Josh Moon

Education

Undergraduate Institution: University of Alabama

Graduate Institution: University of Texas at Austin

Biography

Josh graduated from The University of Alabama in 2014 with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering, after which he attended The University of Texas at Austin as a doctoral Harrington Fellow and NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Advised by Profs. Benny Freeman and Donald Paul, the main focus of his work was investigating the impact of humidity and polymer blending on molecular transport in polybenzimidazole gas separation membranes. Josh graduated with a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from UT Austin in 2019 and is currently working as a post-doc at UCSB, co-advised by Profs. Rachel Segalman and Craig Hawker. He plans to continue pursuing a research career in academia focused on the intersection of polymer design and fundamental molecular transport, particularly for membrane-based applications.

Research

As part of the Center for Materials for Water and Energy Systems (M-WET), Josh's research is currently focused on developing and characterizing polymer membrane materials for water treatment applications. In particular, Josh is investigating water and ion transport in polymeric ionic liquids for selective ion removal for resource recovery (e.g., lithium recovery).