About Me

I’m a PhD student in Civil and Environmental Engineering at MIT, working in the Rock Mechanics Lab. My research focuses on electrical fracturing of rock to permeability enhancement for enhanced geothermal systems and other subsurface applications. I really enjoy building things myself and solving hands-on problems, especially anything related to digital design and fabrication.

Before MIT, I worked on earthquake rehabilitation projects in Nepal, including community housing reconstruction, hospitals, and a blood bank. I did my masters at Tsinghua University, Beijing China and during my master’s, I worked on numerically modeling rainfall- and reservoir water level fluctuation–induced landslides in large reservoir areas, and I also simulated potential scenarios of landslide-induced tsunamis in reservoir settings.

As a researcher, I enjoy working with experimental setups, sensors, and data, and I like digging into how systems actually behave in the lab.

At MIT, my work is focused on understanding electrical pulse–induced rock fracturing from different angles. I run a range of experiments looking at how the number of pulses affects fracturing, along with current–voltage–capacitance effects, time dependence, and chemical changes in the system. The goal is to better understand this dynamic shock-driven fracturing process and explore its potential applications, from enhanced geothermal systems for cleaner energy extraction to other fields like mining and tunneling.