Natural Sciences
Showing 141-160 of 382 Results
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Leo Hollberg
Professor (Research) of Physics and of Geophysics
BioHow can we make optimal use of quantum systems (atoms, lasers, and electronics) to test fundamental physics principles, enable precision measurements of space-time and when feasible, develop useful devices, sensors, and instruments?
Professor Hollberg’s research objectives include high precision tests of fundamental physics as well as applications of laser physics and technology. This experimental program in laser/atomic physics focuses on high-resolution spectroscopy of laser-cooled and -trapped atoms, non-linear optical coherence effects in atoms, optical frequency combs, optical/microwave atomic clocks, and high sensitivity trace gas detection. Frequently this involves the study of laser noise and methods to circumvent measurement limitations, up to, and beyond, quantum limited optical detection. Technologies and tools utilized include frequency-stabilized lasers and chip-scale atomic devices. Based in the Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory (HEPL), this research program has strong, synergistic, collaborative connections to the Stanford Center on Position Navigation and Time (SCPNT). Research directions are inspired by experience that deeper understanding of fundamental science is critical and vital in addressing real-world problems, for example in the environment, energy, and navigation. Amazing new technologies and devices enable experiments that test fundamental principles with high precision and sometimes lead to the development of better instruments and sensors. Ultrasensitive optical detection of atoms, monitoring of trace gases, isotopes, and chemicals can impact many fields. Results from well-designed experiments teach us about the “realities” of nature, guide and inform, occasionally produce new discoveries, frequently surprise, and almost always generate new questions and perspectives. -
Susan Holmes
Professor of Statistics, Emerita
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsOur lab has been developing tools for the analyses of complex data structures, extending work on multivariate data to structured multitable table that include graphs, networks and trees as well as categorical and continuous measurements.
We created and support the Bioconductor package phyloseq for the analyses of microbial ecology data from the microbiome. We have specialized in developing interactive graphical visualization tools for doing reproducible research in biology. -
Wray Huestis
Professor of Chemistry, Emerita
BioProfessor Wray Huestis’ research concerns the molecular mechanisms whereby cells control their shape, motility, deformability and the structural integrity of their membranes. Metabolic control of interprotein and protein-lipid interactions is studied by a variety of biochemical, spectroscopic and radiochemical techniques, including fluorescence and EPR spectrometry, autoradiography and electron microscopy. The role of lipid metabolism and transport in regulating the fluid dynamics of cell suspensions (red blood cells, platelets, lymphocytes) is examined using circulating cells and cells grown in culture. Cell-cell and cell-liposome interactions are studied using model membrane systems with widely differing physical properties. Complexes of liposomes and encapsulated viruses are used as selective vectors to deliver water-soluble compounds across the membranes of intact cells. The particular projects described in the listed publications have as a common goal an understanding of the molecular workings of the cell membrane.
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Jamie Imam
Advanced Lecturer
BioDr. Jamie Imam received her bachelor's degree in Biological Sciences and Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University and her Ph.D. in Genetics from the Stanford School of Medicine. In addition to teaching, Jamie is the Director of the Honors Program in Biology and a Lecturer Consultant with the Center for Teaching and Learning. When she is not teaching or doing science outreach, she enjoys reading, baking and spending time outdoors with her family.
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Kent Irwin
Director, Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory (HEPL), Professor of Physics, of Particle Physics and Astrophysics and of Photon Science
BioIrwin Group web page:
https://irwinlab.stanford.edu/ -
Christine Jacobs-Wagner
Dennis Cunningham Professor, Professor of Biology and of Microbiology and Immunology
BioChristine Jacobs-Wagner is a Dennis Cunningham Professor in the Department of Biology and the ChEM-H Institute at Stanford University. She is interested in understanding the fundamental mechanisms and principles by which cells, and, in particular, bacterial cells, are able to multiple. She received her PhD in Biochemistry in 1996 from the University of Liège, Belgium where she unraveled a molecular mechanism by which some bacterial pathogens sense and respond to antibiotics attack to achieve resistance. For this work, she received multiple awards including the 1997 GE & Science Prize for Young Life Scientists. During her postdoctoral work at Stanford Medical School, she demonstrated that bacteria can localize regulatory proteins to specific intracellular regions to control signal transduction and the cell cycle, uncovering a new, unsuspected level of bacterial regulation.
She started her own lab at Yale University in 2001. Over the years, her group made major contributions in the emerging field of bacterial cell biology and provided key molecular insights into the temporal and spatial mechanisms involved in cell morphogenesis, cell polarization, chromosome segregation and cell cycle control. For her distinguished work, she received the Pew Scholars award from the Pew Charitable Trust, the Woman in Cell Biology Junior award from the American Society of Cell Biology and the Eli Lilly award from the American Society of Microbiology. She held the Maxine F. Singer and William H. Fleming professor chairs at Yale. She was elected to the Connecticut academy of Science, the American Academy of Microbiology and the National Academy of Sciences. She has been an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute since 2008.
Her lab moved to Stanford in 2019. Current research examines the general principles and spatiotemporal mechanisms by which bacterial cells replicate, using Caulobacter crescentus and Escherichia coli as models. Recently, the Jacobs-Wagner lab expanded their interests to the Lyme disease agent Borrelia burgdorferi, revealing unsuspected ways by which this pathogen grows and causes disease -
Iain Johnstone
Marjorie Mhoon Fair Professor of Quantitative Science and Professor of Statistics and of Biomedical Data Sciences
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsEmpirical bias/shrinkage estimation; non-parametric, smoothing; statistical inverse problems.
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Patricia Jones
The Dr. Nancy Chang Professor, Emerita
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsDr. Jones' research focused on genetic, molecular, and cellular mechanisms that regulate immune responses. She hHer most recent work was centered on the regulation of innate immune responses that are triggered by conserved microbial components. As these responses can be harmful they are highly regulated in their occurrence, magnitude, and duration. Her lab discovered a novel mechanism that negatively regulates innate responses, mediated by the phosphatase calcineurin.
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Martin Jonikas
Assistant Professor, Biology
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsPhotosynthesis provides energy for nearly all life on Earth. Our lab aims to dramatically accelerate our understanding of photosynthetic organisms by developing and applying novel functional genomics strategies in the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. In the long run, we dream of engineering photosynthetic organisms to address the challenges that our civilization faces in agriculture, health and energy.
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Shamit Kachru
Professor of Physics and Director, Stanford Institute for Theoretical Physics, Emeritus
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsMy current research is focused in three directions:
— Mathematical aspects of string theory (with a focus on BPS state counts, black holes, and moonshine)
— Quantum field theory approaches to condensed matter physics (with a focus on physics of non-Fermi liquids)
— Theoretical biology, with a focus on evolution and ecology -
Renata Kallosh
Stanford W. Ascherman, MD Professor, Emerita
BioWhat is the mathematical structure of supergravity/string theory and its relation to cosmology?
Professor Kallosh works on the general structure of supergravity and string theory and their applications to cosmology. Her main interests are related to the models early universe inflation and dark energy in string theory. She develops string theory models explaining the origin of the universe and its current acceleration. With her collaborators, she has recently constructed de Sitter supergravity, which is most suitable for studies of inflation and dark energy and spontaneously broken supersymmetry.
She is analyzing possible consequences of the expected new data from current and future cosmological observations, including LiteBIRD satellite CMB data. These results may affect the relationship between superstring theory and supergravity, and the real world. Professor Kallosh works, in particular, on future tests of string theory by CMB data and effective supergravity models with flexible amplitude of gravitational waves produced during inflation. -
Matthew Kanan
Professor of Chemistry and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy
BioMatt Kanan is a Professor of Chemistry and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy at Stanford. Matt’s research group works across multiple fields of chemistry and engineering with applications for sustainable plastics, critical mineral recovery, and carbon management. Their work has led to several inventions in these areas, including new performance-advantaged bioplastics, electrochemical systems to recycle acid and base, metal-free catalysts for C1 transformations, and thermal mineral conversion processes. Matt is the co-founder of ReSource Chemical Corp., an Oakland-based start-up commercializing manufacturing technology developed in his lab, and Mafix, Inc., a spin-out developing mineral fertilizers that remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Prior to joining the Stanford faculty in 2009, Matt did his Ph.D. studies in organic chemistry at Harvard and postdoctoral research at MIT in inorganic chemistry. He earned his B.A. in chemistry from Rice University in 2000.
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Aharon Kapitulnik
Theodore and Sydney Rosenberg Professor of Applied Physics and Professor of Physics
BioAharon Kapitulnik is the Theodore and Sydney Rosenberg Professor in Applied Physics at the Departments of Applied Physics and Physics at Stanford University. His research focuses on experimental condensed matter physics, while opportunistically, also apply his methods to tabletop experimental studies of fundamental phenomena in physics. His recent studies cover a broad spectrum of phenomena associated with the behavior of correlated and disordered electron systems, particularly in reduced dimensions, and the development of effective instrumentation to detect subtle signatures of physical phenomena.
Among other recognitions, his activities earned him the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship (1986-90), a Presidential Young Investigator Award (1987-92), a Sackler Scholar at Tel-Aviv University (2006), the Heike Kamerlingh Onnes Prize for Superconductivity Experiment (2009), a RTRA (Le Triangle de la Physique) Senior Chair (2010), and the Oliver Buckley Condensed Matter Prize of the American Physical Society (2015). Aharon Kapitulnik is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. Kapitulnik holds a Ph.D. in Physics from Tel-Aviv University (1984). -
Hemamala Karunadasa
J.G. Jackson and C.J. Wood Professor of Chemistry and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy and Professor, by courtesy, of Materials Science and Engineering
BioProfessor Hema Karunadasa works with colleagues in materials science, earth science, and applied physics to drive the discovery of new materials with applications in clean energy. Using the tools of synthetic chemistry, her group designs materials that couple the structural tunability of organic molecules with the diverse electronic and optical properties of extended inorganic solids. This research targets materials such as sorbents for capturing environmental pollutants, phosphors for solid-state lighting, and absorbers for solar cells.
Hemamala Karunadasa studied chemistry and materials science at Princeton University (A.B. with high honors 2003; Certificate in Materials Science and Engineering 2003), where her undergraduate thesis project with Professor Robert J. Cava examined geometric magnetic frustration in metal oxides. She moved from solid-state chemistry to solution-state chemistry for her doctoral studies in inorganic chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley (Ph.D. 2009) with Professor Jeffrey R. Long. Her thesis focused on heavy atom building units for magnetic molecules and molecular catalysts for generating hydrogen from water. She continued to study molecular electrocatalysts for water splitting during postdoctoral research with Berkeley Professors Christopher J. Chang and Jeffrey R. Long at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. She further explored molecular catalysts for hydrocarbon oxidation as a postdoc at the California Institute of Technology with Professor Harry B. Gray. She joined the Stanford Chemistry Department faculty in September 2012. Her research explores solution-state routes to new solid-state materials.
Professor Karunadasa’s lab at Stanford takes a molecular approach to extended solids. Lab members gain expertise in solution- and solid-state synthetic techniques and structure determination through powder- and single-crystal x-ray diffraction. Lab tools also include a host of spectroscopic and electrochemical probes, imaging methods, and film deposition techniques. Group members further characterize their materials under extreme environments and in operating devices to tune new materials for diverse applications in renewable energy.
Please visit the lab website for more details and recent news.
