Jeffrey Y. Tsao

Brief Bio

  Jeff Tsao is an independent researcher exploring the nature and nurture of research, broadly encompassing the science, technology, history and philosophy of science and technology. These include as subtopics metascience, research policy, the history and philosophy of science (HPS), and AI for S&T. He retired in October 2025 as a Senior Scientist in the Material, Physical and Chemical Sciences Center at Sandia National Laboratories, after a career spent in the trenches of America’s R&D enterprise.

  He holds a BS in mathematics and an MS in electrical engineering from Stanford University, and a PhD in applied physics from Harvard University, where his advisors were Nico Bloembergen (1981 Nobel Laureate in Physics), Eli Yablonovitch (pioneer in photonic crystals and semiconductor optical physics), and Itamar Burak (laser photochemistry).

  From 1981 to 1991 he was research staff, first at MIT Lincoln Laboratory, studying laser microchemistry, then, at Sandia, studying semiconductor epitaxy—leading to the research monograph Materials Fundamentals of Molecular Beam Epitaxy (Academic Press, 1994).

  From 1991 to 2001 he managed semiconductor materials research departments at Sandia, with an entrepreneurial leave as VP of R&D at E2O Communications, a pre-IPO fiber-communications company, and a sabbatical at Singapore’s Institute of Materials Research and Engineering.

  From 2001 through 2013 he played a “community organizer” role in national research: co-authoring the seminal 1999 white paper The Case for a National Research Program on Semiconductor Lighting; serving as general editor of the first comprehensive DOE solid-state lighting roadmap (2002); coordinating the DOE Basic Research Needs workshops on solar energy utilization (2005) and solid-state lighting (2006) whose processes helped seed the ten-workshop BRN series and, in turn, DOE’s billion-dollar Energy Frontier Research Center program; and then serving as Chief Scientist of the Energy Frontier Research Center for Solid-State Lighting Science (2009–2015). Along the way he helped articulate new insights into the economics of the LED lighting revolution, including the projections known as Haitz’s Law and the economic effect known as the rebound effect.

  In 2013, he turned to the nature and nurture of research: understanding the nature of research so as to better understand how to better nurture it. He was a Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center (2016–2021), and, with Venkatesh Narayanamurti, co-authored The Genesis of Technoscientific Revolutions: Rethinking the Nature and Nurture of Research(Harvard University Press, 2021). His current focus is the Bell Labs Xs vision: rebuilding, in twenty-first-century public-private form, the use-embedded, curiosity-motivated research that the great corporate laboratories of the twentieth century embodied — and that America’s research enterprise has largely lost. He has also begun exploring the connections between technoscientific discovery by human and artificial intelligences.

  Jeff is a Fellow of the American Physical Society (1995), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2009), Optica (2017), the Illuminating Engineering Society (2024), and the IEEE (2025). His recognitions include the IES Technical Achievement Award (2014), the Asian American Engineer of the Year (2013), Sandia and Martin Marietta Author of the Year (1994), and Martin Marietta’s Jefferson Cup Award (1994). He has authored or co-authored more than 140 publications (that have each been cited 10 or more times); his total publications have accumulated over 15,000 citations (h-index 52); he holds 11 U.S. patents; and he has given over 100 invited or plenary talks.

   In his spare time, Jeff enjoys family activities and travel, and dabbles with piano (mostly jazz) and tennis (ranked 23rd in the men’s 65+ USTA Southwest region).

Selected Metaresearch Talks

• 2026 Mar 18 — Donald Stokes' Un-Named Quadrant — APS Global Physics Summit, Denver; 10-min video.

• 2025 Oct 17 — Bell Labs Xs: Reimagining Corporate Research for the 21st Century — Progress Conference 2025, Berkeley; 23-min video.

• 2025 May 14 -- The Bell Labs X Project: A Vision for Re-Inventing Corporate Research Labs — Atlanta Conference on Science and Innovation Policy; 12-min video.

• 2025 Mar 20 — The Scientific Method is Incomplete — APS Global Physics Summit, Anaheim; 11-min video.

• 2025 Feb 25–26 — The Bell Labs X "Project" — NASEM Government-University-Industry-Philanthropy Research Roundtable workshop (host: Darryll Pines); follow-up conversation.

• 2023 Aug 17 — How Human Intelligences Advance Technoscience (and How AI Might Also) — NREL (host: Kirstin Alberi); video.

• 2023 Jun 19 — Solid-State Lighting's Virtuous Cycle — Accelerating Development of Energy Innovation Ecosystems Workshop, University of Cambridge; 8-min video.

• 2023 May 19 — Creativity in Science and Engineering: From the Human to the Artificial — Creativity Conference, Southern Oregon University; 26-min video.

• 2022 Nov 15-17 — Technoscience Search: Opportunities/Challenges for Humans and AIs — Sandia National Labs colloquium; 31-min video.

• 2022 Aug 16 — The Nature and Nurture of Research: A Modern Synthesis — Protocol Labs; 41-min video.

• 2021 Nov 11 — The Genesis of Technoscientific Revolutions — in conversation with Venky Narayanamurti, Sandia New Research Ideas Forum; 90-min video, slides, and audio

Selected Metaresearch Papers

• 2026 — JY Tsao, S Buck, T Masood, A Ouderkirk, and S Sunil — Beyond the Endless Frontier: Building Institutions that Complete the Cycle — white paper on the Bell Labs Xs vision (first posted October, 2025; comprehensive revision posted September 24, 2026).

• 2025 — JY Tsao — Rebuild Corporate Research for a Stronger American Future — policy brief, Federation of American Scientists Day One Project (July 9, 2025).

• 2025 — JY Tsao — Q&A with February Keynote, Jeffrey Tsao — March Q&A  from NASEM GUIPRR workshop (February 25–26, 2025).

• 2025 — JY Tsao, V Narayanamurti, SC Currall — The Bell Labs X "Project": A Vision for Reinventing Corporate Research Labs — working paper for the NASEM GUIPRR workshop (February 25–26, 2025).

• 2024 — JY Tsao, RG Abbott, DC Crowder, S Desai, RPM Dingreville, JE Fowler, A Garland, PP Iyer, J Murdock, ST Steinmetz, KA Yarritu, CM Johnson, DJ Stracuzzi — AI for Technoscientific Discovery: A Human-Inspired Architecture — paper in Journal of Creativity 34, 100077.

• 2024 — V Narayanamurti and JY Tsao — How Technoscientific Knowledge Advances: A Bell-Labs-Inspired Architecture — paper in Research Policy 53, 104983.

• 2023 — V Narayanamurti and JY Tsao — Three Common Misconceptions About the Nature and Nurture of Research — paper in Nature Reviews Physics 5, 2–4.

• 2021 — V Narayanamurti and JY Tsao — The Genesis of Technoscientific Revolutions: Rethinking the Nature and Nurture of Research — book, Harvard University Press.

• 2019 — JY Tsao, CL Ting, CM Johnson — Creative Outcome as Implausible Utility — paper in Review of General Psychology 23, 279.

• 2018 — V Narayanamurti and JY Tsao — Nurturing Transformative U.S. Energy Research: Two Guiding Principles — paper in MRS Energy & Sustainability 5, e10.

• 2018 — GE Aviña, CD Schunn, AR Silva, TL Bauer, GW Crabtree, CM Johnson, T Odumosu, ST Picraux, RK Sawyer, RP Schneider, R Sun, GJ Feist, V Narayanamurti, JY Tsao — The Art of Research: A Divergent/Convergent Thinking Framework and Opportunities for Science-Based Approaches — chapter in E Subramanian, JY Tsao, T Odumosu (Eds.), Engineering a Better Future (Springer, open access).

• 2017 — JY Tsao and V Narayanamurti — Coupling Science and Technology: Encourage but Don't Force — letter in The New Atlantis 53.

• 2015 — T Odumosu, JY Tsao, V Narayanamurti — The Social Science of Creativity and Research Practice: Physical Scientists, Take Notice — commentary in Physics Today 68(11), 8–9.

• 2013 — JY Tsao, V Narayanamurti, GJ Feist (organizers); GR Emmanuel, T Odumosu, AR Silva (proceedings editors); GW Crabtree, CM Johnson, JI Lane, L McNamara, ST Picraux, RK Sawyer, RP Schneider, CD Schunn, R Sun (invited participants) — Art and Science of Science and Technology: Proceedings of the Forum and Roundtable — proceedings of the June 2013 forum at Sandia National Laboratories (Belfer Center, December 2013).

• 2008 — JY Tsao, KW Boyack, ME Coltrin, JG Turnley, WB Gauster — Galileo's Stream: A Framework for Understanding Knowledge Production — paper in Research Policy 37, 330–352.