About

Riley E. Rex is a materials scientist who focuses on understanding the interaction between light and electronic processes in semiconductors. He earned his Bachelor’s degree in Physics from The Evergreen State College in 2010. During his undergraduate years, Riley worked on projects that involved measuring carbon dioxide with infrared spectroscopy, generating electricity with magnets, plasma physics, superconductors, and physics education. In 2008, Riley earned a National Science Foundation scholarship for his academic work. In 2009, he participated in an internship at the Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory.

Riley earned his PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from Washington State University (WSU) in 2016. During graduate school, Riley was the primary author of four publications in American Chemical Society journals and presented at several international conferences. He was also active in the student community. He volunteered at many education and outreach events and served as the president of the WSU chapter of the Materials Research Society. In 2015, Riley earned an Outstanding Service Award for his work in the Materials Science program at WSU. In 2016, Riley’s research earned the 1^st Place Poster award at the Molecules and Materials for Artificial Photosynthesis Conference in Cancun, Mexico, and his dissertation was awarded an Outstanding Thesis Award at WSU.

In the last year of his PhD program, Riley started a visiting faculty position in chemistry at The Evergreen State College. Here he gained teaching experience as the instructor for lectures, labs, and workshops in interdisciplinary chemistry courses. During his time at Evergreen, Riley also mentored student research projects in chemistry and materials science.

Much of the work presented on this site could not have been completed without the guidance and support of Prof. Jeanne McHale and the other members of the McHale group. Special thanks to the Franceschi Microscopy & Imaging Center where I did all of the electron microscopy work and to my lab partners, especially Dr. Candy Mercado and Dr. Fritz Knorr, for their help and direction in the spectroscopy lab.