Welcome to the McCloskey Laboratory website! 

We are a part of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley and the Environmental Energy Technologies Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Our laboratory is interested in fundamental processes occurring in electrochemical energy storage devices, with a particular emphasis on batteries. Many potential battery chemistries possess high theoretical specific energies (e.g., lithium/oxygen and lithium/sulfur), and, as a result, are being explored in hope that their development may lead to an increase in practical battery energy density compared to currently available batteries. However, for these batteries to become a commercial reality, material challenges that cause rechargeability and rate capability limitations need to be addressed; our research efforts are motivated by the opportunity these material challenges present. By employing various state-of-the-art techniques, we use insights gained from fundamental chemical and electrochemical characterization to direct materials development that will lead to improvements in high specific energy battery operation.