Stanford University
Showing 551-594 of 594 Results
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Phillip Wickham
Adjunct Lecturer, Design Courses
Bio“Of the 10,000 start-ups we studied, 65% died because of dysfunctional human dynamic.” - Noam Wasserman (Founder’s Dilemma), HBS
Phil Wickham believes that a leader's energy and its impact on organizational culture is under-appreciated for its role in successful innovation.
Phil is Co-Founder and Executive Managing Director of Sozo Ventures, a $1.7-billion venture fund with offices in Redwood City and Tokyo. Sozo has, for over 15 years, invested in disruptive data science start-ups with global ambitions, specifically supporting them with early, intelligent engagement with Japanese markets. Notable successes include Palantir, Twitter (X), Square, MongoDB, Coinbase, Zoom, ChorusAI and Fastly. Sozo is also an early investor in Applied Intuition, Anduril, Saronic, Grammarly, Deel, Chainalysis, Need, Molten, Mercy Bio, Yellow Card and Carbon Robotics.
Phil is emeritus CEO and Chairman of the Kauffman Fellows. Over 30 years, he’s shepherded the development of nearly 1000 emerging leaders in venture capital in more than 60 countries. During his tenure, more than 300 new venture funds were created from within the Kauffman global community. He also helped conceive, staff and seed-fund TrueBridge Capital Partners (FoF), as well as The Kauffman Fellows Fund (direct), and is an emeritus advisor to the Creandum Fund in Stockholm, Angular Ventures in London/Tel Aviv, Taro Ventures in Tokyo, Frontline Ventures in Dublin and MaC Ventures in LA.
From 2018-2022, Phil taught capital formation at Waseda University as a Visiting Professor. In 2024, he co-founded the 11KS Foundation in Japan to promote innovation education. Phil has also published two #1 best-sellers in Japan on capital formation for startups and writes regularly for publications there.
He was raised on hockey rinks in Upstate New York, and has been playing competitive tennis for longer than he cares to admit. He is an avid collector of antique maps—a passion passed down by his father—and often invokes the parable of the “Island of California” to reinforce the importance of good inquiry and challenging assumptions. He is the proud father of two daughters, the youngest of three children and a screaming Enneagram Type 7.
University of Arizona, BSME, 1987
Rensselaer, MBA, 1994
Kauffman Fellows, 1997 -
Jeffrey Robinson Wood
Capstone Course & Lab Projects Development Director, Mechanical Engineering
Current Role at StanfordME Capstone Course and Lab Project Development Director
Jeff is the ME Capstone Course and Lab Projects Development Director, where he brings his 25-year industry experience to the role. He is responsible for the ongoing strategy, design, curriculum plan and instruction plans for capstone courses in the Mechanical Engineering Department, as part of a broad effort to redesign the curriculum requirements for the undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering.
Lecturer, ME170 - Mechanical Engineering Design: Integrating Context with Engineering
Jeff is a lecturer for the capstone course he has developed, where he brings his extensive experience with the industry product development process to the class. In addition to establishing budget, resource, timeline requirements, Jeff has successfully promoted incorporating themes into the course consistent with the goals of the department and university – to address the pressing needs of human society: energy, sustainability, health, transportation.
Member, Undergraduate Studies Committee, Mechanical Engineering
Innovation Mentor, TomKat Center for Sustainable Energy -
Thomas Wooldridge
Ph.D. Student in Mechanical Engineering, admitted Autumn 2025
BioMy name is Thomas Wooldridge. I recently graduated with my BS in Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University. I am currently a research assistant in Dr. Ron Hanson's lab group, where I am interested in working with shock tubes, laser analytic systems, and hypersonics. I enjoy spending time outside, playing golf and badminton, and going to the gym.
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Peter Xie
Ph.D. Student in Mechanical Engineering, admitted Autumn 2023
BioResearch:
Engineer developing hydrogels for cancer immunotherapies -
Kun Xu
Postdoctoral Scholar, Mechanical Engineering
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsMaterials characterization by using advanced electron microscopy
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Xiao Yang (杨潇)
Postdoctoral Scholar, Mechanical Engineering
BioXiao Yang is a postdoctoral fellow of Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University. Xiao received his bachelor degree from Tianjin University in China in June 2016, and obtained his doctoral degree from Tianjin University in China in June 2023. Xiao’s research interests focus on fabrication and application of functional liquid crystal elastomer composites.
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Rozie Zangeneh
Physical Science Research Scientist
BioDr. Rozie Zangeneh is a physical science research scientist in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Stanford. She develops and utilizes scientific computational tools and conducts massively parallel computations to study detailed physical processes in these systems and develops data-driven low-order models for affordable computation of highly turbulent systems.
Rozie received her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Maine. Her primary research interests include turbulence modeling (LES and RANS), data-driven and reduced-order models, high-speed aero-thermodynamics, and the aerodynamics of wind turbines. -
Hanfeng Zhai
Ph.D. Student in Mechanical Engineering, admitted Autumn 2023
BioI study mechanics of materials using computer simulations across multiple length and time scales. I am currently working on understanding how material defects and microstructures govern macroscopic mechanical behaviors. This includes constructing plasticity theory from statistics of dislocations, homogenization theory of digital rocks, and developing data-driven methods for multiscale simulations.
I did Research Interns at Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs (working on machine learning for dynamical and energy systems) and Tokyo Electron (working on computational modeling of semiconductor manufacturing).
I am currently teaching (TA & co-lecture) for Elasticity & Inelasticity (ME340). I served as the TA for Finite Element Method (ME335A). -
Renee Zhao
Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering and, by courtesy, of Bioengineering and of Materials Science and Engineering
BioRuike Renee Zhao is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University, where she directs the Soft Intelligent Materials Laboratory. Originally from the historic city of Xi'an, she earned her BS from Xi'an Jiaotong University in 2012. She then pursued Solid Mechanics at Brown University, obtaining her MS in 2014 and PhD in 2016. Following her doctoral studies, she completed postdoctoral training at MIT (2016–2018) before serving as an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University (2018–2021).
Renee’s research focuses on developing stimuli-responsive soft composites for multifunctional robotic systems with integrated shape-changing, assembly, sensing, and navigation capabilities. By integrating mechanics, material science, and advanced material manufacturing, her work enables innovations in soft robotics, miniaturized biomedical devices, robotic surgery, origami systems, active metamaterials, and general deployable morphing structures.
Her contributions have been recognized with honors and awards, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), DARPA Young Faculty Award (YFA, 2025), ARO Early Career Program (ECP) Award (2023), AFOSR Young Investigator Research Program (YIP) Award (2023), Eshelby Mechanics Award for Young Faculty (2022), ASME Henry Hess Early Career Publication Award (2022), ASME Pi Tau Sigma Gold Medal (2022), ASME Applied Mechanics Division Journal of Applied Mechanics Award (2021), NSF CAREER Award (2020), and ASME Applied Mechanics Division Haythornthwaite Research Initiation Award (2018). She is also recognized as a National Academy of Sciences Kavli Fellow and was named one of MIT Technology Review's 35 Innovators Under 35. -
Xiaolin Zheng
Professor of Mechanical Engineering, of Energy Science Engineering, Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy and Professor, by courtesy, of Materials Science and Engineering
BioProfessor Zheng received her Ph.D. in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University (2006), B.S. in Thermal Engineering from Tsinghua University (2000). Prior to joining Stanford in 2007, Professor Zheng did her postdoctoral work in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University. Professor Zheng is a member of MRS, ACS and combustion institute. Professor Zheng received the TR35 Award from the MIT Technology Review (2013), one of the 100 Leading Global Thinkers by the Foreign Policy Magazine (2013), 3M Nontenured Faculty Grant Award (2013), the Presidential Early Career Award (PECASE) from the white house (2009), Young Investigator Awards from the ONR (2008), DARPA (2008), Terman Fellowship from Stanford (2007), and Bernard Lewis Fellowship from the Combustion Institute (2004).
