Rate My Professor James LeBeau

James M. LeBeau is the Kyocera Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He earned a BS in materials science and engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 2006 and a PhD in materials from the University of California, Santa Barbara, in 2010. LeBeau joined the faculty in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at North Carolina State University in 2011 and was promoted to associate professor there in 2016. He served as a visiting professor at MIT in 2018 before moving his research group to MIT in 2019 and was promoted to full professor effective July 1, 2025.

LeBeau develops scanning transmission electron microscopy techniques to connect the atomic structure and chemistry of defects and interfaces with material properties. His research focuses on functional oxides, semiconductors, materials for quantum computing, energy storage, and structural materials. He has published more than 90 papers and holds a US patent. LeBeau received the Burton Medal from the Microscopy Society of America in 2020, the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers from the US Department of Defense in 2019, the Young Investigator Award from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research in 2014, the Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation in 2014, and the Kurt F. J. Heinrich Award from the Microanalysis Society in 2013.