PNNL

Erin Iesulauro Barker is a senior research scientist in the National Security Directorate (NSD) at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). She has 15 years of experience in computational modeling of the mechanical behavior of materials at multiple length scales using finite element analysis, developing computational tools for automatically generating digital material samples, and developing highly parallel solver frameworks. Working with computational and experimental scientists, she has applied the integrated computational materials engineering process to applications ranging from irradiation damage modeling for structural steels in nuclear reactors, to the performance of solid phase processed materials and joints, to ice sheet modeling. Barker brings her experience working with computational and experimental scientists from across PNNL working from multiple domains to aid in bringing together the right expertise to tackle multidisciplinary problems for a range of sponsors.

Barker received her PhD in civil engineering from Cornell University in 2006. At Cornell, she was a member of the Cornell Fracture group under Professor Anthony Ingraffea, where she focused on computational solid mechanics and fracture mechanics, as well as software development. Her research work included developing microstructure scale representations of polycrystalline metals and conducting crack initiation and propagation simulations to study the impact of local heterogeneity in materials on bulk performance and failure of materials.

After graduation, she began her professional career at Los Alamos National Laboratory, working on multi-physics and multi-scale simulation capabilities. In 2010, she joined PNNL as a member of the Computational Engineering group in the Physical and Computational Sciences Directorate. She was promoted to group leader of the Computational Engineering group in 2017, where she worked to increase the group’s visibility and collaborations inside and outside of PNNL. She joined the NSD as the Mathematics, Statistics, and Data Science group in 2019 and served as leader for four years. 

• PhD in civil and environmental engineering, Cornell University
• MS in civil engineering, Cornell University
• BS in civil engineering, Ohio Northern University