Ognjen Ilic

Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering

Contact

ilic@umn.edu

612-625-8884

215 Mechanical Engineering

Ognjen Ilic

Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering

Research

Biography

Lab
Laboratory for Nano Optics & Mechanics — ME 373

ME Research Areas
Thermodynamics & Heat Transfer
Materials & Mechanics

ME Impact Areas
Energy Transition
Environment & Sustainability
Next-Gen Manufacturing

Education

Postdoctoral Research Associate, 2016-2019, Department of Applied Physics and Material Science, California Institute of Technology
Ph.D. 2015, Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
A.B. 2009, Physics, Harvard University

Publications & Awards

Honors and Awards

McKnight Land-Grant Professor
Air Force Young Investigator Program (AFOSR YIP) Award
3M Non-Tenured Faculty Award
Materials Research Society (MRS) Bulletin Prize

Selected Publications

M. Stein, S. Keller, Y. Luo, O. Ilic ”Shaping Contactless Radiation Forces Through Anomalous Acoustic Scattering,” Nature Communications 13, 6533 (2022).
O. Ilic and H. Atwater "Self-stabilizing photonic levitation and propulsion of nanostructured macroscopic objects," Nature Photonics, 13(4), p.289 (2019).
O. Ilic “Nanophotonic Materials for Space Applications,” MRS Bulletin, 45(9), 769 (2020).
Y. Shi, O. Ilic, H. Atwater, J. Greer “All-day Fresh Water Harvesting by Microstructured Hydrogel Membranes,” Nature Communications, 12, 2797 (2021).
O. Ilic, N. Thomas, T. Christensen, M. Sherrott, M. Soljačić, A. Minnich, O. Miller, and H. Atwater "Active radiative thermal switching with graphene plasmon resonators," ACS Nano, 12(3), p.2474 (2018).
O. Ilic, P. Bermel, G. Chen, J.D. Joannopoulos, I. Celanovic, M. Soljačić “Tailoring High Temperature Radiation and the Resurrection of the Incandescent Source,” Nature Nanotechnology, 11, 320-324 (2016).
H. Atwater, A. Davoyan, O. Ilic, D. Jariwala, M. Sherrott, C. Went, W. Whitney, J. Wong "Materials challenges for the Starshot lightsail," Nature Materials, 17, p.861 (2018).
O. Ilic, I. Kaminer, B. Zhen, O. Miller, H. Buljan, M. Soljačić "Topologically enabled optical nanomotors," Science Advances, 3(6), e1602738 (2017).

Publications list

Selected Press Coverage:

“Ultrasound Waves Unlock Contactless Manipulation” ASME (2023).
“U of M study shows new way to move objects with sound waves rather than physical touch” KSTP Eyewitness News (2022)
“This Star Trek-style “Tractor Beam” allows objects to be moved using metamaterials and sound waves” The Debrief (2022).
“New Material Could Harvest Water All Day Long” Caltech News (2021).
“These bold engineering ideas could take humanity to the stars” Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE), online feature article (2019).
“A light ride to the stars” Nature Photonics: News & Views (2019).
“Across the universe” editorial in Nature Materials (2018).
“The material science of building a light sail to take us to Alpha Centauri” Ars Technica (2018).
“Building sails for tiny interstellar probes will be tough, but not impossible” Scientific American (2018).
“Tiny motors are driven by light” MIT News (2017).
“Light-bulb moment: A bright idea to save a beloved technology from the dustbin” The Economist (2016).
“Graphene plasmonics: Ultra-tunable graphene light source” Nature Photonics: News & Views (2015).
“A new way to make X-rays” MIT News (2015).