Rate My Professor Nicholas A. Melosh

Nicholas A. Melosh is Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Stanford University. He earned a BS in Chemistry from Harvey Mudd College in 1996 and a PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2001. His research explores the application of methods from semiconductor processing and self-assembly to challenges in biology, materials, and energy. The Melosh group focuses on rationally designing engineered interfaces to enhance communication with biological cells and tissues or to improve energy conversion and materials synthesis. Particular interests include seamlessly integrating inorganic structures with biology for improved cell transfection and therapies, often using diamondoid molecules as building blocks, and developing nanostraw platforms for direct delivery or extraction of material through cell membranes via biomimetic gap junctions created with nanoscale semiconductor techniques.

Melosh holds additional appointments as a member of Bio-X, the Maternal & Child Health Research Institute, and the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute, and as an affiliate of the Precourt Institute for Energy. His work emphasizes fundamental studies of lipid membrane interactions with inorganic surfaces and electrokinetic phenomena in biologically relevant solutions, leading to new device designs such as inorganic electrodes that mimic transmembrane proteins for solid-state patch clamping and neural interfaces for high-parallel data acquisition. He teaches courses including Materials Matter and Bioelectronics.