Karl Putz

Background

About Karl Putz

I am a goal-oriented, customer-focused problem-solver that thrives in team environments. I am skilled at the incorporation of lateral information (other domain knowledge) as well as vertical information (task purpose to organizational goals). Because of these attributes, I am trainable to new situations and goals. Additionally, I am willing to do the jobs that nobody else wants to do in order to advance the cause. This attitude permeates both my professional and personal life from managing group safety to completing an Olympic-length triathlon (despite not enjoying running!). I have a broad knowledge skill base of applications, having worked with companies, the military, and academia, as well as organizational impact skills in technology transfer, safety, team management, mentorship, and facility organization. My project management experience ranges from small-scale organization of lab moves, to designing new laboratories to multi-PI, multi-year industry collaborations. Given the academic setting, my style is collaborative and consensus-building. I let everybody have their say, and then work to align the project goals with the input from the participants. For the past 20 years, the focus of my research has been on the mechanics of soft material systems. My area of expertise is understanding the link between molecular interactions and bulk mechanical properties of novel materials. For the past five years, I have been working in the group of Mark Hersam in Materials Science and Engineering at Northwestern as a research professor. The work has centered around a hundred-fold scale-up in a graphene production process. This graphene is subsequently used for conductive ink formulations for flexible electronics and enhanced battery cathode materials. Prior to the Hersam Group, I worked in the Mechanical Engineering Department at Northwestern. That work involved the mechanics of novel polymer composite systems. This included a long-standing research project with Goodyear that I managed for five years, as well as collaborations with Ford, Boeing, and Grupo Antolin. I also received a patent for my work on polymer composite graphene oxide papers that was recently licensed to Ora Sound. Additional materials systems that I have worked with include: Colloids, catalysts, inorganic glasses, biomolecule separations, 2D nanomaterials Equipment: Dynamic Mechanical Analysis (DMA), Rheometer, Dynamic Scanning Calorimetry (DSC), Thermal Gravimetric Analysis (TGA)