Zachary Cordero

Zachary Cordero joined the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics as an assistant professor in July 2020, to pursue research on additive manufacturing of architectured materials for extreme environments, such as those encountered in thermal protection and propulsion systems. He was formerly an assistant professor of Materials Science and NanoEngineering at Rice University where he lead the Additive Lab. He received his B.Sc. in physics and Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from MIT. He then spent one year as a postdoctoral fellow at the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. There, he developed improved process monitoring, quality control, and microstructure design tools for power-bed, metal additive manufacturing technologies. His notable accomplishments as a principal investigator include: developing a hybrid additive manufacturing technique termed PrintCasting for creating architectured composites with precisely controlled thermal and mechanical properties; elucidating the micro-scale deformation mechanisms that control ultrasonic welding and ultrasonic additive manufacturing; and demonstrating a directional solidification technique for growing oligocrystals with tailored 3D grain boundary networks. At MIT, he is using these techniques to tackle key challenges limiting the performance of next-generation aircraft and spacecraft. Professor Cordero’s work has been recognized by several awards including Air Force Young Investigator.