The Quantum Gardener
UH master physicist and Big 12 Faculty of the Year Award winner Zhifeng Ren leverages natural forces for another passion that requires patience and precision: gardening.
Story by DeAnna Janes
Photography by Benjamin Corda
Zhifeng Ren, the physics professor and world-renowned researcher who holds the University of Houston’s Paul C.W. Chu and May P. Chern Endowed Chair in Condensed Matter Physics, just had “the best year ever.” Winning a Big 12 Faculty of the Year Award for his innovation will do that. But, for Ren, the recognition is about so much more than his own achievements.
“Over the years, there have been many people who have contributed to my research,” says Ren, who is also the director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity. “This really belongs to the whole group.”
One of those people is Paul Chu himself, the famed Taiwanese American physicist and UH legend who discovered high-temperature superconductivity. Ren credits Chu as the catalyst for his interest in physics.
“Back in 1986, when I was finishing my master’s in material science, I heard that Dr. Chu at the University of Houston had discovered superconductivity at 93 Kelvin,” Ren says. “That drove me into physics, because it was just so fascinating.”
As fate would have it, Ren met his hero in 2011 at Boston College, where Ren was researching superconductivity, carbon nanotubes and thermoelectric materials. Impressed by the then-student’s research, Chu recruited Ren to run the physics department at UH. The 2013 move gave Ren the freedom to expand his work further.
Today, Ren is proudest of his boron arsenide research. “We are extremely excited to see that this material has the best properties of any current semiconductors,” he says. “This is the next-generation semiconductor, which has the potential to change the whole world.”
Another “project baby” he’s excited about is the nickel foam filter designed to catch and kill viruses and pathogens, a discovery that proved effective during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As a professor, discovery is exciting, but seeing young people become successful is especially rewarding,” Ren says, adding that his “best year ever” included witnessing two of his graduate students rise in their fields. “Paving the way for young people to be stars in the future is very satisfying,” he says.
To top off his banner year, Ren received UH’s prestigious Farfel Award, took home the International Thermoelectric Society’s Outstanding Achievement in Thermoelectrics Award and watched his garden grow the biggest melons he’s ever seen.
“As a materials physicist, I am trying to make something new that serves and betters society. Often, I don’t get what I want, but sometimes I do. And that’s satisfactory. Same thing in the garden.”
That’s right. When Ren isn’t breaking ground in the lab, he’s doing so in his garden, a 10-acre haven situated in the Houston suburb of Pearland, about half a mile from his home. He retreats to his garden every weekend with his wife, tilling the soil and bunking up in their “weekend house” on the property.
“My parents were both farmers,” Ren says. “They had a small patch of land responsible for growing enough food for a six-person family. I learned from them how to farm. My garden, however, is 10 times bigger and just for fun!”
In fact, Ren’s garden has become so bountiful, thanks to his supercharged John Deere, he shares the spoils with his whole community. “It’s funny, because now, when I go to my land, I see people taking the vegetables from the garden. I don’t know them, and they don’t know me!”
Always paying it forward, be it with surplus crops or scientific discoveries, Ren notes the parallels between his two passions. “As a materials physicist, I am trying to make something new that serves and betters society. Often, I don’t get what I want, but sometimes I do. And that’s satisfactory. Same thing in the garden.”
Zhifeng Ren, the physics professor and world-renowned researcher who holds the University of Houston’s Paul C.W. Chu and May P. Chern Endowed Chair in Condensed Matter Physics, just had “the best year ever.” Winning a Big 12 Faculty of the Year Award for his innovation will do that. But, for Ren, the recognition is about so much more than his own achievements.
“Over the years, there have been many people who have contributed to my research,” says Ren, who is also the director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity. “This really belongs to the whole group.”
One of those people is Paul Chu himself, the famed Taiwanese American physicist and UH legend who discovered high-temperature superconductivity. Ren credits Chu as the catalyst for his interest in physics.
“Back in 1986, when I was finishing my master’s in material science, I heard that Dr. Chu at the University of Houston had discovered superconductivity at 93 Kelvin,” Ren says. “That drove me into physics, because it was just so fascinating.”
As fate would have it, Ren met his hero in 2011 at Boston College, where Ren was researching superconductivity, carbon nanotubes and thermoelectric materials. Impressed by the then-student’s research, Chu recruited Ren to run the physics department at UH. The 2013 move gave Ren the freedom to expand his work further.
Today, Ren is proudest of his boron arsenide research. “We are extremely excited to see that this material has the best properties of any current semiconductors,” he says. “This is the next-generation semiconductor, which has the potential to change the whole world.”
Another “project baby” he’s excited about is the nickel foam filter designed to catch and kill viruses and pathogens, a discovery that proved effective during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As a professor, discovery is exciting, but seeing young people become successful is especially rewarding,” Ren says, adding that his “best year ever” included witnessing two of his graduate students rise in their fields. “Paving the way for young people to be stars in the future is very satisfying,” he says.
To top off his banner year, Ren received UH’s prestigious Farfel Award, took home the International Thermoelectric Society’s Outstanding Achievement in Thermoelectrics Award and watched his garden grow the biggest melons he’s ever seen.
“As a materials physicist, I am trying to make something new that serves and betters society. Often, I don’t get what I want, but sometimes I do. And that’s satisfactory. Same thing in the garden.”
That’s right. When Ren isn’t breaking ground in the lab, he’s doing so in his garden, a 10-acre haven situated in the Houston suburb of Pearland, about half a mile from his home. He retreats to his garden every weekend with his wife, tilling the soil and bunking up in their “weekend house” on the property.
“My parents were both farmers,” Ren says. “They had a small patch of land responsible for growing enough food for a six-person family. I learned from them how to farm. My garden, however, is 10 times bigger and just for fun!”
In fact, Ren’s garden has become so bountiful, thanks to his supercharged John Deere, he shares the spoils with his whole community. “It’s funny, because now, when I go to my land, I see people taking the vegetables from the garden. I don’t know them, and they don’t know me!”
Always paying it forward, be it with surplus crops or scientific discoveries, Ren notes the parallels between his two passions. “As a materials physicist, I am trying to make something new that serves and betters society. Often, I don’t get what I want, but sometimes I do. And that’s satisfactory. Same thing in the garden.”
Built with Shorthand