Halas Group Members




Principal Investigator

Naomi Halas
Stanley C. Moore Professor in Electrical & Computer Engineering
Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Chemistry, Physics & Astronomy
Director, Laboratory for Nanophotonics

DSc, 2007, La Salle University
PhD, 1987, Physics, Bryn Mawr College
MA, 1984, Physics, Bryn Mawr College
BA, 1980, Chemistry, La Salle College




Lab Administrators

Martha Alexander
Administrator
Laboratory for Nanophotonics

     
Carolyn Aresu
Administrator
Rice Quantum Institute




Postdocs

  Surbhi Lal
Postdoctoral Associate

PhD, 2006, Applied Physics, Rice University 
MS, 1997, Physics, Texas Tech University
MS, 1988, Physics, Indian Institute of Technology, New Dehli, India
BS, 1986, Physics, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India

     
  Zheyu (Joey) Fang
Postdoctoral Associate

PhD, 2011, Condensed Matter Physics, Peking University, China 
BS, 2006, Physics, Nankai University, China

Research:
Active plasmonics and graphene plasmonics

     
  Alexander Urban
Postdoctoral Associate

PhD, 2010, Physics, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Germany
MS, 2006, Physics, University of Karlsruhe, Germany
MPhys, 2005, Optoelectronics and Lasers, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK

Email
   


Graduate Students


Ciceron Ayala-Orozco
Chemistry

MS, 2009, Theoretical Chemistry, Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Mexico
BS, 2007, Biological Chemistry & Pharmacology, Universidad Michoacana, Mexico

Research:
Engineering nanostructures for medical applications, developing nanoshell-based DNA/peptide bioconjugates, and analyzing plasmon-exciton coupling in nanoshell-quantum dot complexes

     
  Lisa Brown
Chemistry

MA, 2009, Chemistry, Rice University
BS, 2007, Chemistry, Louisiana State University
BA, 2007, Music, Louisiana State University

Research:
Fabrication and characterization of metallic nanoantennas for surface-enhanced spectroscopies

Email
     
  Jared Day
Applied Physics

MS, 2010, Rice University
BSEE, 2003, Johns Hopkins University


Research:
Development of plasmonic nanostructures to investigate subwavelength energy transport (waveguiding) and the optical and electrical generation of surface plasmon waves

Email
     
  Amanda Goodman
Chemistry

MA, 2013, Chemistry, Rice University
BS, 2010, Chemistry, University of Iowa

Research:
Synthesis and functionalization of plasmonic nanostructures for medical applications

Email
     
  Sam Gottheim
Chemistry

BS, 2011, Chemistry, Muhlenberg College

Research:
UV plasmonics for sensing applications

Email
     
  Nick King
Physics

MS, 2011, Physics, Rice University
BS, 2008, Physics, Rice University

Research:
Coupling of light into dielectric waveguides utilizing plasmonic nanoparticles and asymmetric dielectric environments

     
  Mark Knight
Electrical & Computer Engineering

MS, 2009, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Rice University
BS, 2006, Physics, Carleton College

Research:
Opto-electrical plasmonics and the physics of asymmetric nanostructures

Email 
     
 Adam Lauchner
Applied Physics

MS, 2012, Nanoscale Physics, Rice University
BS, 2006, Mechanical Engineering, Texas Tech University

Research:
Use of plasmonic structures for the development of photodetection devices in the infrared and ultraviolet

Email 
   
  Michael McClain
Chemistry

MA, 2013, Chemistry, Rice University
BS, 2011, Chemistry, Emory University
BS, 2011, Physics, Emory University

Research:
Chemical synthesis of aluminum nanoparticles

Email
 
     
  Shaunak Mukherjee
Chemistry

MA, 2010, Chemistry, Rice University
MS, 2007, Chemistry, University of Delhi, India
BS, 2005, Chemistry, St. Xavier's College, India

Research:
Plasmonic properties of asymmetric nanostructures, plasmon induced chemical changes

Shaunak's webpage 
     
  Oara Neumann
Applied Physics

MS, 2004, Chemical Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
MS, 1997, Analytical Chemistry, University of Bucharest, Romania
BA, 1996, Chemistry, University of Bucharest, Romania

Research:
Probing of biomolecules using plasmonic nanostructures

Email

     
  Andrea Schlather
Chemistry

MA, 2012, Chemistry, Rice University
BS, 2009, Chemistry, University of Houston

Research:
Modulating the plasmonic properties of metal nanoclusters through plasmon-exciton interactions

Email

     
  Ali Sobhani
Electrical & Computer Engineering

MS, 2011, Nanoelectronics, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

Research:
Exploiting plasmonics in opto-electronic devices for energy harvesting and sensing

Email 
     
  Christyn A. Thibodeaux
Applied Physics

BS, 2010, Physics, Xavier University of Louisiana

Research:
Engineering and characterization of sub-50 nm nanoparticles for theranostic nanomedicine

Email

     


Fangfang Wen
Chemistry

MA, 2012, Chemistry, Rice University
MS, 2010, Nanophotonics, Ecole normale supérieure de Cachan, France
MS, 2010, Molecular Biophotonics, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain
BS, 2008, Optical Science & Technology, Xi'an University of Posts &Telecommunications, China

Research:
Electrically-controlled optical switch based on a single nanoantenna

Email
  
     
  Yu Zhang
Physics

MS, 2011, Pysics, Rice University
MS, 2007, Plasma Physics, University of Science and Technology of China
BS, 2004, Plasma Physics, University of Science and Technology of China

Research:
Nonlinear optics by asymmetric plasmonic nanostructures

Email
 
     
  Bob Zheng
Electrical and Computer Engineering

BS, 2010, Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California, Berkeley

Research:
Hybridizing electro-active materials with active plasmonic devices

Email
  
     
  Linan Zhou
Chemistry

BS, 2012, Chemistry, Peking University, China

Research:
Plasmon-enhanced heterogeneous catalytic chemical reactions

Email
     


Alumni

Carla Aguirre  Graduate Research Associate, University of Montreal
Richard Averitt  Associate Professor, Boston University
Rizia Bardhan Assistant Professor, Vanderbilt University
Aoune Barhoumi Postdoctoral Fellow, Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, MIT
Sandra Bishnoi  Assistant Professor, Illinois Institute of Technology
Kelley Bradley  Nanofabrication Facility Manager, University of Houston
Bruce Brinson  Self-Employed Consultant
Clarence Charnay Universite Montpellier 2, Place Eugene Batallion, France
Alan Cheville Associate Professor, Oklahoma State University
Joseph Cole Algorithm Developer, Applied Materials
Dan Duan 
Tumasang Fofang Sandia National Laboratories
Nathaniel Grady  Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of Physics & Beijing National Lab for Condensed Matter Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Muhammed Gheith
Glenn Goodrich Director, Process Development and Chemistry, Nanospectra Biosciences, Inc., Houston  
Greg Hale Engineer, Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
Lee Hirsch Director, Defense Science Study Group, Inst for Def Analyses, Washington DC  
Ryan Huschka Assistant Professor of Chemistry, Newman University  
Joseph Jackson Patent Engineer, Osha Liang LLC, Houston
Tara Kasper  
Kevin Kelly Associate Professor, Rice University
Janardan Kundu Postdoctoral Fellow, Los Alamos National Laboratory 
Britt Lassiter Postdoctoral Fellow, David Smith Group, Duke University
Allen Lee  
Carly Levin Senior Research Scientist, Nano3D Biosciences, Inc.
Na Liu Assistant Professor, Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Stuttgart, Germany
Yu Liu University of Pennsylvania
Nyein Zaw Lwin MBA Program, Florida
Nikolay Mirin  R&D Photolithography Process Engineer, Micron Technology, Inc., Boise, Idaho
Cristin Moran 3M, Minnesota
Julius Mueller 
Steve Oldenburg  President, nanoComposix, San Diego
Phil Pippenger  Intellectual Property Attorney, Leydig, Voit, & Mayer, Ltd., Chicago
Corey Radloff  3M, Minnesota
Matt Reiten   
Jay Resh  Director, Advantage Testing, Houston
Dipankar Sarkar  Angstrom Instruments, India
Scott Sershen  United States Surgical
Jennifer Steele  Assistant Professor, Trinity University, San Antonio
Sri Priya Sundararajan  Senior Si Process Engineer, OneChipPhotonics, Ottawa, ON
Felicia Tam  Oxonica Materials, Inc., Mountain View, CA
Robin Taylor   
Hui Wang  Assistant Professor, University of South Carolina
Sarah Westcott  Nomadics, Stillwater, OK
Dan Wolfe   
Jian Ye  
Dongmao Zhang Assistant Professor, Mississippi State University