fluid mechanics.
Anton Nel
Music Performance
Anton Nel is a pianist and continues to tour internationally as recitalist, concerto soloist, chamber musician and teacher. He has performed with some of the world's finest instrumentalists at festivals on four continents.
Quoc Nguyen
Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering
Quoc Nguyen’s research covers advanced gas and chemical enhanced hydrocarbon recovery methods in hydrocarbon formations, thermal and solvent-based recovery of oils, improved production of unconventional resources, fluids design for controlling unwanted fluid production, improving the conformance of injected fluids, removal and preventative treatment of scale deposits and hydrates, and research of heat and mass transfer phenomena and geochemistry.
Chiyo Nishida
Spanish & Portuguese
Chiyo Nishida’s research focuses on Spanish morph-syntax. More recently, she has focused on argument realization variation in ditransitive and gustar-type verb constructions. She is also looking into how to teach information structure and word order to intermediate and advanced students of Spanish.
Hiroshi Nishiyama
Neuroscience
Hiroshi Nishiyama's research goal is to illuminate the principles governing the structural plasticity of neural circuitry in the intact mammalian brain, under both normal (e.g. development, learning and memory) and pathologic conditions (e.g. neurodegeneration).
Dev Niyogi
Earth and Planetary Sciences, Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Dev Niyogi's research contributes to understanding and developing solutions for climate extremes, particularly the urban and agricultural landscapes, and developing synthesis studies, and capacity building activities internationally.
Ryosuke Okuno
Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering
Ryosuke Okuno's research and teaching interests include petroleum engineering, enhanced oil recovery, heavy oil recovery, unconventional oil and gas resources, energy decarbonization, hydrogen and carbon dioxide storage, numerical simulation, thermodynamics, multiphase behavior, and applied mathematics.
Shelby Oxenford
Asian Studies
Shelby Oxenford's interests include postwar and contemporary Japanese, Korean, and comparative East Asian literature, film and media.
Robert Peroni
Law
Robert Peroni specializes in corporate tax, federal income taxation, international tax, natural resource taxation, and professional responsibility/legal ethics. He is an expert in international taxation and in energy taxation.
Franco Pestilli
Psychology
Franco Pestilli's research spans cognitive and computational neuroscience, vision science, and neuroinformatics, contributing to methods for mapping brain networks, understanding human brain neuroanatomy and connectivity, as well as to clarifying fundamental aspects of human visual perception and cognition.
Jonathan Pierce
Neuroscience
Jonathan Pierce's research focuses on genetic mechanisms that govern behaviors and contribute to neurological disorders.
Mark Ravina
History
Mark Ravina specializes in Japanese history, especially 18th- and 19th-century politics, but his broader methodological interest is in the transnational and international dimension of state-building. His research focuses on political language in nineteenth-century Japan, with a focus on text mining.
Néstor Rodríguez
Sociology
Nestor Rodriguez’s research focuses on Guatemalan migration, U.S. deportations to Mexico and Central America, the unauthorized migration of unaccompanied minors, evolving relations between Latinos and African Americans/Asian Americans, and ethical and human rights issues of border enforcement.
Jaganath Sankaran
Public Affairs
Jaganath Sankaran's research focuses on the growing military and nuclear weapons capabilities of China and the counter military balancing undertaken by the United States, Japan, India and other states. In particular, he studies the impact of emerging technological advances on weapons systems deployed by these states.
Joseph Schaub
Asian Studies
Joseph Schaub's studies focuses on Japanese popular culture.
William Schwartz
Medicine
William Schwartz has conducted research on biological clocks and especially on the "master" brain clock in the mammalian hypothalamus. At the Dell Medical School, he is working on the development of interdisciplinary courses at the intersection of biology and medicine for UT Austin undergraduates and the approach to patients with neurological disease for Dell Med students and residents.
Jonathan Sessler
Chemistry
Jonathan Sessler's research expertise is focused on organic chemistry, texaphyrin, expanded porphyrins, anion recognition, drug development, anti cancer agents, and the technical analyses of patents.
Zhenghui Sha
Mechanical Engineering
Zhenghui Sha’s research focuses on system science and design science as well as the intersection between these two areas. His goal is to build the decision-centric science foundation for complex systems engineering and design. Such a foundation will facilitate the integration within complex systems and amplify the data-driven power in engineering design and design research.
Li Shi
Mechanical Engineering
Li Shi's research efforts are focused on electronic and quantum materials for future-generation energy-efficient devices and quantum information technologies. The common theme of these multidisciplinary investigations is to understand and control the transport, conversion, and storage of heat, electricity, and magnetization from the macroscale down to the nanoscopic level of quantized energy excitations, including photons, phonons, electrons, and
SV Sreenivasan
Mechanical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering
S.V. Sreenivasan is a nanotechnologist with an interest in creating high throughput nanofabrication techniques that enable scalable nanotech applications in electronics, displays, and healthcare.
Peter Stone
Computer Science
Peter Stone's research focuses on artificial intelligence with the goal to create autonomous agents that can learn to interact with other agents in a wide range of environments. His research contributions are in the areas of machine learning, autonomous agents and multiagent systems, and robotics. Application domains include robot soccer, autonomous bidding agents, smart traffic management, general-purpose service robots, and autonomous vehicles.
Jeremi Suri
Public Affairs, History
Jeremi Suri's research interests include the formation and spread of nation-states, the emergence of modern international relations, the connections between foreign policy and domestic politics, and the rise of knowledge institutions as global actors.
Hirofumi Tanaka
Kinesiology and Health Education
Hirofumi Tanaka's interests focus on vascular aging that manifests as the stiffening of large elastic artery and vascular endothelial dysfunction, such as the physiological mechanism that mediate vascular aging, sequel or consequences of aging-related vascular dysfunction, and lifestyle modifications that prevent and reverse vascular dysfunction with aging.
Takashi Tanaka
Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
Takashi Tanaka’s research focus is on efficient and reliable real-time decision-making algorithms for autonomous robots and humans. He specializes in stochastic and non-stochastic optimal control, robust control, distributed and networked control, optimization, and game theory. His recent research activities explore the interface between control theory and information theory.
Peter Thomas
Marine Science
Peter Thomas' research focuses on endocrine control of reproduction in fishes and other vertebrates, rapid steroid hormone actions through novel steroid membrane receptors, applications of endocrinology in fish culture, and effects of environmental factors such as hypoxia and pollutants on reproductive endocrine function.
Keiko Torii
Molecular Biosciences
Keiko Torii's research studies how positional cues govern tissue patterning and organ shape, and how lineage-specific stem cells are initiated, maintained or terminally differentiated during plant development, using the stomata's patterning and differentiation as a model.
Maxim Tsoi
Physics
Maxim Tsoi's research is focused on the field of "spintronics," which refers to studying the role played by an electron spin in solid state physics and aims at developing a revolutionary new class of electronic devices based on the spin degree of freedom of the electron. The focus of his research is on experimental investigations of various spintronic phenomena (e.g. spin-transfer torque) in magnetic nanostructures.
Sharon Vaughn
Special Education
Sharon Vaughn investigates effective interventions for students with reading difficulties and students who are English language learners.
Partnerships
- Hiroshima University
- Iwate University
- Keio University
- Kyoto University
- Nagoya University
- Oberlin University
- Oita University
- Sophia University
- Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
- Waseda University
Alumni Connections
Texas Exes Japan Chapter
Participate in Japan's Texas Exes International Chapter to stay connected to UT, meet fellow alumni, participate in a variety of activities and programs, cultivate professional relationships, and find opportunities to engage in the local community.