Charles Lieber
| Charles M. Lieber | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born | 1959 (age 58–59) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Citizenship | United States |
| Alma mater |
Franklin & Marshall College Stanford University |
| Known for | Nanomaterials synthesis and assembly Nanostructure characterization Nanoelectronics and nanophotonics Nanobioelectronics |
| Awards | Wolf Prize in Chemistry (2012) MRS Von Hippel Award (2016) NAS (2004) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields |
Nanoscience and nanotechnology Chemistry Materials physics Neuroscience |
| Institutions |
Harvard University Columbia University |
| Doctoral students |
Hongjie Dai Philip Kim Peidong Yang SungWoo Nam |
Charles M. Lieber (born 1959) is an American chemist and pioneer in the field of nanoscience and nanotechnology. In 2011, Lieber was recognized by Thomson Reuters as the leading chemist in the world for the decade 2000-2010 based on the impact of his scientific publications. Lieber has published over 390 papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals and has edited and contributed to many books on nanoscience. He is the principal inventor on over fifty issued US patents and applications, and founded the nanotechnology company Nanosys in 2001 and Vista Therapeutics in 2007. He is known for his contributions to the synthesis, assembly and characterization of nanoscale materials and nanodevices, the application of nanoelectronic devices in biology, and as a mentor to numerous leaders in nanoscience.
Lieber “spent much of his childhood building – and breaking – stereos, cars and model airplanes.” He obtained a B.A. in Chemistry from Franklin & Marshall College, graduating with honors in 1981. He went on to earn his doctorate at Stanford University in Chemistry, carrying out research on surface chemistry in the lab of Nathan Lewis, followed by a two year postdoc at Caltech in the lab of Harry Gray on long-distance electron transfer in metalloproteins. A self-confessed competitive person, Lieber feels “pressure to get things done quickly and – ideally – first” and to break new ground: “What I like to do as a scientist is to work on things that have not already been shown to work”. Studying the effects of dimensionality and anisotropy on the properties of quasi-2D planar structures and quasi-1D structures in his early career at Columbia and Harvard led him to become interested in the question of how one could make a one-dimensional wire, and to the epiphany that if a technology were to emerge from nascent work on nanoscale materials “it would require interconnections – exceedingly small, wire-like structures to move information around, move electrons around, and connect devices together.” Lieber was an early proponent of using the fundamental physical advantages of the very small to meld the worlds of optics and electronics and create interfaces between nanoscale materials and biological structures, and “to develop entirely new technologies, technologies we cannot even predict today.”
Lieber joined the Columbia University Department of Chemistry in 1987, where he was Assistant Professor (1987-1990) and Associate Professor (1990-1991) before moving to Harvard as Full Professor (1992). He now holds a joint appointment at Harvard University in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and the Harvard Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, as the Joshua and Beth Friedman University Professor. In 2015 he became Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology.
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