Jeffrey Richards

Dr. Jeffrey Richards is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Northwestern University's McCormick School of Engineering. His research focuses on establishing structure-property relationships in multicomponent soft materials to enable next-generation technologies for energy storage and conversion. The Richards Lab develops novel experimental methods to characterize colloidal systems using combined rheological and electrical measurements.

Research interests include carbon black suspensions for battery applications, rheo-electric characterization techniques, nanoparticle self-assembly, and flowable semiconducting materials. Recent work examines lithium-ion battery slurry processing (2025), anisotropic conductive composites (2025), and dielectric spectroscopy during shear deformation (2023).

Publications demonstrate innovations in electroless nanoparticle deposition (2023), carbon suspension rheology (2023), and high-throughput mechanical characterization (2023). The lab develops open-source tools like FSVPy for velocimetry analysis.

Dr. Richards leads a research group including postdoctoral fellows and graduate students, with a commitment to diversity in materials science. He obtained his PhD from the University of Washington in 2014.