You Zhou
Associate Professor
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Maryland
Affiliate: Electrical and Computer Engineering, Physics, Quantum Materials Center
Kim Engineering Building, Room 2246, 8228 Paint Branch Drive, College Park, MD 20742
Curriculum vitae (PDF)·Google Scholar·Selected publications·youzhou (at) umd.edu
You Zhou is an Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park, with affiliations in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Physics, and the Quantum Materials Center. The Zhou lab builds heterostructures of atomically thin semiconductors and probes them with light, studying electron crystals, excitons, and polarons, and how their strong coupling to light can be used in devices. Zhou received a B.S. in Physics from Peking University in 2010 and a Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard University in 2015, advised by Shriram Ramanathan, and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard with Hongkun Park from 2015 to 2020. Zhou joined the University of Maryland faculty in 2021 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2026. Honors include the NSF CAREER Award, the Department of Energy Early Career Award, and the IUPAP Early Career Scientist Prize in the Structure and Dynamics of Condensed Matter.
Education
- Ph.D. in Applied Physics, Harvard University, 2015
- B.S. in Physics, Peking University, 2010
Appointments
- Associate Professor, University of Maryland, 2026–present
- Assistant Professor, University of Maryland, 2021–2026
- Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University, 2015–2020
Awards and honors
- 2026Junior Faculty Outstanding Research Award, UMD
- 20242DM Young Scientist Award, 2D Materials, IOP Publishing
- 2023Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award, ORAU
- 2023Outstanding Young Scientist, Maryland Academy of Sciences
- 2023IUPAP Early Career Scientist Prize in the Structure and Dynamics of Condensed Matter
- 2022Department of Energy Early Career Award
- 2021NSF CAREER Award
- 2018Forbes 30 Under 30–Science
- 2013MRS Graduate Student Award
- 2012Ernst Habicht Fellowship, Harvard University
In the news
- 2026Nature Physics News & Views, Phys.org, and Maryland Today on Wigner polarons as probes of an electron crystal (Nature Physics).
- 2024Nature Photonics News & Views, a Department of Energy Office of Science highlight, Brookhaven National Laboratory, and MSE UMD on giant optical nonlinearity from Fermi polarons (Nature Photonics).
- 2021Quanta Magazine, the Harvard Gazette, Phys.org, Chemistry World, and MSE UMD on bilayer Wigner crystals (Nature); commentary in the Journal Club for Condensed Matter Physics.
- 2021Department of Energy highlight on temperature-independent thermal emission from a correlated oxide.
- 2020Nature Reviews Materials on electrically tunable valley dynamics in twisted WSe2 bilayers; Nature Nanotechnology News & Views on reconstructed domains in twisted MoSe2 bilayers.
- 2018Nature research highlight, Physics Synopsis, and Chemistry World on the atomically thin mirror (Physical Review Letters).
- 2017Nature Nanotechnology News & Views on dark excitons; Columbia Engineering on correlated perovskites for tunable photonics.
- 2016Nature Energy, Harvard SEAS, IEEE Spectrum, Argonne National Laboratory, and National Science Review on strongly correlated perovskite fuel cells (Nature).
- 2014The Harvard Gazette, Phys.org, IEEE Spectrum, and NSF on colossal resistance switching in a perovskite nickelate.
- 2013Harvard SEAS on a correlated-oxide synaptic transistor.
Invited talks
Service
Professional service
- 2025–Member, MRS Early Career Professionals Subcommittee.
- 2020–25Organizer, two technical symposia: Symposium MQ04, Emerging Materials for Quantum Information Technologies, MRS Fall Meeting (2025); and Symposium on Correlated Insulating States in Two Dimensions, Harvard University (2020, recordings).
- 2023Selected Participant, National Academy of Engineering EU-US Frontiers of Engineering Symposium.
- 2020–Proposal Reviewer for the Department of Energy, National Science Foundation (including the Graduate Research Fellowship Program), Department of Defense (including the NDSEG Fellowship Program), Dutch Research Council, and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
- 2013–Journal Referee for more than 30 journals, including 2D Mater., Adv. Mater., Appl. Phys. Lett., IEEE Electron Device Lett., Mater. Today, Nano Lett., Nat. Commun., Nat. Mater., Nat. Phys., Nat. Rev. Mater., Nature, Optica, Phys. Rev. Lett., Phys. Rev. X, and Science.
University and department service
- 2021–Member, 25 Ph.D. dissertation committees, University of Maryland (2 at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute).
- 2023–26Member, Graduate Admission Committee, Department of Materials Science and Engineering.
Teaching, mentoring, and outreach
- ENMA 436/636Introduction to Quantum Materials and Devices.
- ENMA 460/PHYS 431Introduction to Solid State Physics.
- ENMA 486/688Seminar in Materials Science and Engineering.
- ENMA 434Quantum Mechanics for Engineers.
- ENMA 499Senior Laboratory Project.
Outreach
Every summer the group takes in high school and undergraduate students through national and local programs. They work alongside the graduate students and postdocs on real pieces of ongoing projects: growing films, fabricating devices, running optical measurements.
We partner with the Army Educational Outreach Program, the National Security Scholars Summer Internship Program, and the Summer RISE Program of Montgomery County Public Schools, and work with Maryland public schools, Howard Community College, and the Close the Gap Foundation to reach students who would not otherwise find their way into a research laboratory.
- 2026Mentor, 4 undergraduates, National Security Scholars Summer Internship Program.
- 2026Mentor, 4 undergraduates and 1 high-school student, Army Educational Outreach Program (AEOP) summer program.
- 2024Speaker, Discovering Engineering Summer Camp, University of Maryland.
- 2023Speaker, Pre-College Scholars Program Summer Camp, University of Maryland.
- 2023Speaker, Engineering Seminar, Howard Community College.
- 2023Mentor, 2 high-school research interns, Asian American Academy of Science and Engineering Mentorship Program.
- 2021–Advisor, 3 high-school research interns, Maryland Public Schools.
- 2021–Host, 11 summer students, Summer RISE Program, Montgomery County Public Schools.
- 2021Mentor, low-income and first-generation students, Forbes 30 Under 30 x Close the Gap Foundation.