Zhang's Group

The Smart Material Lab (SML) in the University of North Texas (UNT) is focused on design, analysis, and experiments for piezoelectric devices used for sensing, energy harvesting, and structure health monitoring applications. This group has conducted research in the measurement of linear/nonlinear material constants for a variety of piezoelectric crystals, high temperature material test methodology, modelling and experiment of novel sensing and energy harvesting mechanism, and structure health monitoring in harsh environments. The technology we have developed addresses critical national needs in the monitoring of power plants, manufacturing process and control, aerospace propulsion systems, oil and gas exploration, and other applications. The group’s research is funded by National Science Foundation (NSF), Army Research Office (ARO), Department of Defense (DoD), Department of Energy (DoE) and UNT.