Sylvie Roke
EPFL STI IBI-STI LBP
BM 4112 (Bâtiment BM)
Station 17
1015 Lausanne
+41 21 693 11 91
+41 21 693 10 42
Office:
BM 4112
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Web site: Web site: https://sv.epfl.ch/education
EPFL SV IBI-GE
BM 4112 (Bâtiment BM)
Station 17
1015 Lausanne
Web site: Web site: https://bioengineering.epfl.ch/
+41 21 693 11 91
EPFL
>
STI
>
STI-SMT
>
SMT-ENS
Fields of expertise
Aqueous interfaces and systems
Nonlinear optics
Ultrafast spectroscopy
Light scattering
Nonlinear and multiphoton imaging
Soft matter and membrane systems
Mission
Approximately sixty percent of the mass of the human body is composed of water. Water is not the passive background against which biology unfolds, but an active participator in change. The structural and dynamical properties of water determine the outcome of biological and chemical change. This change occurs at interfaces and in solution. To understand the molecular level details of water-related biological, chemical and physical processes, and to harness them for tomorrow’s technology, we investigate the structure and dynamics of water on various length scales and with varying degrees of complexity.Our strategy is to develop novel optical technology, geared to obtaining molecular level details of nanoscale and microscopic systems in aqueous environments as well as other complex 3D environments such as pores. We have focused on ultrafast nonlinear optical methods as they are non-invasive and label-free and inherently interface specific or sensitive to polar structures. We apply these tools to fundamental questions that have important implications for biology, chemistry or technology.
Topics of interest:
• Water, aqueous solutions
• Aqueous interfaces and nanoscopic systems
• Nonlinear optics, ultrafast spectroscopy, light scattering
• Multiphoton imaging
• Soft systems: Interfaces, membranes, electric double layers
• Structure and dynamics in living systems
• Neuroimaging and neurological activity
Biography
2011 present: Julia Jacobi Chair in photomedicine, École Polytechnique Fédérale Lausanne (EPFL), CH.2005 2012: Max Planck Research Group Leader (W2 /C3) of a centrally announced open theme independent research group. Host: The Max-Planck Institute for Metals Research, Stuttgart, DE.
2005 2005: Alexander von Humboldt Fellow, dept. of Applied Physical Chemistry, Heidelberg University, DE.
2004 2005: Postdoctoral Fellow, FOM-Institute for Plasma Physics, NL.
Awards and Distinctions
2022 - Elected Member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences (SATW)2021 - Elected Fellow of Optica (formerly Optical Society of America)
2020 - Winner of an ERC Synergy Grant
2020 - Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society
2020 - ERC Proof of Concept Grant
2019 - Featured for OSA living stories2014 - Winner of an ERC Consolidator Grant.
2013 - Cover and Featured Professional in the 2013-2014 SPIE Monthly Planner.
2011 - Julia Jacobi Chair in photomedicine.
2010 - Fellow of the Young Academy of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW) and the German Academy of Natural Scientists, Leopoldina.
2010 - Young member Werner von Siemens Ring (DE).
2010 - Selection for the Excellence Network of the Robert-Bosch Foundation (DE).
2009 - Winner of an ERC Startup Grant.
2008 - Hertha-Sponer-Preis awarded by the German Physical Society (DPG)
2007 - Young Researcher prize, ESF conference on Bio-interfaces, Saint Feliu, ES.
2006 - Minerva Prize awarded biyearly by the Dutch Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM).
2006 - Featured Professional in Brilliant Minds for Germanys international broadcaster Deutsche Welles Tomorrow Today (broadcast on television worldwide 06/2006).
2005 - Recipient of a Max Planck Research Group Leader position.
2005 - Recipient of an Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship.
2005 - Prize winner in a Dutch science writing contest of the Dutch Physical Society.
2004 - Ph. D. degree with highest honors, awarded to <5% of all candidates.
2003 - L. J. Oosterhoff prize, awarded by the University of Leiden.
2002 - Young Researcher prize of the Holland Research School for Molecular Chemistry.
2001 - Young Researcher prize at the Gordon Research Conference on Surface Dynamics, New Hampshire, USA.
2000 - Cum Laude, M. Sc. in chemistry with highest honors, <10% of all candidates.
2000 - Cum Laude, M. Sc. in physics with highest honors, <10% of all candidates.
Education
PhD
Natural Sciences
Leiden University
2000-2004 (highest honors)
M.Sc.
Physics
Utrecht University
1997 - 2000 (highest honors)
M. Sc.
Chemistry
Utrecht University
1995 - 2000 (highest honors)
Publications
Infoscience publications
Publications
Liposomes and Lipid Droplets Display a Reversal of Charge-Induced Hydration Asymmetry
Nano Letters. 2023-10-23. DOI : 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c02653.Evolution of the electrical double layer with electrolyte concentration probed by second harmonic scattering
Faraday Discussions. 2023-07-17. DOI : 10.1039/d3fd00036b.Interfacial Inversion, Interference, and IR Absorption in Vibrational Sum Frequency Scattering Experiments
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2023-07-20. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcb.3c02727.High throughput wide field second harmonic imaging of giant unilamellar vesicles
Biointerphases. 2023-05-01. DOI : 10.1116/6.0002640.A discrepancy of 10(7) in experimental and theoretical density detection limits of aerosol particles by surface nonlinear light scattering
Communications Chemistry. 2023-06-08. DOI : 10.1038/s42004-023-00903-8.Lysozyme Interaction with Phospholipid Nanodroplets Probed by Sum Frequency Scattering Vibrational Spectroscopy
Langmuir. 2023-04-26. DOI : 10.1021/acs.langmuir.3c00276.Size dependence of second-harmonic scattering from nanoparticles: Disentangling surface and electrostatic contributions
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2023-03-07. DOI : 10.1063/5.0135157.Passive transport of Ca2+ ions through lipid bilayers imaged by widefield second harmonic microscopy
Biophysical Journal. 2023-02-21. DOI : 10.1016/j.bpj.2023.01.018.Ion-Induced Transient Potential Fluctuations Facilitate Pore Formation and Cation Transport through Lipid Membranes
Journal of the American Chemical Society. 2022-12-15. DOI : 10.1021/jacs.2c08543.Tribute to Dor Ben-Amotz
The Journal of Physical Chemistry B. 2022-04-28. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcb.2c01804.Water Structure at the Hydrophobic Nanodroplet Surface Revealedby Vibrational Sum Frequency Scattering Using Isotopic Dilution br
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2022-04-28. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcb.2c01987.Water as a contrast agent to quantify surface chemistry and physics using second harmonic scattering and imaging: A perspective
Applied Physics Letters. 2022-04-18. DOI : 10.1063/5.0085807.Ultrasensitive Label-Free Detection of Protein–Membrane Interaction Exemplified by Toxin-Liposome Insertion
The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. 2022-04-04. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpclett.1c04011.Charge transfer across C-H center dot center dot center dot O hydrogen bonds stabilizes oil droplets in water
Science. 2021-12-10. DOI : 10.1126/science.abj3007.Imaging Cu2+ binding to charged phospholipid membranes by high-throughput second harmonic wide-field microscopy
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2021-11-14. DOI : 10.1063/5.0063362.Biodegradable Harmonophores for Targeted High-Resolution In Vivo Tumor Imaging
Acs Nano. 2021-03-23. DOI : 10.1021/acsnano.0c10634.Hyaluronan orders water molecules in its nanoscale extended hydration shells
Science Advances. 2021-03-01. DOI : 10.1126/sciadv.abf2558.Handy water: Chiral superstructures around peptide beta-sheets
Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America. 2021-01-12. DOI : 10.1073/pnas.2024376118.Molecular Mechanism for the Interactions of Hofmeister Cations with Macromolecules in Aqueous Solution
Journal Of The American Chemical Society. 2020-11-11. DOI : 10.1021/jacs.0c07214.Vibrational Sum Frequency Scattering in Absorptive Media: A Theoretical Case Study of Nano-objects in Water
Journal Of Physical Chemistry C. 2020-10-22. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.0c05196.Mapping Electrochemical Heterogeneity at Gold Surfaces: A Second Harmonic Imaging Study
Journal Of Physical Chemistry C. 2020-09-17. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.0c02740.Self-Assembly at Water Nanodroplet Interfaces Quantified with Nonlinear Light Scattering
Langmuir. 2020-08-11. DOI : 10.1021/acs.langmuir.0c01887.On the stability and necessary electrophoretic mobility of bare oil nanodroplets in water
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2020-06-28. DOI : 10.1063/5.0009640.Imaging the Heterogeneity of the Oxygen Evolution Reaction on Gold Electrodes Operando: Activity is Highly Local
Acs Catalysis. 2020-06-05. DOI : 10.1021/acscatal.0c01177.Surface Potential and Interfacial Water Order at the Amorphous TiO2 Nanoparticle/Aqueous Interface
Journal of Physical Chemistry C. 2020-05-21. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.0c01158.Transient domains of ordered water induced by divalent ions lead to lipid membrane curvature fluctuations
Communications Chemistry. 2020-02-07. DOI : 10.1038/s42004-020-0263-8.Mapping of real-time morphological changes in the neuronal cytoskeleton with label-free wide-field second-harmonic imaging: a case study of nocodazole
Neurophotonics. 2019-10-01. DOI : 10.1117/1.NPh.6.4.045006.Polyelectrolytes induce water-water correlations that result in dramatic viscosity changes and nuclear quantum effects
Science Advances. 2019-12-01. DOI : 10.1126/sciadv.aay1443.Determination and evaluation of the nonadditivity in wetting of molecularly heterogeneous surfaces
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 2019-12-17. DOI : 10.1073/pnas.1916180116.Surface Characterization of Colloidal Silica Nanoparticles by Second Harmonic Scattering: Quantifying the Surface Potential and Interfacial Water Order
The Journal of Physical Chemistry C. 2019-07-26. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.9b05482.Chemistry of Lipid Membranes from Models to Living Systems: A Perspective of Hydration, Surface Potential, Curvature, Confinement and Heterogeneity
Journal of the American Chemical Society. 2019-07-19. DOI : 10.1021/jacs.9b02820.The interfacial structure of nano-and micron-sized oil and water droplets stabilized with SDS and Span80
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2019-05-28. DOI : 10.1063/1.5083844.Specific Ion Effects at the Interface of Nanometer-Sized Droplets in Water: Structure and Stability
The Journal of Physical Chemistry. 2019-06-10. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.9b01001.The Diverse Nature of Ion Speciation at the Nanoscale Hydrophobic/Water Interface
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2019-03-14. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcb.8b10207.Hydration mediated interfacial transitions on mixed hydrophobic/hydrophilic nanodroplet interfaces
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2018-12-21. DOI : 10.1063/1.5035161.Comment on "Water- water correlations in electrolyte solutions probed by hyper-Rayleigh scattering" [J. Chem. Phys. 147, 214505 (2017)]
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2018-10-28. DOI : 10.1063/1.5023579.Membrane water for probing neuronal membrane potentials and ionic fluxes at the single cell level
Nature Communications. 2018-12-11. DOI : 10.1038/s41467-018-07713-w.Temperature dependence of water-water and ion-water correlations in bulk water and electrolyte solutions probed by femtosecond elastic second harmonic scattering
The Journal of Chemical Physics. 2018-04-30. DOI : 10.1063/1.5023343.Zwitterionic and Charged Lipids Form Remarkably Different Structures on Nanoscale Oil Droplets in Aqueous Solution
Langmuir. 2018. DOI : 10.1021/acs.langmuir.7b02896.Solvent fluctuations and nuclear quantum effects modulate the molecular hyperpolarizability of water
Physical Review B. 2017. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.96.041407.Optical imaging of surface chemistry and dynamics in confinement
Science. 2017. DOI : 10.1126/science.aal4346.Aqueous Nanoscale Systems
CHIMIA International Journal for Chemistry. 2017. DOI : 10.2533/chimia.2017.278.The Jones-Ray Effect Reinterpreted: Surface Tension Minima of Low Ionic Strength Electrolyte Solutions are caused by Electric Field Induced Water-Water Correlations
Chemical Physics Letters. 2017. DOI : 10.1016/j.cplett.2017.06.018.Communication: Mean-field theory of water-water correlations in electrolyte solutions
The Journal of Chemical Physics. 2017. DOI : 10.1063/1.4983221.The interfacial structure of water droplets in a hydrophobic liquid
Nature Communications. 2017. DOI : 10.1038/ncomms15548.Interfacial Structure and Hydration of 3D Lipid Monolayers in Aqueous Solution
The Journal of Physical Chemistry B. 2017. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcb.7b00609.Characterization of the interface of binary mixed DOPC:DOPS liposomes in water: The impact of charge condensation
The Journal of Chemical Physics. 2017. DOI : 10.1063/1.4974084.Optical label-free and model-free probe of the surface potential of nanoscale and microscopic objects in aqueous solution
Physical Review B. 2016. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.94.195410.Second-Harmonic Scattering as a Probe of Structural Correlations in Liquids
The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. 2016. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpclett.6b01851.Freezing effects of oil-in-water emulsions studied by sum-frequency scattering spectroscopy
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2016. DOI : 10.1063/1.4959128.What interactions can distort the orientational distribution of interfacial water molecules as probed by second harmonic and sum frequency generation?
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2016. DOI : 10.1063/1.4959033.Second Harmonic and Sum-Frequency Generation from Aqueous Interfaces Is Modulated by Interference
Journal Of Physical Chemistry C. 2016. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.5b12453.Electrolytes induce long-range orientational order and free energy changes in the H-bond network of bulk water
Science Advances. 2016-04-01. DOI : 10.1126/sciadv.1501891.Wide-field medium-repetition-rate multiphoton microscopy reduces photodamage of living cells
Biomedical Optics Express. 2016. DOI : 10.1364/BOE.7.001458.Intermolecular Headgroup Interaction and Hydration as Driving Forces for Lipid Transmembrane Asymmetry
Journal of the American Chemical Society. 2016. DOI : 10.1021/jacs.5b11776.Three Dimensional Nano "Langmuir Trough" for Lipid Studies
Nano Letters. 2015. DOI : 10.1021/acs.nanolett.5b02143.From Hydrophobic to Hydrophilic: The Structure and Density of the Hexadecane Droplet/Alkanol/Water Interface
Journal Of Physical Chemistry C. 2015. DOI : 10.1021/acs.jpcc.5b04904.Sum frequency spectroscopy of the hydrophobic nanodroplet/water interface: Absence of hydroxyl ion and dangling OH bond signatures
Chemical Physics Letters. 2014. DOI : 10.1016/j.cplett.2014.09.034.Sum frequency and second harmonic generation from the surface of a liquid microjet
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2014. DOI : 10.1063/1.4896996.High throughput second harmonic imaging for label-free biological applications
Optics Express. 2014. DOI : 10.1364/OE.22.031102.Charge Asymmetry at Aqueous Hydrophobic Interfaces and Hydration Shells
Angewandte Chemie-International Edition. 2014. DOI : 10.1002/anie.201310266.Probing Rotational and Translational Diffusion of Nanodoublers in Living Cells on Microsecond Time Scales
Nano Letters. 2014. DOI : 10.1021/nl500356u.Toward Vibrational Dynamics at Liquid-Liquid and Nano-Interfaces: Time-Resolved Sum-Frequency Scattering
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2014. DOI : 10.1021/jp411798s.Specific Ion Effects in Amphiphile Hydration and Interface Stabilization
Journal of the American Chemical Society. 2014. DOI : 10.1021/ja4120117.Stern Layer Formation Induced by Hydrophobic Interactions: A Molecular Level Study
Journal Of The American Chemical Society. 2013. DOI : 10.1021/ja4102858.Analysis of Complex Spectra Using Fourier Filtering
Journal Of Physical Chemistry C. 2013. DOI : 10.1021/jp406161n.The Presence of Ultralow Densities of Nanocrystallites in Amorphous Poly(lactic acid) Microspheres
Journal of Physical Chemistry B. 2013. DOI : 10.1021/jp4034497.Vesicle Photonics
Annual Review of Materials Research. 2013. DOI : 10.1146/annurev-matsci-071312-121724.Label-Free Hyper Rayleigh and Second Harmonic Scattering with High Efficiency
Optics Express. 2013. DOI : 10.1364/OE.21.000815.Sodium dodecyl sulfate at water-hydrophobic interfaces: A simulation study
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2012. DOI : 10.1021/jp304900z.Surface Impurities Are Not Responsible For the Charge on the Oil/Water Interface: A Comment
Angewandte Chemie-International Edition. 2012. DOI : 10.1002/anie.201204662.Comparison of scattering and reflection SFG: a question of phase-matching
Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. 2012. DOI : 10.1039/c2cp40324b.Erratum: Probing nanoscopic droplet interfaces in aqueous solution with vibrational sum-frequency scattering: A study of the effects of path length, droplet density and pulse energy (Chemical Physics Letters (2011) 512 (7680))
Chemical Physics Letters. 2012. DOI : 10.1016/j.cplett.2012.01.055.Laser-Heating-Induced Displacement of Surfactants on the Water Surface
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2012. DOI : 10.1021/jp2074545.Nonlinear spectroscopy of bio-interfaces
International Journal of Materials Research. 2011. DOI : 10.3139/146.110535.Probing nanoscopic droplet interfaces in aqueous solution with vibrational sum-frequency scattering: A study of the effects of path length, droplet density and pulse energy
Chemical Physics Letters. 2011. DOI : 10.1016/j.cplett.2011.06.081.Direct comparison of phase-sensitive vibrational sum frequency generation with maximum entropy method: Case study of water
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2011. DOI : 10.1063/1.3662469.Surface Structure of Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate Surfactant and Oil at the Oil-in-Water Droplet Liquid/Liquid Interface: A Manifestation of a Nonequilibrium Surface State
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2011. DOI : 10.1021/jp200536k.Label-free spectroscopic detection of vesicles in water using vibrational sum frequency scattering
Soft Matter. 2011. DOI : 10.1039/c0sm01358g.Theory of optical second-harmonic and sum-frequency scattering from arbitrarily shaped particles
Journal Of The Optical Society Of America B-Optical Physics. 2011. DOI : 10.1364/JOSAB.28.001374.The Orientation and Charge of Water at the Hydrophobic Oil Droplet-Water Interface
Journal Of The American Chemical Society. 2011. DOI : 10.1021/ja202081x.Surface-Specific Interaction of the Extracellular Domain of Protein L1 with Nitrilotriacetic Acid-Terminated Self-Assembled Monolayers
Langmuir. 2010. DOI : 10.1021/la902320b.Continuous Photobleaching to Study the Growth Modes of Focal Adhesions
Journal of Adhesion Science and Technology. 2010. DOI : 10.1163/016942410x508046.Separating surface structure and surface charge with second-harmonic and sum-frequency scattering
Physical Review B. 2010. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.82.235431.Obtaining molecular orientation from second harmonic and sum frequency scattering experiments in water: angular distribution and polarization dependence
Journal of Chemical Physics. 2010. DOI : 10.1063/1.3429969.The Interfacial Tension of Nanoscopic Oil Droplets in Water Is Hardly Affected by SDS Surfactant
Journal Of The American Chemical Society. 2010. DOI : 10.1021/ja9095158.ANYL 82-Vibrational sum frequency scattering from vesicles in solution
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2009.ANYL 370-Surface binding of transmembrane proteins to nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA)-terminated self-assembled monolayers
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2009.Nonlinear light scattering spectroscopy from polymorph microspheres: Ultrasensitive detection of buried nanoscopic domains
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2009.Nonlinear Optical Spectroscopy of Soft Matter Interfaces
Chemphyschem. 2009. DOI : 10.1002/cphc.200900138.Nonlinear Mie theory for second-harmonic and sum-frequency scattering
Physical Review B. 2009. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.79.155420.ANYL 369-Separating charge and structure of interfaces by angular-resolved vibrational sum-frequency scattering
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2009.Detection of buried microstructures by nonlinear light scattering spectroscopy
Physical Review Letters. 2009. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.095502.COLL 182-Local surface structure of surfactant on emulsion droplets probed by nonlinear light scattering spectroscopy
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2009.Nonlinear light scattering from clusters and single particles
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2009. DOI : 10.1063/1.3141383.Delocalized surface modes reveal three-dimensional structures of complex biomolecules
Journal of Physical Chemistry C. 2008. DOI : 10.1021/jp801254y.Generation and application of high power femtosecond pulses in the vibrational fingerprint region
Applied Physics B: Lasers and Optics. 2008. DOI : 10.1007/s00340-008-2993-7.ANYL 416-Vibrational sum frequency scattering from biodegradable polymer particles
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2007.ANYL 185-Molecular view of a colloidal gelation
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2007.ANYL 466-3-D Structure of biomolecules at interfaces: Femtosecond vibrational sum frequency generation in the fingerprint region
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2007.Surface and bulk structure of poly-(lactic acid) films studied by vibrational sum frequency generation spectroscopy
Chemical Physics Letters. 2007. DOI : 10.1016/j.cplett.2007.10.061.Sum frequency generation scattering from the interface of an isotropic particle: Geometrical and chiral effects
Physical Review B. 2007. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.75.245438.ANYL 279-Vibrational sum frequency generation scattering from the interface of an isotropic particle: Geometrical and chiral effects
Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society. 2007.Surface molecular view of colloidal gelation
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2006. DOI : 10.1073/pnas.0606116103.Femtosecond sum frequency generation at the metal-liquid interface
Surface Science. 2005. DOI : 10.1016/j.susc.2005.06.049.Interface-solvent effects during colloidal phase transitions
Journal of Physics Condensed Matter. 2005. DOI : 10.1088/0953-8984/17/45/036.Nonlinear optical scattering: The concept of effective susceptibility
Physical Review B - Condensed Matter and Materials Physics. 2004. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevB.70.115106.A molecular view of cholesterol-induced condensation in a lipid monolayer
Journal Of Physical Chemistry B. 2004. DOI : 10.1021/jp0452249.Cascading second-order versus direct third-order nonlinear optical processes in a uniaxial crystal
Optics Communications. 2004. DOI : 10.1016/j.optcom.2004.01.070.Vibrational spectroscopic investigation of the phase diagram of a biomimetic lipid monolayer
Physical Review Letters. 2003. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevLett.90.128101.Vibrational sum frequency scattering from a submicron suspension
Physical Review Letters. 2003. DOI : 10.1103/PhysRevLett.91.258302.Time- vs. frequency-domain femtosecond surface sum frequency generation
Chemical Physics Letters. 2003. DOI : 10.1016/S0009-2614(03)00085-X.Femtosecond time-resolved vibrational SFG spectroscopy of CO/Ru(0 0 1)
Surface Science. 2002. DOI : 10.1016/S0039-6028(01)01968-9.Luminescence of Exchange Coupled Pairs of Transition Metal Ions
Journal of The Electrochemical Society. 2001. DOI : 10.1149/1.1375169.Ultrafast surface dynamics studied with femtosecond sum frequency generation
Journal of Physical Chemistry A. 2001. DOI : 10.1021/jp004167q.The adsorption behaviour of isobutane on Pt(533): A combined RAIRS and TPD study
Chemical Physics Letters. 2000. DOI : 10.1016/S0009-2614(00)00528-5.Reorganization of adsorbed films by coadsorbing species
Journal Of Chemical Physics. 2000. DOI : 10.1063/1.1309529.Research
Research Highlights
We develop novel optical technology, geared to obtaining molecular level details of nanoscale and microscopic systems in aqueous environments as well as other complex 3D environments such as pores. We have focused on ultrafast nonlinear optical methods as they are non-invasive and label-free and inherently interface specific or sensitive to polar structures. We apply these tools to fundamental questions that have important implications for biology, chemistry or technology.Topics of interest:
• Water, aqueous solutions
• Aqueous interfaces and nanoscopic systems
• Nonlinear optics, ultrafast spectroscopy, light scattering
• Multiphoton imaging
• Soft systems: Interfaces, membranes, electric double layers
• Structure and dynamics in living systems
• Neuroimaging and neurological activity
10 Research Highlights (anti-chronological)
• Surface electrostatic potentials and reaction constants can be optically imaged in real time and display heterogeneities of respectively a factor of 3 x the average and 8 orders of magnitude on a glass micro-capillary surface immersed in water.
• Electrolytes induce changes in the hydrogen bond network of water that range over ~77 hydration shells and are subject to quantum effects. These changes lead to energy changes on the order of kT per ion, which lead to surface tension anomalies, better known as the controversial Jones-Ray effect (discovered in the 1930’s).
• Discovery that (~50-150 nm) liposomes exhibit trans-membrane asymmetry in their hydration shells rather than the lipid composition. Specific interactions may induce membrane asymmetry.
• Development of a nanodroplet platform to study the molecular structure of lipid droplets and biological monolayer phenomena in solution.
• Discovery that various molecular properties of nanoscale / submicron droplets of oil and water behave differently than extended planar interfaces composed of the same chemicals; reasons can be found in the difference in hydrogen bond network configurations and a different balance of electrostatic interactions.
• Development of wide field medium repetition rate second harmonic and multiphoton imaging instruments with ~5000 x better efficiency than scanning confocal microscopy.
• Angle resolved second harmonic scattering can be used to measure unique surface potential values on particles in solution.
• Development of second harmonic scattering instrumentation with an improved efficiency of ~1000.
• Invention of vibrational sum frequency scattering, and subsequent development into a reliable interfacial molecular probe of buried interfaces of nano- and microscale materials.
• Development of nonlinear optical theories to understand nonlinear light scattering.
Teaching & PhD
Teaching
Life Sciences Engineering
Microengineering