Principal Investigator
Jesse A. Rodríguez is an assistant professor and Nesbitt Faculty Scholar in Energy Engineering in the School of Mechanical, Industrial, and Manufacturing Engineering at Oregon State University. He recently completed a postdoctoral research appointment at the Center for Statistics and Machine Learning at Princeton University under Dr. Bill Tang; Principal Research Scientist at Princeton Plasma Physics Lab. His postdoctoral research was focused on using deep learning to predict turbulent disruption events in tokamak fusion reactors, as well as tokamak digital twinning.
Jesse completed his PhD in Mechanical Engineering with a PhD Minor in Computational and Mathematical Engineering at Stanford University under Dr. Mark Cappelli in August 2023, his dissertation focusing on manipulating electromagnetic waves with plasma metamaterials. Rodríguez obtained his MS in Mechanical Engineering with a focus on fluid mechanics at Stanford University in 2020, and a triple honors BS in Physics, Mathematics, and Nuclear Engineering at Oregon State University in 2018. When not working, Jesse splits his time between his family, watch collecting, snowboarding, rock climbing, running, and going to the cinema.
Graduate Students
Katherine Bronstein received her B.S. in Mechanical Engineering at Oregon State University. She loves riding her motorcycle (rain or shine), cliff jumping, half marathon running with her border collie, lifting, and swimming. Feel free to ask her about the tragic death of her first D&D character or the best Final Fantasy game. Her research interests include the application of plasma physics in optical computing and electric propulsion.
Prof. Rodríguez is seeking students of all levels! A strong physics background is helpful, but the only requirements are enthusiasm and diligence. Interested post-doctoral researchers are also encouraged to contact Prof. Rodríguez.
Preparation (undergrads + incoming grads)
If you are an undergraduate or incoming grad interested in getting involved within the lab, use the following course lists to prepare and/or assess your preparation to contribute. These are not hard requirements, only a guideline to give you an idea of what skills will help you contribute in our lab. See Prof. Rodríguez about waiving prerequisite requirements.
Bare Minimum
- CS 161 Intro to CS I
- CS 162 Intro to CS II
- PH 21X Physics w/ Calculus sequence
- MTH 255 & 256 ODEs + Vector calc
Get Involved
- ST 314 Intro to Stats for Engineers
- MTH 341 Linear Algebra
- PH 431 Electromagnetism
- PH 411 Electronics
- PH 481 Physical Optics
Fully Research-Ready
- ME 517 Optimization in Design
- ME 540 Intermediate Thermodynamics
- Prof. Rodríguez Plasma sequence (in development)
For Computational Work
- CS 475 Intro to Parallel Programming
- AI 534 Machine Learning
- AI 535 Deep Learning
Academic Lineage
Prof. Rodríguez’s direct line of advisors goes all the way back to Sir Isaac Newton, who is his 14th great grand-advisor! Our academic family tree can be found here. Prof. Rodríguez’s Erdős and Einstein numbers are both 6 at most.
