Research

NSME faculty affiliates are based in UNM engineering and science departments as well as the UNM medical school and nearby Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. Faculty research groups undertake cutting-edge research projects with high potential technological and societal impact involving nanoscience and nanotechnology themes. These projects are interdisciplinary in nature thus providing student participants with a broad perspective and unique skill sets in the course of their Ph.D. work. Many NSME graduates go on to positions in industry, academia and national laboratories. The following outlines key research thrusts within the NSME program spanning multiple faculty groups across the UNM community.

Energy harvesting and catalysis

The search for new and efficient energy sources has benefitted substantially by advances in basic science. Next-generation materials for energy harvesting, conversion, and storage rely heavily on nanoscale and hybrid systems developed from bottom-up and top-down approaches. Efforts to develop new homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysts with improved efficiency and lower cost are among global leaders.

Current active faculty researchers:

Nathan Jackson
Ganesh Balakrishnan
Abhaya Datye
Fernando Garzon
Ramesh Giri
John Grey
Hua Guo
Yang Qin
Martin Kirk
Richard Kemp
Sang Han
Sang Eon Han

Nano-Biology, Drug Discovery and Targeted Delivery

Understanding the secrets of the human genome and intrinsically complex structure-function relationships of biological systems underlie many health-related issues facing our society. Researchers from UNM engineering, science and medical school departments seek to address critical questions in the exciting and broad field of nanobiology. Nanomaterials approaches have also gained widespread attention for their facile tunability of functionality and specificity.

Current active faculty researchers:

Nathan Jackson
Jeffrey Brinker
Tione Buranda
Heather Canavan
Eva Chi