Jeffrey Dick

Adjunct Associate Professor

Electrochemistry, Nanotechnology, Sensors, Single Cell Biology, Catalysis

Our research is highly interdisciplinary and works at the interface of chemistry, biology, and nanotechnology. We are interested in the applications of electrochemistry to micro and nanoscale biological systems. Electrochemistry is a powerful tool to study these systems as nanoelectrode probes can be easily fabricated down to dimensions similar to biological macromolecules, 5-15 nm in diameter. These very tiny electrodes allow us to study the behavior of single molecules and nanoparticles. The manipulation of electrode size spanning nearly 9 orders of magnitude also allows us to study reactions occurring in living cells in real time and observe those reactions changing after a perturbation, such as delivery of a drug, infection, carcinogenesis, or even aging. These experiments are very sensitive and give us access to the ultimate sensitivity in analysis: a limit of detection of just one. Thus, we are interested in analytical applications of technologies we develop, such as the specific detection of virus particles in complex matrices like saliva, blood, and urine.

BS, Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana, 2013; Ph.D, National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, 2017; Postdoc, NIH CORE Postdoctoral Scholar, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, 2017-2018.