Faculty Profiles
Virginia Ayres
Associate Professor
Research Biography
Investigates both inorganic and organic nanostructures. The small physical dimensions of nanostructures result in new and fascinating localized and sometimes quantized interactions. At the nano (10-9 m) level, the distinction between organic and inorganic behavior can be reduced to fundamental interactions common to both. However, very different applications are enabled by different combinations of the same fundamentals! Our group investigates two combinations, biocompatibility between organic and inorganic nanostructures, and nanocircuits for applications in harsh radiation and low temperature environments.
Selected Publications
- B W Jacobs, V M Ayres, R E Stallcup, A Hartman, M A Tupta, A D Baczewski, M A Crimp, J B Halpern, M He and H C Shaw, "Electron Transport in Zinc-Blende Wurtzite Biphasic Gallium Nitride Nanowires and GaNFETs", Nanotech., Vol.18, 475710 (6 pp) (2007)
- Benjamin W. Jacobs, Virginia M. Ayres, Mihail P. Petkov, Joshua B. Halpern, MaoQe He, Andrew Baczewski, Kaylee McElroy, Martin A. Crimp, Jiaming Zhang, Harry C. Shaw, "Electronic and Structural Characteristics of Zinc-Blende Wurtzite Biphasic Homostructure GaN Nanowires," Nano Lett., Vol. 7, No. 5, pp. 1435-1438, 2007.
- (Invited) Sally Meiners, Ijaz Ahmad, Abdul S. Ponery, Nathan Amor, Virginia M. Ayers, Yuan Fan, Qian Chen, and Ashwin N. Babu, "Engineering Electrospun Nanofibrillar Surfaces for Spinal Cord Repair: A Discussion", Polymer Int., Vol 56, pp 1340-1348 (2007)
- Y Fan, Q Chen, V M Ayres, A D Baczewski, L Udpa and S Kumar, "Scanning Probe Recognition Microscopy Investigation of Tissue Scaffold Properties," Vol 2, Issue 4, pp. 651-661, Int. J. Nanomedicine (2007)
Selected Achievements and Awards
- Outsanding Alumnus Award