Mim Rahimi, Ph.D.
Kaspar J. Willam Assistant ProfessorOffice Location N117 Engineering Building 1
Phone 713-743-7697 | Fax 713-743-4260
Email mrahimi [at] uh.edu
Education
Postdoctoral, Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2021
Ph.D., Chemical Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, 2017
B.S., Chemical Engineering, Sharif University of Technology, 2014
Professional Experience
2021 – Present: Assistant Professor, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Houston, Houston, TX
2021 – Present: Assistant Professor, Materials Science and Engineering (Affiliate), University of Houston, Houston, TX
2018 – 2021: Postdoctoral Associate, Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
2014 – 2017: Graduate Research Assistant, Department of Chemical Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA
2011 – 2014: Researcher, Biochemical & Bioenvironmental Research Center, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran
Summer 2012: Visiting Researcher, Department of Chemical Engineering, UAE University, Al-Ain, UAE
Classes
Electrochemical Engineering (Graduate Course_developed by Dr. Rahimi)
Environmental Chemistry (Graduate Course)
Energy, Environment, and Climate (Undergraduate Course_developed by Dr. Rahimi)
Awards & Honors
NSF CAREER Award, 2024
World’s Top 2% Scientists (2023, 2024, 2025) – Stanford University / Elsevier Global Ranking
40 Under 40 Recognition Program by the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists (AAEES), 2025
Junior Faculty Research Excellence Award for 2024-2025, University of Houston
2025 AAEES Excellence in Environmental Engineering and Science® (E3S) Awards Competition
Winner of the UH-Chevron $25K Energy Transition Innovation Challenge, 2023
Best Presentation Award, Chemical Engineering Graduate Research Symposium, Pennsylvania State University, September 2017.
The Iranian American Academics & Professionals (IAAP) scholarship, May 2017.
Graduate Student Scholarship, Pennsylvania State University, 2014.
Professional Memberships
International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE)
The Electrochemical Society (ECS)
The American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE)
American Chemical Society (ACS)
Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP)
International Association for Carbon Capture (IACC)
Research Interests
Earth's climate is now changing faster than at any point in the history of modern civilization, mainly as a result of human activities. Designing any action plan to mitigate climate change must include a detailed strategy to lower greenhouse gas emissions, especially carbon dioxide (CO2). Electrochemical processes play an important role in reducing global CO2 emissions. By crucially bridging electricity and thermochemistry, electrochemistry is a powerful tool with multiple intersection points in current energy systems and emission reduction roadmap scenarios.
In our lab, we develop various electrochemical processes to help industries become more energy-efficient and to capture CO2 from either point sources (e.g., power plant flue gas) or air. We are also interested in implementing artificial intelligence as a powerful emerging tool for carbon capture processes. These tasks can be considered the new frontiers within the electrochemistry and climate change framework, and their development is necessary to achieve emission reduction goals. The specific research directions we pursue in our lab are:
- Energy and Sustainability
- Electrochemical processes for:
- carbon capture, utilization, and storage (eCCUS)
- harvesting low-grade waste heat
- aqueous environmental applications
- Smart carbon capture with artificial intelligence
If you are interested to know more about our research scopes and activities, please visit our lab website at https://teamrahimi.com/research.
Invited Presentations / Lectures
- M. Rahimi, New Roles for Electrochemical Processes for Carbon Separation and Concentration, Schlumberger-Doll Research Center, Online, August 17, 2023.
- M. Rahimi, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Carbon Capture and Storage, Illinois Sustainable Technology Center, Prairie Research Institute, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, March 28, 2023.
- M. Rahimi, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Utilization, A Guest Lecturer at A Graduate Course on Carbon Capture, Storage, and Utilization at the University of Texas at Austin, November 15, 2022.
- M. Rahimi, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Energy Efficiency, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering Graduate Seminar, University of Houston, August 27, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Energy Efficiency, Department of Chemical Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, March 9, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Energy Efficiency, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Houston, March 3, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, Electrochemistry for climate change mitigation: The emergence of electrochemical carbon capture, Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) Future Faculty Seminar Series, Online, February 26, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Energy Efficiency, Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, University of Connecticut, February 16, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation: Carbon Capture and Energy Efficiency, Department of Chemical Engineering, The University of Texas at San Antonio, February 5, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, New frontiers for Electrochemistry in Addressing Climate Change: Carbon capture and storage, Future opportunities for CO2: The chemistry of carbon dioxide and its role in decarbonization, Society of Chemical Industry (SCI), Online, October 29, 2020
- M. Rahimi, Thermally regenerative batteries: A story of capturing waste heat as electrical power, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, December 13, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, Thermally regenerative batteries: A story of capturing waste heat as electrical power, Department of Earth and Environmental Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, December 8, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, Conversion of low-grade heat to electricity by a thermal ammonia battery with carbon-silver electrodes, Environmental Engineering Kappe Seminar Series, Pennsylvania State University, November 8, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, Harvesting of low-grade thermal energy as electrical power using a thermally regenerative battery, Environmental Engineering Kappe Seminar Series, Pennsylvania State University, March 2, 2016.
Conference Presentations
- M. Rahimi, A. Hassan, Y. Fang, Electrochemically Mediated Amine Regeneration for Efficient CO2 Separation: Development and Characterization of Blend Electrolytes, 244th ECS Meeting, Gothenburg, Sweden, October 8-12, 2023.
- M. Rahimi, A. Hassan, Y. Fang, Emerging Electrochemical Processes for Carbon Capture and Storage, Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) Research and Education Conference, Boston, MA, June 20-23, 2023.
- M. Rahimi, T. A. Hatton, New frontiers for Electrochemistry in Addressing Climate Change: Carbon capture and storage, 2020 American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Annual Meeting, Electrochemical Fundamentals: Faculty Candidate, Online, November 17, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, T. A. Hatton, Electrochemistry for Climate Change: CO2 Capture by An Electrochemically Mediated Amine Regeneration Process, 71st Annual Meeting of the International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE), Online, August 31, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, M. Wang, T. A. Hatton, Electrochemically-mediated amine regeneration for CO2 capture: Experimental and modeling analysis, 25th Topical Meeting of the International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE), Toledo, Spain, May 12–15, 2019.
- M. Rahimi, M. Wang, S. Hariharan, M. Massen-Hane, T. A. Hatton, Carbon Dioxide Capture by an Electrochemically-Mediated Amine Regeneration, 2018 American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Annual Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA, October 28–November 2, 2018.
- M. Rahimi, T. Kim, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, A fully regenerable thermal silver ammonia battery to convert low-grade waste heat to electricity, 232nd ECS Meeting, National Harbor, MD, October 1–6, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Thermally Regenerative Batteries: A Story of Capturing Low-Grade Thermal Energy as Electricity, Chemical Engineering Graduate Research Symposium, Pennsylvania State University, September 15, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, T. Kim, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, A fully regenerable thermal silver ammonia battery to convert low-grade waste heat to electricity, Energy Days 2017, Pennsylvania State University, May 22, 23, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, T. Kim, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Converting low-grade waste heat into electricity using a silver ammonia battery, 20th Annual Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology Student Symposium (ECMSS), Pennsylvania State University, April 21, 22, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, Z. Schoener, X. Zhu, F. Zhang, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Application of thermally regenerative battery to remove copper from wastewater, 252nd American Chemical Society National Meeting & Exposition, Philadelphia, PA, August 21-25, 2016.
- M. Rahimi, Z. Schoener, X. Zhu, F. Zhang, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Application of thermally regenerative battery for wastewater treatment containing copper ions, 19th Annual Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology Student Symposium (ECMSS), Pennsylvania State University, April 8, 9, 2016.
Editorial Activities / Discussions in Refereed Journals
- Associate Editor | Frontiers in Earth Science
- Editorial Board Member | PLOS Climate
Editorial Board Member | Batteries Journal - Expert Reviewer | The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Working Group I and III contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6)
- Guest Editor | Special Issue in the Sustainability journal on “New Frontiers in Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS)”, Special Issue in the Energies journal on “Electrochemical Processes for Climate Change Mitigation”, Special Issue in the Batteries journal on “Lithium-Ion Batteries: Latest Advances and Prospects”, Special Issue in the Batteries journal on “Future Battery Concepts”
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
- For full list of publications, please visit: https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=cjLJz2MAAAAJ
- Hassan, M. Afshari, M. Rahimi, A Membraneless Electrochemically Mediated Amine Regeneration for Carbon Capture, Nature Communications 16, 6333, 2025.
- M. Afshari, A. Refaie, P. Aleta, A. Hassan, M. Rahimi, A Vanadium Redox Flow Process for Carbon Capture and Energy Storage, ACS ES&T Engineering 5, 1099–1110, 2025. (Featured on the front cover)
- S. F. Rafie, M. Tamtaji, M. Rahimi, P. Ravi Teja Nunna, N. Abu-Zahra, Steered Rare Event and Classical MD Combined with Quantum DFT for Multiscale Mechanistic Modeling of CO2 Capture by Amine-Based Solvents, Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 13, 119470, 2025.
- M. Mohammadi, A. Soleimani, Y. Lin, M. Alian, H. Hosseinzadeh, S. K. Suman, M. Rahimi, V. Balan, Enzymatic depolymerization of lignin and electrocatalytic hydrodeoxygenation for the production of reduced aromatic compounds: A review and perspective, Biotechnology Advances 83, 108647, 2025.
- A. Hassan, P. Aleta, A. Refaie, M. Afshari, Y. Fang, E. Kalantari, M. Rahimi, Reviving the Absorbent Chemistry of Electrochemically Mediated Amine Regeneration for Improved Carbon Capture Form Flue Gas, Chemical Engineering Journal 484, 149566, 2024.
- P. Tajalli, M. Omidiyan, M. Rahimi, T. R. Lee, Exploring the potential of transition-metal-based hollow micro- and nanoparticles in supercapacitor electrodes, Materials Today Sustainability 26, 100733, 2024.
- K. Chowdhury, S. Behura, M. Rahimi, M. Heydari G., oCVD PEDOT-Cl Thin Film Grown by SbCl5 Oxidant as the Hole Transport Layer to Enhance the Perovskite Solar Cell Device Stability, ACS Applied Energy Materials 7, 1068-1079, 2024.
- B. E. Logan, M. Rahimi, L. Li, L. R. Winter, W. Peng, B. J. Robinson, Catalyzing climate solutions through energy and carbon education, Environmental Science & Technology 58, 20333−20335, 2024.
- P. Aleta, A. Refaie, M. Afshari, A. Hassan, M. Rahimi, Direct ocean capture: the emergence of electrochemical processes for oceanic carbon removal, Energy & Environmental Science 16, 4944-4967, 2023.
- M. Rahimi, A. Khurram, T. A. Hatton, B. Gallant, Electrochemical carbon capture processes for mitigation of CO2 emissions, Chemical Society Reviews 51, 8676-8695, 2022.
- H. Seo, M. Rahimi, T. A. Hatton, Electrochemical Carbon Dioxide Capture and Release with a Redox-Active Amine, Journal of the American Chemical Society 144, 2164–2170, 2022.
- M. Rahimi, S. M. Moosavi, B. Smit, T. A. Hatton, Toward Smart Carbon Capture with Machine Learning, Cell Reports Physical Science 2, 100396, 2021.
- M. Rahimi, K. M. Diederichsen, N. Ozbek, M. Wang, W. Choi, T. A. Hatton, An electrochemically mediated amine regeneration process with a mixed absorbent for post-combustion CO2 capture, Environmental Science & Technology 54, 8999–9007, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, G. Catalini, S. Hariharan, M. Wang, M. Puccini, T. A. Hatton, Carbon dioxide capture using an electrochemically driven proton concentration process, Cell Reports Physical Science 1, 100033, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, F. Zucchelli, M. Puccini, T. A. Hatton, Improved CO2 capture performance of electrochemically mediated amine regeneration processes with ionic surfactant additives, ACS Applied Energy Materials 3, 10823–10830, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, G. Catalini, M. Puccini, T. A. Hatton, Bench-scale demonstration of CO2 capture with an electrochemically driven proton concentration process, RSC Advances 10, 16832–16843, 2020.
- M. Rahimi, Public Awareness: What Climate Change Scientists Should Consider, Sustainability 12, 8369, 2020.
- M. Wang, M. Rahimi, A. Kumar, S. Hariharan, W. Choi, T. A. Hatton, Flue Gas CO2 Capture via Electrochemically Mediated Amine Regeneration: System Design and Performance, Applied Energy 255, 113879, 2019.
- M. Rahimi, A. P. Straub, F. Zhang, X. Zhu, M. Elimelech, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Emerging electrochemical and membrane-based systems to convert low-grade heat to electricity, Energy & Environmental Science 11, 276–285, 2018.
- M. Rahimi, T. Kim, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, A thermally regenerative ammonia battery with carbon-silver electrodes for converting low-grade waste heat to electricity, Journal of Power Sources 373, 95–102, 2018.
- M. Rahimi, A. D'Angelo, C. A. Gorski, O. Scialdone, B. E. Logan, Electrical power production from low-grade waste heat using a thermally regenerative ethylenediamine battery, Journal of Power Sources 351, 45–50, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, L. Zhu, K. L. Kowalski, X. Zhu, C. A. Gorski, M. A. Hickner, B. E. Logan, Improved electrical power production of thermally regenerative batteries using a poly(phenylene oxide) based anion exchange membrane, Journal of Power Sources 342, 956–963, 2017.
- M. Rahimi, Z. Schoener, X. Zhu, F. Zhang, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Removal of copper from water using a thermally regenerative electrodeposition battery, Journal of Hazardous Materials 322, 551–556, 2017.
- M. Feilizadeh, M. Rahimi, S. M. E. Zakeri, N. Mahinpey, M. Vossoughi, M. Qanbarzadeh, Individual and interaction effects of operating parameters on the photocatalytic degradation under visible light illumination: Response surface methodological approach, The Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering 95, 1228–1235, 2017.
- X. Zhu, T. Kim, M. Rahimi, C. A. Gorski, B. E. Logan, Integrating reverse-electrodialysis stacks with flow batteries to achieve improved energy recovery from salinity gradients and energy storage, ChemSusChem 10, 797–803, 2017.
- T. Kim, M. Rahimi, B. E. Logan, C. A. Gorski, Harvesting energy from salinity differences using battery electrodes in a concentration flow cell, Environmental Science & Technology 50, 9791–9797, 2016.
- X. Zhu, M. Rahimi, C. Gorski, B. Logan, A thermally-regenerative ammonia-based flow battery for electrical energy recovery from waste heat, ChemSusChem 9, 873–879, 2016.
- T. Kim, M. Rahimi, B. Logan, C. Gorski, Evaluating battery-like reactions to harvest energy from salinity differences using ammonium bicarbonate salt solutions, ChemSusChem 9, 981-988, 2016.
- M. Feilizadeh, M. Vossoughi, S. M. E. Zakeri, M. Rahimi, Enhancement of efficient Ag-S/TiO2 nanophotocatalyst for the photocatalytic degradation under visible light, Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research 53, 9578–9586, 2014.
Books / Book Chapters
- M. Rahimi, ed., Lithium-Ion Batteries: Latest Advances and Prospects, Batteries – MDPI Publishers; ISBN 978-3-0365-0584-8, May 2021.
Others
- Reviewer for Scholarly Journals:
Nature Communication | Science Advances | Nature Energy | Joule | Environmental Science & Technology | Environmental Science & Technology Letters | ACS Energy Letters | Matter | Journal of Power Sources| Electrochimica Acta | Langmuir | Journal of Materials Chemistry A | Desalination | Chemical Engineering Journal| Journal of The Electrochemical Society | AIChE Journal | International Journal of Hydrogen Energy | Separation and Purification Technology | Applied Energy | Journal of Cleaner Production | Environmental Science & Technology Engineering | Chemical Communications | Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research | Environmental Engineering Science | ACS Applied Energy Materials| Energies | Fuel Processing Technology| Applied Sciences |Molecules | Sustainability| Materials | Energy, Ecology and Environment | Processes | C–Journal of Carbon Research | STAR Protocols
- Reviewer for Scholarly Journals: