Team

Professor McBride received her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, her MS in Chemical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and a BS in Environmental Engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno. Prior to joining UPenn as an assistant professor in 2024, she worked at Princeton University as a Presidential Postdoctoral fellow under Professor Howard Stone. Her research interests lie at the intersection of water chemistry, transport phenomena, and interfacial engineering. She is passionate about water and sustainability and maintains involvement in sustainability, advocacy, and education projects outside of her research. Her other interests include microgravity research, water technologies for long-term human spaceflight, patterning phenomena and using art for science communications. She is the recipient of the American Physical Society Division of Fluid Dynamics Milton van Dyke Award, the American Society for Gravitational and Space Research Orr-Reynolds Distinguished Service Award, the Meredith Kamm Memorial Award for excellence in graduate studies, and a Mistletoe Research Fellowship.

Samantha is a sophomore in the M&T program studying Materials Science & Engineering and Entrepreneurship & Innovation. With a lifelong passion for leveraging technology to solve global problems, prior to entering Penn, Samantha built numerous projects and ventures in blockchain, AI, hardware, chemistry, and materials that won international innovation prizes and thousands in seed funding; founded and scaled a women in STEM non-profit to reach 33K+ girls in 84+ countries; and represented Team Canada at the 2022 International Chemistry Olympiad; and for her work as a young, female technology entrepreneur, has been recognized by Forbes, IBM, Nikkei, and various 25 Under 25 lists. Samantha's research interests lie at the intersection of materials chemistry and sustainable development, including bio-based and bio-inspired materials, biopolymers, soft matter, smart materials, waste valorization, water purification, and other issues at the water-food-energy nexus. Her ultimate goal for the future is to build a startup combining nature-inspired processes with high-tech computational advances to design a more sustainable future.

Joey Wu is a Taiwanese-American scientist in the Vagelos Integrated Program in Energy Research (VIPER) studying bioengineering and environmental science at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the founder of Waterroots, a nonprofit based on water safety education supported by the Philadelphia Water Department, Clinton Global Initiative, Millennium Fellowship, Stroud Water Research Center, and Water Center at Penn. Joey is an active climate activist, organizing events for Save the Meadows movements, acting as a Penn Climate Speaker, the Special Projects head of Toxisense, the deputy director of research for Climate Cardinals, and a member of SAGE (student advisory group for the environment). As the North America representative for the Tunza Ecological Ambassador program, Joey seeks to use open communication and interdisciplinary partnerships to fight climate change; harnessing volunteering and youth initiatives, he seeks to alleviate global famine and water insecurity.