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Vinothan N. Manoharan

Faculty
  • Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and Physics
  • Participant, Materials Research Science and Engineering Center
  • Member, Kavli Institute for Bionano Science & Technology
Vinothan N. Manoharan

Contact Information

Nickname: Vinny
Office: Lyman Laboratory 329
Email: vnm [ AT ] seas [ DOT ] harvard [ DOT ] edu
Office Phone: (617) 495-3763
Office Fax: (617) 495-0416
Lab Name: Manoharan Lab
Lab Room: McKay 530
Lab Phone: (617) 495-9894
Assistant: Barbara Drauschke
Office: Jefferson 348
Email: bdrausch [ AT ] seas [ DOT ] harvard [ DOT ] edu
Office Phone: (617) 495-4320

Recruitment Status

Currently accepting graduate students.

Websites

Education

  1. B.S.E., 1996, Princeton University
  2. Ph.D., 2004, University of California, Santa Barbara

Research Interests

    • Materials & Devices
    • Biophysics and Self-Assembly
    • Materials Science
    • Nanophotonics
    • Soft Condensed Matter
    • Surface and Interface Science

Primary Teaching Area

Applied Physics

Profile

Some of the most difficult problems in condensed matter and biophysics today involve understanding how systems order themselves and why they sometimes fail to do so.

  • Why do some liquids form glasses rather than crystals when cooled?
  • How do proteins consistently fold into unique structures, given the myriad possible paths available to them?
  • What are the forces between macromolecules, and how do those forces determine the structure of aggregates (and living things)?

A related problem in materials science and nanotechnology involves preparing materials that organize themselves in three dimensions.

In my lab we use light scattering, optical microscopy, spectroscopy, synthesis and other experimental techniques to understand the physics of self-organization. For most of these experiments we use colloids, suspensions of particles typically about a micrometer in size.

Because these particles are small enough to be buffeted about by Brownian motion, yet large enough that their motion is directly visible, they are extremely useful: they can be used as tracers to probe the internal dynamics of networks and fluids, as "handles" that can be attached to proteins and DNA so that these molecules can be manipulated with optical tweezers, and as generic model systems for understanding how random motion transforms disorder to order.

Positions & Employment

Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences/Harvard Department of Physics

  • Present: Associate professor of Chemical Engineering and Physics

Selected Publications

  1. Kaz, D. M., McGorty, R., Mani, M., Brenner, M. P., & Manoharan, V. N. (2011). Physical ageing of the contact line on colloidal particles at liquid interfaces. Nature Materials, doi:10.1038/nmat3190
  2. Fung, J., Martin, K. E., Perry, R. W., Kaz, D. M., McGorty, R., & Manoharan, V. N. (2011). Measuring translational, rotational, and vibrational dynamics in colloids with digital holographic microscopy.  Optics Express, 19(9), 8051-8065.
  3. Perro, A., & Manoharan, V. N. (2010). Bulk Synthesis of Polymer−Inorganic Colloidal Clusters. Langmuir, 26(24), 18669-18675.
  4. Fan, J. A., Bao, K., Wu, C., Bao, J., Bardhan, R., Halas, N. J., Manoharan, V. N., Shvets, G., Nordlander, P., Capasso, F. (2010). Fano-like Interference in Self-Assembled Plasmonic Quadrumer Clusters. Nano Letters, 10(11), 4680-4685.
  5. McGorty, R., Fung, J., Kaz, D., & Manoharan, V. N. (2010). Colloidal self-assembly at an interface. Materials Today, 13(6), 34-42.
  6. Fan, J. A., Wu, C., Bao, K., Bao, J., Bardhan, R., Halas, N. J., Manoharan, V. N., Nordlander, P., Shvets, G., Capasso, F. (2010). Self-Assembled Plasmonic Nanoparticle Clusters. Science, 328(5982), 1135-1138.
  7. Meng, G., Arkus, N., Brenner, M. P., & Manoharan, V. N. (2010). The Free-Energy Landscape of Clusters of Attractive Hard Spheres. Science, 327(5965), 560-563.
  8. Manoharan, V. N. (2010). Digital Holographic Microscopy for 3D Imaging of Complex Fluids and Biological Systems. In Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-edge Engineering from the 2009 Symposium. National Academies Press.
  9. Ali, N., & Manoharan, V. N. (2009). RNA folding and hydrolysis terms explain ATP-independence of RNA interference in human systems. Oligonucleotides, 19(4), 341-346.
  10. Perro, A., Meng, G., Fung, J., & Manoharan, V. N. (2009). Design and Synthesis of Model Transparent Aqueous Colloids with Optimal Scattering Properties. Langmuir, 25(19), 11295-11298.
  11. Perro, A., Meng, G., & Manoharan, V. N. (2009). Fabrication of Model Colloidal Systems with Tunable Optical Properties for Self-Assembly Studies. In Mater. Res. Soc. Symp. Proc. (Vol. 1135, pp. CC06-08).