| Name | Donglei (Emma) Fan |
| Role | Associate Professor |
| Institution | The University of Texas at Austin |
| Contact | dfan@austin.utexas.edu |
| Keywords / Areas of Interest | Nanomanufacturing, 3D porous materials, micro/nanorobotics, biochemical sensing, self-powered sensors and flexible energy devices, graphene/graphite/nanowires |
| Expertise Sought | We are interested in forming collaboration with colleagues on nanostructure fabrication and applications, including device characterization, biomedical, electronic, energy, and environmental applications, and commercialization. |
Bio:
Dr. Donglei “Emma” Fan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Graduate Advisor of the Materials Science and Engineering Program at The University of Texas at Austin. Among various honors, Prof. Fan has been admitted as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry since 2021 and served as an invited Official Nominator of the Japan Prize since 2017. She received the prestigious National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2012. Her research on the bottom-up assembling of artificial nanomotors was included in Science Year by Year, DK Smithsonian (2017) and selected as the #3 of “10 discoveries that will shape the future in 2014” by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Focus magazine. Prof. Fan’s research program focuses on exploring fundamental physics, chemistry, and materials science, and investigating innovative manufacturing/assembly approaches to bridge the fabrication of nanomaterials with their applications in nanorobotics, self-powered flexible devices, and high-performance biochemical sensing. Her research has spurred a series of publications on leading journals, including Nature Nanotechnology, Nature Communications, Science Advances, the Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences, Physical Review Letters, Advanced Materials, and ACS Nano. She also received five granted patents and has a few pending patents. Dr. Fan’s research has been widely reported by international news agencies, such as BBC, Forbes, Nano Today, IEEE Spectrum, and PBS TV station. Dr. Fan’s lab has the following active research topics: (1) Innovative design and manufacturing concepts of 3-D nanoporous composite superstructures for water treatment, flexible energy storage, and self-powered devices (2) Bottom-up assembling of active nanomaterials and NEMS devices, including nanorobots, nanomotors, and nanoresonators (3) High-performance biochemical sensing, controlled molecule release, single-molecule detection, surface enhanced Raman scattering (3) Development of new tools for assembling, manipulation, and actuation of nanoparticles as building blocks of biomedical devices and electronics.
