Speakers | RamanFest

Speakers Presenting at RamanFest 2020

Dr. V. Ara Apkarian University of California, Irvine
Dr. Nick Borys Montana State University
Dr. Aaron J. Celestian Natural History Museum of Los Angeles
Dr. Silke H. Christiansen Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin, Germany
Dr. Moritz Kircher Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Dr. Igor Lednev University at Albany, State University of New York
Dr. Anna Luczak Bristol-Myers Squibb
Dr. Wei Min Columbia University
Dr. Isao Noda University of Delaware
Dr. Christian Pellerin University of Montreal, Canada
Dr. Eric Potma University of California, Irvine
Dr. Bin Ren Xiamen University, China
Dr. Charles A. Roberts Toyota Motor North America
Dr. Steve Weisberg, Ph.D. Southern California Coastal Water Research Project
Mr. Max Turner Wetherington The Pennsylvania State University
Dr. Huabing Yin University of Glasgow, UK

Speakers' Information

V. Ara Apkarian is a Distinguished Professor of Chemical Physics at UCI. He holds BS and PhD degrees in Chemistry from USC and Northwestern. Following a postdoctoral fellowship at Cornell, he joined the Chemistry faculty at UCI in 1983, where he has served as Department Chair (2004-2007) and as the founding co-Director of the Chemical and Materials Physics (ChaMP) program, and as Director of the NSF Center for Chemical Innovation on Chemistry at the Space-Time Limit (2007-2020). His principle scientific contributions are in photophysics, ultrafast molecular and quantum dynamics in condensed matter, nonlinear optics, spectroscopy, and atomistic spectromicroscopy. His work, which combines experiment and theory, has appeared in ~200 peer-reviewed publications. He has organized/co-organized more than 30 scientific conferences and workshops in topics ranging from photophysics, low temperature chemistry and physics, condensed phase photodynamics, ultrafast processes, superfluid helium, molecular videography, and chemistry at the space-time limit. His current research combines ultrafast nonlinear optics and plasmonics with scanning-probe microscopy to interrogate dynamics of single molecules and extended states of matter with atomistic resolution.

Dr. Nick Borys

Nick Borys is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics at Montana State University. The research of the Borys Lab at MSU is focused on exploring quantum phenomena in low-dimensional material systems with nano-optical imaging and spectroscopy techniques in both the steady-state and transient temporal domains. Among other thrusts, a current major research direction in the Borys Lab is to understand how local strain, material composition, and heterostructure configuration affect multi-exciton phenomena in 2D semiconductors with a particular emphasis on how the phenomena can be enhanced and ultimately utilized for novel non-classical light sources in qusantum photonic device architectures.

Dr. Aaron Celestian

Dr. Celestian currently researches how minerals interact with their environments and with living things, and how those minerals can be used to solve problems like climate change, pollution, and disease. His biggest impact has been in understanding the molecular processes that allow for the use of nano-crystalline minerals in remediation applications in high-level radioactive waste tanks at the Savannah River and Hanford waste sites. His on-going research in experimental design, real-time material characterization, mineral discovery & application, and the functionalization of minerals is developing novel nano-crystalline Earth materials into functional materials for a wide variety of demanding applications. Dr. Celestian’s environmental studies regularly interfaces with the mining, oil & gas, and pharmaceutical industries. Dr. Celestian holds adjunct teaching and research faculty positions at the University of Southern California and is an Affiliate Research Scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In addition to research, Dr. Celestian oversees the Gem & Mineral Hall at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles and regularly develops mineral science exhibits seen by approximately one million visitors per year.

Professor Silke Christiansen

Silke Christiansen is appointed full professor since 11/2013 at the Free University – Berlin in the physics department and is running a research department for correlative microscopy and materials data at the Fraunhofer Institute for Ceramics materials and systems, Germany. She received several awards including the MRS student award, a research fellowship award by the Bayerische Forschungsstiftung for a research stay at Columbia University, NY, USA and a Feodor Lynen Fellowship awarded by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to carry out research in silicon technology at TJ Watson Research Center of IBM, Yorktown Heights, NY, USA. Moreover, she is distinguished honorary professor at the Material Science Dept., Chungbuk University in Korea for 5 years (2014-2019). She has significant experience in the field of nano-materials and context microscopy and spectroscopy, bio-medical sensing, bio-technology and opto- as well as large-area electronics. She advances materials based on correlated microscopies and spectroscopies for which she operates a labs@location unit with Carl Zeiss Microscopy. She gained her scientific experience at various institutions in Germany and the US, e.g. IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY, USA, Columbia University, NY, USA, Max Planck Institute for Microstructure Physics and the Science of Light in Halle and Erlangen, Leibnitz Institute for Photonic Technology in Jena and the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg. She has more than 350 peer-reviewed publications, more than 12 patents/- applications, more than 10990 citations and an h-index of 53.

Professor Moritz Kircher

Moritz Kircher, MD, PhD is the Chairman of the Department of Imaging of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute & Harvard Medical School, where he also is the Director of the Lurie Family Imaging Center (LFIC) and the Molecular Cancer Imaging Facility (MCIF), as well as a laboratory head. He also serves as Chief of the Oncoradiology Division at the Brigham and Women's Hospital.

A graduate of the Charité Medical School in Berlin, he moved to the US for postdoctoral training with Prof. Ralph Weissleder at the Center for Molecular Imaging Research at MGH-Harvard Medical School, followed by Radiology Residency and MRI Fellowship at Harvard Medical School and Stanford, respectively, and postdoctoral work with Prof. Sam Gambhir at the Molecular Imaging Program at Stanford. From 2010 and 2018 he was an attending Radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Here, he was also head of the Kircher Laboratory in the Sloan Kettering Institute, where he pioneered the development of SE(R)RS nanoparticles for high precision in vivo cancer imaging, and served as Associate Vice Chair for Research for the Department of Radiology. He has received over $12M in funding from the NIH and foundations. Among his recent awards are the 2012 World Molecular Imaging Society (WMIS) Young Investigator Award, the 2013 Walter-Friedrich-Preis, Damon-Runyon-Rachleff Innovation Award (2014), and Pershing Square Sohn Prize (2015). In 2016, he was elected as a "Young Leader" by the International Society for Strategic Studies in Radiology (IS3R) (one of six to date). He served as the founding Chair of the "Molecular Imaging in Nanotechnology and Theranostics (MINT)" Interest Group of the WMIS, and is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Nanotheranostics.

Professor Igor K Lednev, PhD, FRSC, FSAS

Igor K. Lednev is a Professor at the University at Albany, State University of New York. He received his Ph.D. in 1983 graduating from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and held a position as a group leader at the Russian Academy of Sciences. He worked in several leading laboratories around the world including UK, Canada and Japan before joining Sanford Asher’s laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh In 1997. Dr. Lednev accepted a faculty position at the University at Albany in 2002 and was promoted to full Professor in 2013. Prof. Lednev’s research is focused on the development and application of novel laser spectroscopy for medical diagnostics and forensic purposes. He co-authored over 220 publications in peer-reviewed journals.
Dr. Lednev is a cofounder and CTO of a startup company SupreMEtric targeting the commercialization of his patented technology. He served as an advisory member on the White House Subcommittee for Forensic Science. He is a Fellow of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy and the Royal Society of Chemistry (UK). He launched a new Forensic Science Symposium at Pittcon in 2018 together with the National Institute of Justice. This symposium has become a regular annual event and will include 34 invited talks and a poster session in Chicago, IL in 2020. Dr. Lednev is on the editorial boards of four scientific journals. He received several prestigious awards including Gold Medal Award from NY/NJ Section of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy, Guest Professor Fellowship from the Friedrich-Schiller-University, Germany, Research Innovation Award from Research Corporation, Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities and CAS Dean’s Award for Outstanding Achievements in Teaching.

Dr. Anna Luczak

Anna Luczak, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist at Bristol-Myers Squibb in the Global Analytical Science and Technology group within Quality organization and currently manages Analytical and Quality related projects, compendia compliance, and method lifecycle management and also focuses on developing and using novel spectroscopic techniques to detect bio-pharmaceutical counterfeits in support of corporate security investigations. Anna also works on developing novel fingerprinting methods for elucidation of secondary structure of biologics for bio-process related applications and eventually filing. Anna received her Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from New Jersey Institute of Technology under the direction of Prof. Zafar Iqbal where she studied Raman spectroscopy for various pharmaceutical applications. Before joining BMS in 2014, she worked at Johnson and Johnson where she lead process improvements of existing products including scale-up and transfer to the 3rd party. Anna has been a co-chair of SciX Pharmaceutical Analysis Section for the past 4 years. Lastly and most importantly, Anna is a young mother to Maria and Amelia who reads and listens to books and podcasts constantly to help her shape the young minds of her girls and make them realize they are really, really smart.

Professor Wei Min

Dr. Wei Min graduated from Peking University in 2003. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2008, studying single-molecule biophysics with Prof. Sunney Xie. After continuing his postdoctoral work in Xie group, Dr. Min joined the faculty at Columbia University in 2010, and was promoted to Full Professor there in 2017. He is also affiliated with the Kavli Institute for Brain Science and NeuroTechnology Center at Columbia University. Dr. Min's current research interests focus on developing novel optical spectroscopy and microscopy technology to address biomedical problems. In particular, his group has made important contributions to the development of stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) microscopy and its broad application in biomedical imaging. Dr. Min's contribution has been recognized by a number of honors, including Pittsburgh Conference Achievement Award (2019), Analyst Emerging Investigator Lectureship (2018), Coblentz Award of Molecular Spectroscopy (2017), the ACS Early Career Award in Experimental Physical Chemistry (2017), Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (2015), Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2013), and NIH Director's New Innovator Award (2012).

Dr. Isao Noda

Isao Noda is an Affiliated Professor Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Delaware.
He was born in Tokyo, Japan. He came to the United States in 1969 and graduated from Columbia University in New York City, in 1974 with B.S. degree in chemical engineering. He received his M.S. in bioengineering (1976), as well as his M.Phil. (1978) and Ph.D. (1979) in chemical engineering from Columbia. In 1997, he also received D.Sc. degree in chemistry from the University of Tokyo. He worked for the Procter and Gamble Company in Cincinnati, Ohio from 1978 to 2012.

After retirement from P&G, he became an Affiliated Professor at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Delaware, and also holds the position of Chief Science Officer and Senior Vice President at Danimer Scientific in Bainbridge, GA. His research interest is in the broad area of polymer science and spectroscopy. He is known for the development of a novel class of bio-based biodegradable plastics, Nodax™, and also a versatile analytical technique called two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy.

He is a recipient of the 1991 William F. Meggers Award from the Society for Applied Spectroscopy and the 2002 Williams-Wright Award from the Coblentz Society. He was selected as the 2005 Chemist of the Year by the Cincinnati Section of the American Chemical Society. He received the International Academic Cooperation and Exchange Medal in 2008 from the Chinese Chemical Society and Chinese Optical Society, the New York State Society for Applied Spectroscopy’s Gold Medal in 2009, the 2011 Bomem-Mechelson Award from the Coblentz Society, and the 2011 Ellis R. Lippincott Award jointly from the Optical Society of America, the Society for Applied Spectroscopy and the Coblentz Society. He became a Fellow in 2011 and Honorary Member in 2013 of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy and a Fellow of the Optical Society of America in 2012. He has about ninety (90) patents granted in the US and the EU, has published over four hundred (411) articles in peer-reviewed journals, and coauthored three (3) books.

Select Publications
1. I. Noda, “Advances in two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy (2DCOS),” Frontiers of Molecular Spectroscopy, 2nd ed, J. Laane, Ed. Pp.45-75, Elsevier, Amsterdam, 2018.
2. I. Noda, P.R. Green, M.M. Satkowski, and L.A. Schechtman, “Preparation and properties of a novel class of polyhydroxyalkanoate copolymers,” Biomacromolecules, 6(2), 580-586 (2005).
3. I. Noda and Y. Ozaki, Two-Dimensional Correlation Spectroscopy — Applications in Vibrational and Optical Spectroscopy, Wiley: Chichester, UK, 2004.
4. I. Noda, "A generalized two-dimensional correlation method applicable to infrared, Raman, and other types of spectroscopy," Appl. Spectrosc., 47(9), 1329-36 (1993).
5. I. Noda, "Latex Elastomer with a Permanently Hydrophilic Surface," Nature, 350(6314), 143-144 (1991).

Professor Christian Pellerin

Christian Pellerin is a professor in the Department of Chemistry at Université de Montréal. He received his B.Sc. in chemistry in 1997 from Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières and his Ph.D. in polymer chemistry in 2002 from Université Laval under the supervision of Michel Pézolet. He joined the faculty at Université de Montréal in 2005 after a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Delaware with John F. Rabolt and D. Bruce Chase. His research interests include the development and application of infrared and Raman spectroscopy to azomaterials, electrospun nanofibers, molecular glasses, and ultrathin films. He has published 80 articles and received the SAS Meggers award for his work on vibrational spectroscopy.

Professor Eric Potma

Born and raised in the Netherlands, Eric Potma got his Masters at the University of Groningen in 1996. He stayed five more years for his graduate research, which he completed in 2001. While working in the ultrafast spectroscopy group of Prof. Douwe Wiersma, Eric focused his research on the development of laser sources for microscopy and the application of nonlinear methods to optical imaging. In 2001, Potma joined the group of Prof. Sunney Xie at Harvard University as a postdoctoral fellow. During this time, he was been involved with projects on synchronizing mode-locked lasers, visualizing lipid bilayers with CARS microscopy and vibrational imaging of tissue in vivo at video rate. In 2005, Eric joined the Department of Chemistry at the University of California in Irvine, where he currently is a Professor of Chemistry. His group focuses on the characterization of nano-structured materials and biological tissues with the aid of new optical imaging techniques.

Professor Dr. Bin Ren

Bin Ren received his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the Xiamen University in 1998. He started his career right after graduation in the same university and became full professor in 2004, Minjiang professor in 2009, and Changjiang Scholar Professor in 2016. He was awarded National Distinguished Young Scholar of National Science Foundation of China in 2008. He spent one year in City College of New York and one sabbatical year in Fritz-Haber Institute of MPG in Berlin as an Alexander von Humboldt fellow. He is now the vice director of State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surface and the vice dean of the College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Xiamen University. He is a member of the international steering committee of International Conference on Raman Spectroscopy (ICORS) and Asian Spectroscopy Conference (ASC). He is now an Associate Editor of Analytical Chemistry (ACS). His research interest is on the development of spectroscopic methods for dynamic and structure of surfaces and interfaces in the electrochemical systems and living cells at the spatial (nanometer), time (matches the time scale of events), and sensitivity (single molecules) limits.

Dr. Charles Roberts

Charles A. Roberts is a principal scientist at the Toyota Research Institute of North America in Ann Arbor, MI. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a B.S. in Chemical Engineering. He received a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Lehigh University under the supervision of Professor Israel E. Wachs in the Operando Molecular Spectroscopy & Catalysis Research Lab. Since joining Toyota in 2012, his research has focused on automotive exhaust gas purification, with a specific focus on the identification of structure-function-reactivity relationships for deNOx reactions over metal oxide catalysts utilizing spectroscopic characterization. His work has provided support to various materials research projects by introducing and expanding utilization of in situ Raman spectroscopy.

Dr. Stephen Weisberg

Dr. Stephen Weisberg is Executive Director of the Southern California Coastal Water Research Project Authority, a research institute created by 14 California water quality agencies to ensure a solid scientific foundation for their management activities. Dr. Weisberg’s research emphasis is in developing tools to support implementation of, and data interpretation from, environmental monitoring programs. Beyond his research activities, Dr. Weisberg focuses on linking the needs of the management community with science. He serves on numerous advisory committees, including the State of California’s Water Quality Monitoring Council, the California Ocean Protection Council Science Advisory Team, the California Sea Grant Program Advisory Council, and the EPA’s Board of Scientific Counselors. Dr. Weisberg received his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan and his Ph.D. from the University of Delaware.

Mr. Max Turner Wetherington

Maxwell Turner Wetherington is the PI for the Molecular Spectroscopy lab within the Materials Characterization Laboratory (MCL) at Penn State. After dark, Max pursues a PhD within the Material Science and Engineering (MATSE) department, studying the optical properties of novel 2D materials and developing new sensing/characterization capabilities. Max completed his M.S. in MATSE from Penn State in 2013 studying graphene oxide synthesis and radiolysis, after which he made the obvious transition to farming…Eventually finding his way back to the lab, Max championed several STEM outreach efforts that went beyond his job responsibilities within MCL, including day events for underserved K-12 students in addition to the development of a week-long overnight camp for high school students titled “Make it Matter” within the Science-U program. As an MCL staff scientist Max has co-authored in a broad spectrum of research including entomology, geoscience, chemical engineering and MATSE. He has also participated in industry project development across the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) range. The instrumentation Max manages/operates within the MCL includes Raman spectroscopy (TERS, UV Raman, Vis Raman, NIR Raman), NanoIR spectroscopy, FTIR, UV-Vis spectrophotometry, AFM, optical microscopy, optical profilometry, & contact angle goniometer.

Professor Huabing Yin

Huabing Yin is a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Glasgow. She received her PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Swansea, UK (2002). She was awarded a prestigious Royal Society of Edinburgh Personal Research Fellowship in 2006 and became a Lecturer in 2007 at the University of Glasgow. She was promote to Senior Lecturer (2011) and Professor in 2017. Yin’s research focuses on the development of advanced devices and methodologies to investigate microscale phenomena in the life and environmental sciences. She is an internationally recognized scientist in single-cell analysis, microfluidics and integrated biosensors. In particular, she has developed innovative microfluidic approaches for continuous Raman activated cell sorting. Her research has been supported by RCUK (EPSRC, BBSRC, NERC), charitable organizations and industries.

Speakers Presenting at RamanFest 2020

Dr. V. Ara Apkarian University of California, Irvine

Dr. Nick Borys Montana State University

Dr. Aaron J. Celestian Natural History Museum of Los Angeles

Dr. Silke H. Christiansen Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin, Germany

Dr. Moritz Kircher Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Dr. Igor Lednev University at Albany, State University of New York

Dr. Anna Luczak Bristol-Myers Squibb

Dr. Wei Min Columbia University

Dr. Isao Noda University of Delaware

Dr. Christian Pellerin University of Montreal, Canada

Dr. Eric Potma University of California, Irvine

Dr. Bin Ren Xiamen University, China

Dr. Charles A. Roberts Toyota Motor North America

Dr. Steve Weisberg, Ph.D. Southern California Coastal Water Research Project

Mr. Max Turner Wetherington The Pennsylvania State University

Dr. Huabing Yin University of Glasgow, UK

Speakers' Information