Computationally-Assisted Materials Discovery - Startup Exchange Lightning Talks

Irina Gaziyeva comes to Corporate Relations from the Mechanical Engineering Department at MIT where she worked 10 years as Administrative Assistant where she has supported four senior faculty members and their research groups (20-25 graduate students). Since 2018, Irina has acted as program coordinator, teaming-up with the program manager and program faculty lead for the MechE Alliance program. She has facilitated 45+ virtual seminars, workshops, and mentoring events in this informal role. Irina has also actively connected members of the MechE community to support student career development, mentorship, and networking opportunities with MIT alumni and industry. Before MIT, Irina held positions as Administrative Assistant and Member Representative at Brookline Dental and Tufts Health plan, respectively. Irina has also been a Community Organizer in Worcester, MA.

Irina earned her B.A., Management (with Innovation & Entrepreneurship track) at Clark University in Worcester, and her M.S., Program and Project Management from Brandeis University in Waltham. She has received many awards at MIT for outstanding service, and she has extensive community volunteer work to her credit.

As EVP of QuesTekInnovations LLC, Jason T. Sebastian, Ph.D., is focused on overall company growth and management, and on the entire spectrum of commercial and government-sponsored alloy modeling, development, and deployment activities. Since Jason joined QuesTek in 2006, his technical activities have focused on the development of high-strength steels for structural and power transmission applications; precipitation-strengthened cobalt-based alloys; alloys for additive manufacturing; non-toxic, high-strength/low-friction copper-based alloys to replace lead-containing bronzes; a low-cost, castable titanium alloy; a highly-processable nickel-based superalloy; advanced soft magnetic alloys; and other computationally-designed alloys. Jason is a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he earned a B.S. in Ceramic Engineering and a B.A. in Philosophy. After a year of postgraduate study at Cambridge University (Churchill College) with the support of a Winston ChurchillFoundation Scholarship, he went on to earn a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Northwestern University under the supervision of Prof. David Seidman and with the support of a Department of Defense National DefenseScience and Engineering Graduate Fellowship.Dr. Prabhu Rao is an executive with demonstrated success and strong leadership in the clean energy business. Over the last three decades he has been involved in many incubator and start-up ecosystems and has mentored a large number of founders and entrepreneurs. As the CEO of Ivys Adsorption Inc. and Chairman of Ivys Energy Solutions, Dr. Rao is focused on developing products and solutions to enable a circular economy. He is a strong believer that circularity is an essential step to the transition to a renewable future.

Jacob Grose, Ph.D. is currently the CEO/Co-founder of Copernic Catalysts, a Boston-based startup leveraging computational materials design and high-throughput experiments to develop transformational drop-in catalysts for sustainable ammonia and e-fuel production. Prior to founding Copernic in 2021, Jacob was an Investment Manager for BASF Venture Capital, where he headed the Boston office, sourcing and managing investments related to current and future businesses of BASF. He has worked at the intersection of chemistry and entrepreneurship for more than 15 years, interacting with multiple startups in a variety of roles at BASF and Lux Research. Jacob received his Ph.D. in physics from Cornell University.Dr. Rojas has climate-tech venture capital and technology development experience, having previously worked for Baruch Future Ventures and having co-invented the core IP for a successful start-up. He holds a Ph.D. in hydrogen production and energy systems from Stanford University (under Dr. Arun Majumdar), as well as two M.S. degrees from Stanford and two B.S. degrees from MIT.

Dr. Alex O’Brien is the co-founder and CEO of AtoMeInc, a materials innovation company producing reinforced metal materials for extreme environments. Alex graduated with a PhD from MIT’s Nuclear Science and Engineering department in 2023 with a dissertation focused on applying 3D printing to develop new alloys for nuclear fusion. Shortly after graduating, Alex joined with former MIT research scientist, Dr. Kang Pyo (KP) So, to form a startup company that would allow them to scale their work on enhanced printable metals and to expand its reach to a wider realm of applications. Alex and KP are currently operating AtoMe’s first laboratory as part of the prestigious HAX accelerator program in Newark, NJ, and are currently spearheading several pilot programs to introduce nano-ceramic reinforced 3D printing into a variety of major industries. Alex has the vision to push the limits of today’s materials to new heights through intelligent customization and to bolster the liability and power of 3D printing to support rapid innovation across the globe.

Dr. Fred Liu is the Founder and CEO ofDeepVerse, a materials informatics company developing adaptive AI systems to accelerate materials innovation. With a Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from the University of Cambridge and postdoctoral research at MIT's Department of Materials Science and Engineering, he bridges cutting-edge AI with industrial R&D needs. His work has resulted in 15+ patents and software IP, including quantum Monte Carlo frameworks and self-optimizing models for high-performance computing. AtDeepVerse, he leads the development of multi-agent AI systems that use active learning and uncertainty quantification to optimize materials from small datasets, enabling breakthroughs with minimal experimental runs. Dr. Liu’s vision is to empower industries with vertically integrated AI solutions that combine first-principles calculations, automated experimentation, and adaptive learning for efficient materials discovery.

Tim Menke is Co-Founder & COO of Atlantic Quantum, where he leads supply chain strategy, government affairs, and business operations. During his PhD at Harvard and MIT, Tim bridged quantum algorithms with superconducting circuit design using machine learning techniques. He was the first to experimentally demonstrate multi-body interactions between quantum bits and the ability to control the strength of these interactions. In addition to his doctoral work, Tim spearheaded a research collaboration with BMW, Zapata, and MIT, in which he co-developed quantum-inspired and quantum algorithms to optimize complex manufacturing schedules. Tim holds a PhD in Physics from Harvard University, as well as master’s and bachelor’s degrees in Physics from ETH Zurich in Switzerland.