Yuanli Bai is a Professor of mechanical engineering at UCF. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2008. He obtained his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Department of Automotive Engineering from Tsinghua University in 2000 and 2003, respectively. While at MIT, he worked under the supervision of Professor Tomasz Wierzbicki, the director of Impact and Crashworthiness Lab, on plasticity and ductile fracture mechanics of materials. Prior to joining UCF in 2011, he was a mechanical engineer at General Electric Global Research Center in Niskayuna, New York.

Dr. Bai’s current research is focused on plasticity, fracture and fatigue testing, modeling and simulation for various engineering materials, including lightweight alloys, metallic matrix nano composites, polymer matrix composites, soft tissue materials, and recently virus/proteins. He operates the Lab of Solid and Structure Mechanics under the MAE department. Dr. Bai has published over 100 papers in the field’s most highly rated journals and conference proceedings.

Awards:

• Teaching Incentive Program (TIP) Award, University of Central Florida, 2022.


• Research Incentive Award (RIA), University of Central Florida, 2019.


• Excellent in graduate teaching, University of Central Florida, 2019.


• U.S. Air Force Summer Faculty Fellowship, 2013


• The first-class winner of the Asian-Pacific American Forum Growth Competition, General Electric, 2009

• Sun, Y. Akçay, F.A., Wu, D. and Bai, Y., “Analytical and Numerical Modeling on Strengths of Aluminum and Magnesium Micro Lattice Structures Fabricated via Additive Manufacturing”. Progress in Additive Manufacturing, (2024): 1-14.


• Zhou, Q., Song, S., Chen, Q., Bai, Y., " Experimental, Numerical and Analytical Studies on Wire Extrusion Processes Considering Friction Effects". International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, 130, no. 7 (2024): 3929-3944.


• Xue, Lufeng, Wang Cai, Yeting Sun, Marcelo Paredes, Chaoyang Sun, and Yuanli Bai. "The influence of heat treatment on microstructure and mechanical response of a newly developed non-equimolar AlCrCuFeNi high-entropy alloy: Experiments and numerical modeling." Materials Characterization 207 (2024): 113544.


• Nonn, A., Kiss, B., Pezeshkian, W., Tancogne-Dejean, T., Cerrone, A., Kellermayer, M., Bai, Y., Li, W., and Wierzbicki, T. “Inferring Mechanical Properties of the SARS-CoV-2 Virus Particle with Nano-Indentation Tests and Numerical Simulations”, Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials, 148 (2023): 106153.


• Ghazali, S., Algarni, M., Bai, Y., “A Micro-Macro Mixed GTN-MMC Model to Study Plasticity and Fracture of AISI 4340 Steel”, Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics, 127 (2023): 104059.


• Grasso, M., Bai, Y., Brighton, J., Carless, O., & StLeger-Harris, C. (2023). Numerical simulation of plasticity in double lap metallic bolted joints. Mechanics Based Design of Structures and Machines, 1-20.


• Wierzbicki, T., Bai, Y., Finite Element modeling of alpha-helices and tropocollagen molecules with reference to the spike of SARS-CoV-2, Biophysical Journal, accepted for publications, May 2022.


• Luo, X., Zhao, K., He, X., Bai, Y., De Andrade, V., Zaiser, M., Liu, J. (2022). Evading strength and ductility trade-off in an inverse nacre structured magnesium matrix nanocomposite. Acta Materialia, 228, 117730


• Lee, J., Choi, Y., & Bai, Y. (2022). Investigation on High Velocity Impact of Projectile on Double Layered Geomaterial. KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering, 26(5), 2089-2096.


• Song, S., He, X., Zhou, Q., Ren, L., Chen, Q., & Bai, Y. (2021). Analytical models of the strength and ductility of CNT reinforced metal matrix nano composites under elevated temperatures. Materials Science and Engineering: A, 813, 141078.


• Mehta, A., Zhou, L., Huynh, T., Park, S., Hyer, H., Song, S., Bai, Y., Imholte, D.D., Woolstenhulme, N.E., Wachs, D.M. and Sohn, Y., 2021. Additive manufacturing and mechanical properties of the dense and crack free Zr-modified aluminum alloy 6061 fabricated by the laser-powder bed fusion. Additive Manufacturing, 41, p.101966.


• Hyer, H., Zhou, L., Liu, Q., Wu, D., Song, S., Bai, Y., McWilliams, B., Cho, K. and Sohn, Y., 2021. High strength WE43 microlattice structures additively manufactured by laser powder bed fusion. Materialia, 16, p.101067.