Three doctoral students named Yale Planetary Solutions Fellows

Three Yale Engineering PhD students – Breanna van Loenen, Dongjin Seo, and Jason Dong – have been selected as Yale Planetary Solutions (YPS) Doctoral Fellows, a university-wide program supporting interdisciplinary research on climate change, biodiversity loss, and ecosystem collapse.

Van Loenen, a student in Chemical & Environmental Engineering advised by Prof. Drew Gentner, combines satellite remote sensing with ground-based measurements to study community exposure to volatile organic compound emissions from oil and gas operations. She previously researched transportation-related ultrafine particulate matter at Boston University School of Public Health.

Seo, an Applied Physics student advised by Prof. Logan Wright, develops computational methods that help scientists model and interact with complex physical systems, particularly in settings where experiments are costly, limited, or uncertain. His work sits at the intersection of machine learning, physics, and scientific discovery.

Dong, also in Chemical & Environmental Engineering and advised by Prof. David Kwabi, uses spectroscopy to investigate how organic redox-active molecules degrade over time. His research aims to identify key degradation mechanisms and inform the design of more stable materials for grid-scale flow batteries.

As YPS Fellows, the three will receive a $3,500 annual stipend top-up and a $2,000 research budget over two years, along with training in systems thinking, communications, and cross-disciplinary collaboration – joining a selective, university-wide cohort of scholars working across disciplines to advance planetary solutions.