Faculty

• Dr. Chang Liu

Graduate students

• Duc Nguyen
  • 2025 DFD Travel Award
  • Early Bird Awardee of 100+1 New England Complex Fluids Conference
• Jino George

We are continuously searching for highly motivated Ph.D. students to join the group. If you are interested in applying Ph.D. fellowship together, please contact me. More fellowships for doctoral candidates and also available here.

Undergraduates

• Zhengyang Wei
  • Zhengyang Wei, Chang Liu “Nonlinear input-output analysis of transitional shear flows using small-signal finite-gain \(\mathcal{L}_p\) stability” Physical Review Fluids (Accepted) https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.08129 Data and Code: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17086411
  • Zhengyang Wei, Weichen Zhao, Chang Liu “Upper bound of transient growth in accelerating and decelerating wall-driven flows using the Lyapunov method” (Under Review) https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.01410 Data and Code: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.16876758
  • 2025 DFD Travel Award and UConn OUR Conference Presentation Award
  • Awarded 2025 UConn Summer Undergraduate Research Fund (SURF) Awards
  • Selected by University Scholar Program (Featured in UConn Today)
• Kalin Kochnev
  • Kalin Kochnev, Chang Liu “Stability Analysis of Thermohaline Convection With a Time-Varying Shear Flow Using the Lyapunov Method” (Under Review) https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.26545 Data and Code: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17227640
  • Awarded 2024 UConn Summer Undergraduate Research Fund (SURF) Awards
  • Awarded NASA Connecticut Space Grant Consortium Undergraduate Scholarship

Highly motivated undergraduate students are encouraged to get in touch. UConn students can check funding opportunities from the Office of Undergraduate Research, such as Summer Undergraduate Research Fund (SURF) Awards, Caxide Scholars Program, Holster Scholars Program, and University Scholar Program. More opportunities for undergraduate students are here.

Visiting Students and Scholars

• Zekai Song

Visiting students and scholars are welcome to contact and discuss potential collaborative projects.

Postdocs

Currently, we only consider postdocs with external sources of funding or fellowship. If you are interested in applying postdoc fellowship together, please contact me to discuss a potential project. More Fellowships for postdocs and early career professionals, and also here.

High School Students

• Nabeel Chasmawala

Highly motivated high school students interested in Science Research Competitions are welcome to contact. K-14 educators who are interested in Research Experiences for Teachers in Engineering and Computer Science are welcome to contact.

Alumni

• Leran Hu (Visiting Undergraduate, Summer 2025)
• Saujas Kant (High School Intern, Summer 2025)
• Arden Lu (High School Intern, Summer 2025)
• Weichen Zhao (Visiting Undergraduate, Summer 2024) Next position: Master student at Binghamton University–SUNY
• Yusuf Zaidi (Undergraduate)
  • Awarded NASA Connecticut Space Grant Consortium Internship
• Aditya Thakar (High School Intern, Fall 2024) Next position: Undergraduate at the University of Connecticut
• Jingrui (Ray) Hu (High School Intern, Summer 2024) Selected as Valedictorian. Next position: Undergraduate at the University of California, Los Angeles
• Benjamin Machlus (High School Intern, Summer 2024) Next position: Undergraduate at Rochester Institute of Technology

Research Mentees before UConn

• Zhiwei Dave Li (Co-advised with Adrian van Kan and Edgar Knobloch)
  • Next position: Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago
  • Zhiwei Dave Li, Chang Liu, Adrian van Kan, Edgar Knobloch (2025) “Traveling spatially localized convective structures in an inclined porous medium” Physical Review Fluids. 10, 034402 (Featured by NSF ACCESS) https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.10.034402
  • Awarded SIAM student travel award for SIAM Conference on Applications of Dynamical Systems (DS25)
  • Awarded 2024 APS DFD travel award
• Lichuan Xu (Co-advised with Adrian van Kan and Edgar Knobloch)
  • Next position: Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago
  • Lichuan Xu, Adrian van Kan, Chang Liu, Edgar Knobloch (2024) “Fluctuation-Induced Transitions in Anisotropic Two-Dimensional Turbulence” Physical Review Fluids. 9, 064605. (Editor’s Suggestion) https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.9.064605
  • Awarded by Physics Innovators Initiative Summer Scholars (Pi²) and Berkeley Physics Undergraduate Research Scholars (BPURS)
• Troy Tsubota (Co-advised with Benjamin Foster and Edgar Knobloch)
  • Next position: Ph.D. student at Harvard University
  • Troy Tsubota, Chang Liu, Benjamin Foster, Edgar Knobloch (2024) “Bifurcation delay and front propagation in the real Ginzburg-Landau equation on a time-dependent domain” Physical Review E. 109, 044210 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.109.044210
  • UC Berkeley Physics Departmental Citation (top graduating senior)
  • Awarded by Physics Innovators Initiative Summer Scholars (Pi²) and Berkeley Physics Undergraduate Research Scholars (BPURS)
• Aishwarya Rath (Co-advised with Dennice F. Gayme)
  • Aishwarya Rath, Chang Liu, Dennice F. Gayme (2024) “A structured input-output approach to evaluating the effects of uniform wall-suction on optimal perturbations in transitional boundary layers” 2024 Conference on Decision and Control, Milan, Italy, pp. 7714-7719 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10886180
• Yu Shuai (Co-advised with Dennice F. Gayme)
  • Next position: Ph.D. student at Princeton University
  • Yu Shuai, Chang Liu, Dennice F. Gayme (2023) “Structured Input-Output Analysis of Oblique Laminar-Turbulent Patterns in plane Couette-Poiseuille Flow.” International Journal of Heat and Fluid Flow. 103, 109207. (Invited) https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatfluidflow.2023.109207
  • Yu Shuai, Chang Liu, Dennice F. Gayme (2022) “Structured Input-Output Analysis of Oblique Turbulent Bands in Transitional Plane Couette-Poiseuille Flow.” Proceedings of the Twelfth International Symposium on Turbulence and Shear Flow Phenomenon, Osaka, Japan (Online). http://www.tsfp-conference.org/proceedings/2022/254.pdf.pdf

Collaborators

• Edgar Knobloch
• Keith Julien
• Dennice Gayme
• Colm-cille P. Caulfield
• Stanislav Gordeyev
• Flint Thomas
• Igal Gluzman
• Antwan D. Clark
• Shixiao Fu