Critical mineral recovery
Engineering ligand-functionalized metal-organic frameworks and ion-exchange membranes to recover rare earth elements and lithium from complex brines.
Yiming Liu Research Group
Interfacial science for
circular water systems
Water · Materials · Energy · CircularityWelcome
About our research
Welcome to the Liu Group at South Dakota State University. We are interested in understanding and controlling the moments where matter meets water.
We are a curious, collaborative research team working at the intersection of environmental engineering, interfacial science, and materials design. By connecting molecular-scale mechanisms with membrane, electrochemical, and thermal processes, we develop technologies for critical mineral recovery, material-water interface control, brine concentration, and scale prevention.
We are recruiting.
Explore our research →We currently have openings for motivated Ph.D. students and are actively recruiting motivated M.S. and B.S. students. Interested students should email Dr. Yiming Liu at yiming.liu@sdstate.edu with a single PDF containing their CV and academic transcript, along with a brief statement of interest in the email.
Research directionsScience designed
Science designed
for circularity.
Material-water interface
Understanding and controlling nucleation, scaling, and molecular transport where water meets membranes, electrodes, and heat-transfer surfaces.
Brine concentration process
Reimagining hypersaline water as a source of water, energy, and materials through high-recovery separations and efficient process design.
Associated publicationsFirst-AuthoredMultistage surface-heated vacuum membrane distillation process enables high water recovery and excellent heat utilizationFirst-AuthoredConducting thermal energy to the membrane/water interface for the enhanced desalination of hypersaline brines using membrane distillation
Latest
All news →News & highlights
Founding President Best Paper Award
Chinese-American Professors in Environmental Engineering and Science
Outstanding Oral Presentation Award
19th Chinese Environmental Conference
New work in Nature Communications
Electrical control of CaCO3 nucleation and crystal growth
Collaboration
Interested in working together?
I welcome conversations with researchers, students, and partners working on material-water interfaces, critical-mineral separations, and brine concentration processes.
Join the group →