Mya Thai

About Mya Thai

I specialize in solving the failures that stop critical programs in their tracks.At Intel, I brought a semiconductor tool line from 0% yield to 100% in seven days — a solution that became the vendor\'s global manufacturing standard. At Enevate, I developed a thermal propagation barrier now incorporated into Tier-1 EV pack designs, and built an abuse lab that qualified five global safety standards simultaneously, cutting timelines by 5×.What I enjoy most is the full process: finding the root cause, building the right solution, and seeing it through to completion. That end-to-end ownership is where I thrive.Over nine years across two very different industries, I\'ve built expertise in FIB-SEM/TEM failure analysis, DFMEA, battery abuse testing, and root-cause investigation. I hold 10+ patents and have published in ACS Energy Letters, Nano Letters, and Chemistry of Materials.I\'m now looking for Staff Engineer roles in battery safety, energy systems, semiconductor reliability, or advanced mobility.

Experience

1. Principal Scientist

   Enevate Corporation

   Aug 2021 — Present · US

   Led battery safety, failure analysis, and validation systems for high-energy-density lithium-ion cells with silicon-dominant anodes, bridging advanced electrochemistry with manufacturing and system-level engineering.Battery Safety & Validation Systems• Built a complete in-house battery safety testing program from zero, establishing thermal propagation, nail penetration, flame testing capabilities with controlled-speed actuation and synchronized temperature/voltage monitoring.• Developed a thermal propagation prevention solution validated by third-party testing, achieving 100% success in internal validation and enabling company-wide safety qualification of cells.• Generated large-scale thermal propagation and degradation datasets that directly informed product architecture decisions, technical advisory board reviews, and Tier-1 automotive partner evaluations.• Defined testing specifications, equipment requirements, heater configurations, and safety protocols that became the company’s safety validation framework.• Executed urgent partner requests end-to-end (test planning → execution → reporting) within same-day timelines, accelerating customer decision cycles.• Led post-abuse cell teardown analysis, translating complex failure modes into actionable engineering insights for R&D and executive stakeholders.Cross-Functional Leadership• Co-inventor on 15+ patents spanning thermal propagation mitigation and nanostructured energy storage architectures.• Trained scientists and engineers in ion-milling, SEM, confocal surface-area measurement, and Karl Fischer.• Advanced novel R&D concepts (e.g, microbead-based silicon expansion control) from research to engineering optimization.• Collaborated closely with anode, cell, and manufacturing teams to translate materials science into scalable engineering solutions.• Delivered concise root-cause and technical reports directly supporting technical advisory board discussions, executive decisions, and board-level reviews.

Education

• UC Irvine

  Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Physical Chemistry

  2011 — 2016

• UCLA

  Bachelor of Science (BS), Chemistry

  2011

Skills

• Tem
• Afm
• Photolithography
• Powder X-Ray Diffraction
• Data Analysis
• Physics
• Scanning Electron Microscopy
• Chemistry
• Electrochemistry
• Research
• Igor Pro
• Characterization
• Spectroscopy
• Microscopy
• Sem
• Latex
• Nanomaterials
• Nanotechnology
• Materials Science
• Science