He received the Ph.D degree from University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB) in 2012 after Nobel Laureate Professor Shuji Nakamura. Dr. Zhao's research focuses on GaN-based wide bandgap semiconductor devices for power and energy applications, including LEDs, solar cells, and power transistors. Dr. Zhao has more than 70 journal and conference publications, 2 book chapter, and over 10 patents. He has received 2016 DoD DTRA Young Investigator Award, 2015 NASA Early Career Faculty Award, 2015 Bisgrove Scholar Career Faculty Award, and several best paper awards. His work was supported by NASA, DoD, and SFAz for space and power applications.