Geoff Wehmeyer
Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering
Geoff Wehmeyer is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. He leads the Nanoscale Heat Transfer Laboratory and teaches courses in heat transfer and statistical mechanics. His research interests include thermal property measurements of nanomaterials, nanoscale thermometry using electron microscopy, and thermal management using nonlinear thermal devices.
Geoff Wehmeyer joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering as an assistant professor in 2018. Dr. Wehmeyer received his bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 2013. At UT Austin, he researched fluid flow through microstructured heat pipes for electronic cooling applications and designed compact adsorbent heat pump systems for electric vehicle cabin climate control. He received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering in 2018 from the University of California, Berkeley, where he was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and a Berkeley Graduate Fellowship. During his doctoral research, Dr. Wehmeyer developed electron microscopy nanothermometry techniques and phonon transport simulations to study the fundamental mechanisms of heat transfer in complicated nanostructures.
Research Areas
Dr. Wehmeyer uses experimental and theoretical techniques to study heat transfer, with an emphasis on nanoscale heat conduction. This research is motivated by applications such as microelectronic thermal management, solid-state energy conversion, and heat-assisted magnetic recording, all of which require a detailed understanding of how heat is conducted through nanostructures and across interfaces. Dr. Wehmeyer seeks to first understand the mechanisms of heat transfer at small lengthscales, and then to use this fundamental knowledge in the design of macroscopic thermal management and energy conversion technologies. Research projects of current interest include developing ultra-high spatial resolution temperature mapping tools, measuring thermal properties of anisotropic thin films, modeling heat transport in superlattices, and building active and nonlinear thermal systems for improved thermal control.
Education
B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, University of Texas Austin, 2013
Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, University of California-Berkeley, 2018
Honors & Awards
CTE Faculty Fellow, 2021-24
Sophia Meyer Farb Prize for Teaching, Phi Beta Kappa, 2021
NASA Early Career Faculty Award, 2019
National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, 2013-18
Berkeley Graduate Fellowship, 2013-15
