Dr. Zhang has been conducting research and working in the materials and coatings industry for more than 20 years. His expertise is in surface science, polymer processing, nanocomposites, green technology, coatings and films, and polymer recycling. He is currently the President and Chief Technology Officer of his technology startup company PEG LLC. His recent research experience at Virginia Commonwealth University is on functional surface sciences. While working at VCU, he developed a new adhesion model that emphasizes not just surface energy, but also the mechanical and geometrical properties of a surface coating. The surface modification method he used is to incorporate minimum amount of functional surface modifier into to an engineering polymer. It takes advantage of the low cost and good mechanical properties of the engineering polymer. His company is now past the research stage and is launching a new product for the wind industry for the protection of wind turbine blades against erosion and ice.