She received her Ph.D. in Materials Science from California Institute of Technology in 2001. She was a co-recipient of 1999 Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology for Theoretical Work during her Ph.D. study. After her Ph.D., she spent 12 years working at the Chemical Sciences and Materials Systems Lab, General Motors R&D Center. At GM, she developed multi-scale models starting from atomistic level to solve problems related to forming and machining of lightweight alloys, and developing energy materials for batteries and fuel cells. She won three GM Campbell awards for fundamental research on various topics and TMS Young Leader Professional Development Award. She transitioned from industry to academia in 2013 and quickly built the “Materials Simulation for Clean Energy” Lab at MSU. Recently, she received the 2017 TMS Brimacombe Medalist Award.