Cees Dekker
Encyclopedia
Cornelis "Cees" Dekker, born in Haren
(The Netherlands) in 1959 is a scientist known for his research on carbon nanotubes and molecular biophysics
. He has more than 200 publications, including more than 20 papers in Nature and Science., Four of his group publications have been cited more than 1000 times, 25 papers got cited more than 100 times, and in 2001, his group work was selected as "breakthrough of the year" by the journal Science
. Dekker’s research style is characterized by a strong drive and enthusiasm for science, longterm vision, and experimental research directed at exploring novel phenomena in unknown territories. In recognition of his achievements, Dekker has been elected Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
and Fellow to the American Physical Society
and the Institute of Physics
. He was awarded a number of national and international prizes, including the 2001 Agilent Europhysics Prize and the 2003 Spinozapremie
. He also was granted an honorary doctorate from Hasselt University
, Belgium.
He received a PhD in Experimental Physics at the University of Utrecht in 1988. From 1988 to 1993 Dekker was University Lecturer at the University of Utrecht; in these years he also worked in the United States as Visiting Researcher at IBM Research
. It was during this period that Dekker carried out research at the University of Utrecht and at IBM on magnetic spin systems and on noise in superconductors and semiconductors. In 1993 he was appointed as Associate Professor at Delft University of Technology. At the end of the 90s Dekker and his team achieved success with the discovery of the electronic properties of carbon nanotubes, the first single-molecule transistor and applied nanoscience. In 1999 he was appointed to the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Professorship, a chair for outstanding young scientists. In 2000, he was appointed in a regular full professorship in Molecular Biophysics at the Faculty of Applied Sciences. In 2007, he was appointed as a Distinguished University Professor at Delft. Since 2010, he is the Chair of a new Department of Bionanoscience at the Delft University as well as the Director of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience
at Delft.
Dekker is a Christian
and active in the discussion about the relationship between science and religion, a topic on which he co-edited several books. Although Dekker was involved in discussions around Intelligent Design in the Netherlands around 2005, he has since clearly distanced himself from this movement. Dekker advocates that science and religion are not in opposition but can be harmonized. He wrote the foreword to the Dutch translation of ‘The Language of God' by Francis Collins
, the current director of the National Institutes of Health
. Like Collins, Dekker is a proponent of theistic evolution
. He is actively debating creationists in the Netherlands.
. STM
and nanolithography
techniques were used to demonstrate that these nanotubes are quantum wires at the single-molecule level, with outstanding physical properties. Many new phenomena were discovered, and he and his research group established a leading position in this field of research. Dekker and his research group discovered new physics of nanotubes as well as explored the feasibility of molecular electronics
. In 1998, they were the first to build a transistor
based on a single nanotube molecule.
Since 2001, Dekker has shifted the main focus of his work towards biophysics
where he studies the properties of single biomolecules and cells
using the tools of nanotechnology
. This change of field was driven by his fascination for the remarkable functioning of biological molecular structures, as well as by the long-term perspective that many interesting discoveries can be expected in this field. Current lines of research in his biophysics group are in the areas of:
• Solid state nanopores
• Physics of chromatin
maintenance
• Biophysics
and evolution
of bacteria
• 1990, first measurement of quantum size effect in the noise of quantum point contacts
• 1991, demonstration of a new vortex-glass phase in high-temperature superconductors
• 1996, first mesoscopic charge density waves devices
• 1996, first electrical measurements on a single metal nanocluster between nanoelectrodes
• 1997, discovery that carbon nanotubes behave as quantum coherent molecular wires
• 1998, discovery that carbon nanotubes act as chirality-dependent.semiconductors or metals
• 1998, discovery of room-temperature transistors, made from a single nanotube molecule
• 1999, first measurement of the wavefunction of single molecular orbitals of carbon nanotubes
• 1999, discovery of kink heterojunctions of carbon nanotubes which gave decisive evidence for a new Luttinger description of interacting electrons in nanotubes
• 2000, discovery that nanotubes can carry extraordinary large current densities
• 2000, resolved the controversial issue of electronic transport through DNA molecules by measurements of insulating behavior at the single molecule level
• 2000, demonstration of an AFM technique for single-molecule manipulation of nanotubes
• 2001, discovery of single-electron transistors at room temperature based on nanotubes
• 2001, realization of first logic circuits with carbon nanotube devices
• 2001, discovery of the molecular structure of DNA repair enzymes with AFM
• 2002, exploration of new assembly routes with carbon nanotubes functionalized with DNA
• 2003, demonstrated the first biosensors made out of a carbon nanotube
• 2003, resolved the structure and mechanism of DNA repair proteins
• 2003, discovery of a new technique for fabricating solid-state nanopores for DNA translocation
• 2004, discovery of new physics in translocation of DNA through nanopores
• 2004, first experimental study of ions conduction in nanofluidic channels
• 2004, first electrochemistry with individual single-wall carbon nanotubes
• 2004, STM detection and control of phonons in carbon nanotubes
• 2004, first electrical docking of microtubules on kinesin-coated nanostructures
• 2004, first biophysics characterization of the mechanical properties of double-stranded RNA
• 2004, first single-molecule study of DNA translocation by a restriction-modification enzyme
• 2005, discovery of the mechanism of DNA uncoiling by topoisomerase enzymes
• 2005, discovery of long-range conformational changes in Mre11/DNA repair complexes
• 2005, first force measurements on a DNA molecule in a nanopore
• 2006, first demonstration of molecular sorting in a lab on a chip using biomotors
• 2006, discovery of nanobubbles in solid-state nanopores
• 2006, first estimate of electrokinetic energy conversion in a nanofluidic channel
• 2007, first real-time detection of strand exchange in homologous recombination by RecA
• 2007, discovery of a low persistence length of ends of microtubules
• 2007, resolved the mechanism of biosensing with carbon nanotubes
• 2008, first observation of protein-coated DNA translocation through nanopores
• 2008, resolved the origin of the electrophoretic force on DNA in nanopores
• 2008, discovered a significant velocity increase of microtubules in electric fields
• 2008, discovered an anomalous electro-hydrodynamic orientation of microtubules
• 2008, resolved the origin of noise in carbon nanotubes in liquid
• 2009, discovery of a new phenotype for bacteria in narrow slits
Haren (Groningen)
Haren is a municipality and a town in the northeastern Netherlands located in the direct urban area of the City of Groningen.- Population centres :*Essen*Glimmen*Haren*Noordlaren*Onnen-External links:*...
(The Netherlands) in 1959 is a scientist known for his research on carbon nanotubes and molecular biophysics
Molecular biophysics
Molecular biophysics is a rapidly evolving interdisciplinary area of research that combines concepts in physics, chemistry, engineering, mathematics and biology...
. He has more than 200 publications, including more than 20 papers in Nature and Science., Four of his group publications have been cited more than 1000 times, 25 papers got cited more than 100 times, and in 2001, his group work was selected as "breakthrough of the year" by the journal Science
Science (journal)
Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is one of the world's top scientific journals....
. Dekker’s research style is characterized by a strong drive and enthusiasm for science, longterm vision, and experimental research directed at exploring novel phenomena in unknown territories. In recognition of his achievements, Dekker has been elected Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences is an organisation dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands...
and Fellow to the American Physical Society
American Physical Society
The American Physical Society is the world's second largest organization of physicists, behind the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft. The Society publishes more than a dozen scientific journals, including the world renowned Physical Review and Physical Review Letters, and organizes more than 20...
and the Institute of Physics
Institute of Physics
The Institute of Physics is a scientific charity devoted to increasing the practice, understanding and application of physics. It has a worldwide membership of around 40,000....
. He was awarded a number of national and international prizes, including the 2001 Agilent Europhysics Prize and the 2003 Spinozapremie
Spinozapremie
The Spinozapremie is an annual award by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research of 2.5 million Euro, to be spent on new research. The award is the highest scientific award in the Netherlands...
. He also was granted an honorary doctorate from Hasselt University
Hasselt University
Hasselt University is a university with campuses in Hasselt and Diepenbeek, Belgium. It was founded in 1971, as the Limburgs Universitair Centrum...
, Belgium.
He received a PhD in Experimental Physics at the University of Utrecht in 1988. From 1988 to 1993 Dekker was University Lecturer at the University of Utrecht; in these years he also worked in the United States as Visiting Researcher at IBM Research
IBM Research
IBM Research, a division of IBM, is a research and advanced development organization and currently consists of eight locations throughout the world and hundreds of projects....
. It was during this period that Dekker carried out research at the University of Utrecht and at IBM on magnetic spin systems and on noise in superconductors and semiconductors. In 1993 he was appointed as Associate Professor at Delft University of Technology. At the end of the 90s Dekker and his team achieved success with the discovery of the electronic properties of carbon nanotubes, the first single-molecule transistor and applied nanoscience. In 1999 he was appointed to the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Professorship, a chair for outstanding young scientists. In 2000, he was appointed in a regular full professorship in Molecular Biophysics at the Faculty of Applied Sciences. In 2007, he was appointed as a Distinguished University Professor at Delft. Since 2010, he is the Chair of a new Department of Bionanoscience at the Delft University as well as the Director of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience
Kavli Institute of Nanoscience
The Kavli Institute of Nanoscience Delft was established in 2004 at the Department of NanoScience, Faculty of Applied Sciences, Delft University of Technology through a grant by the US-based Kavli foundation....
at Delft.
Dekker is a Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
and active in the discussion about the relationship between science and religion, a topic on which he co-edited several books. Although Dekker was involved in discussions around Intelligent Design in the Netherlands around 2005, he has since clearly distanced himself from this movement. Dekker advocates that science and religion are not in opposition but can be harmonized. He wrote the foreword to the Dutch translation of ‘The Language of God' by Francis Collins
Francis Collins
Francis Collins may refer to:*Francis Collins , geneticist*Francis Dolan Collins , 19th century American politician-See also:*Frank Collins *Francis Collings, BBC journalist*Francis Collin, English footballer...
, the current director of the National Institutes of Health
National Institutes of Health
The National Institutes of Health are an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and are the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and health-related research. Its science and engineering counterpart is the National Science Foundation...
. Like Collins, Dekker is a proponent of theistic evolution
Theistic evolution
Theistic evolution or evolutionary creation is a concept that asserts that classical religious teachings about God are compatible with the modern scientific understanding about biological evolution...
. He is actively debating creationists in the Netherlands.
Research overview
Dekker started his research on single carbon nanotubes in 1993 when he set up a new line of research to study electrical transport through single organic molecules between nanoelectrodes. In 1996 a breakthrough was realized with carbon nanotubes. This was achieved in a collaboration with the group of Nobel laureate Richard SmalleyRichard Smalley
Richard Errett Smalley was the Gene and Norman Hackerman Professor of Chemistry and a Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Rice University, in Houston, Texas...
. STM
STM
STM, an abbreviation, may refer to:In technology:*Scanning tunneling microscope, a non-optical microscope*Signature tagged mutagenesis, a genetic technique to create random mutants...
and nanolithography
Nanolithography
Nanolithography is the branch of nanotechnology concerned with the study and application of fabricating nanometer-scale structures, meaning patterns with at least one lateral dimension between the size of an individual atom and approximately 100 nm...
techniques were used to demonstrate that these nanotubes are quantum wires at the single-molecule level, with outstanding physical properties. Many new phenomena were discovered, and he and his research group established a leading position in this field of research. Dekker and his research group discovered new physics of nanotubes as well as explored the feasibility of molecular electronics
Molecular electronics
Molecular electronics, sometimes called moletronics, involves the study and application of molecular building blocks for the fabrication of electronic components...
. In 1998, they were the first to build a transistor
Transistor
A transistor is a semiconductor device used to amplify and switch electronic signals and power. It is composed of a semiconductor material with at least three terminals for connection to an external circuit. A voltage or current applied to one pair of the transistor's terminals changes the current...
based on a single nanotube molecule.
Since 2001, Dekker has shifted the main focus of his work towards biophysics
Biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that uses the methods of physical science to study biological systems. Studies included under the branches of biophysics span all levels of biological organization, from the molecular scale to whole organisms and ecosystems...
where he studies the properties of single biomolecules and cells
Cell (biology)
The cell is the basic structural and functional unit of all known living organisms. It is the smallest unit of life that is classified as a living thing, and is often called the building block of life. The Alberts text discusses how the "cellular building blocks" move to shape developing embryos....
using the tools of nanotechnology
Nanotechnology
Nanotechnology is the study of manipulating matter on an atomic and molecular scale. Generally, nanotechnology deals with developing materials, devices, or other structures possessing at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometres...
. This change of field was driven by his fascination for the remarkable functioning of biological molecular structures, as well as by the long-term perspective that many interesting discoveries can be expected in this field. Current lines of research in his biophysics group are in the areas of:
• Solid state nanopores
• Physics of chromatin
Chromatin
Chromatin is the combination of DNA and proteins that make up the contents of the nucleus of a cell. The primary functions of chromatin are; to package DNA into a smaller volume to fit in the cell, to strengthen the DNA to allow mitosis and meiosis and prevent DNA damage, and to control gene...
maintenance
• Biophysics
Biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that uses the methods of physical science to study biological systems. Studies included under the branches of biophysics span all levels of biological organization, from the molecular scale to whole organisms and ecosystems...
and evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
of bacteria
Bacteria
Bacteria are a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria have a wide range of shapes, ranging from spheres to rods and spirals...
Research achievements
• 1988, first realization of a model two-dimensional spin glass and verification of its dynamics• 1990, first measurement of quantum size effect in the noise of quantum point contacts
• 1991, demonstration of a new vortex-glass phase in high-temperature superconductors
• 1996, first mesoscopic charge density waves devices
• 1996, first electrical measurements on a single metal nanocluster between nanoelectrodes
• 1997, discovery that carbon nanotubes behave as quantum coherent molecular wires
• 1998, discovery that carbon nanotubes act as chirality-dependent.semiconductors or metals
• 1998, discovery of room-temperature transistors, made from a single nanotube molecule
• 1999, first measurement of the wavefunction of single molecular orbitals of carbon nanotubes
• 1999, discovery of kink heterojunctions of carbon nanotubes which gave decisive evidence for a new Luttinger description of interacting electrons in nanotubes
• 2000, discovery that nanotubes can carry extraordinary large current densities
• 2000, resolved the controversial issue of electronic transport through DNA molecules by measurements of insulating behavior at the single molecule level
• 2000, demonstration of an AFM technique for single-molecule manipulation of nanotubes
• 2001, discovery of single-electron transistors at room temperature based on nanotubes
• 2001, realization of first logic circuits with carbon nanotube devices
• 2001, discovery of the molecular structure of DNA repair enzymes with AFM
• 2002, exploration of new assembly routes with carbon nanotubes functionalized with DNA
• 2003, demonstrated the first biosensors made out of a carbon nanotube
• 2003, resolved the structure and mechanism of DNA repair proteins
• 2003, discovery of a new technique for fabricating solid-state nanopores for DNA translocation
• 2004, discovery of new physics in translocation of DNA through nanopores
• 2004, first experimental study of ions conduction in nanofluidic channels
• 2004, first electrochemistry with individual single-wall carbon nanotubes
• 2004, STM detection and control of phonons in carbon nanotubes
• 2004, first electrical docking of microtubules on kinesin-coated nanostructures
• 2004, first biophysics characterization of the mechanical properties of double-stranded RNA
• 2004, first single-molecule study of DNA translocation by a restriction-modification enzyme
• 2005, discovery of the mechanism of DNA uncoiling by topoisomerase enzymes
• 2005, discovery of long-range conformational changes in Mre11/DNA repair complexes
• 2005, first force measurements on a DNA molecule in a nanopore
• 2006, first demonstration of molecular sorting in a lab on a chip using biomotors
• 2006, discovery of nanobubbles in solid-state nanopores
• 2006, first estimate of electrokinetic energy conversion in a nanofluidic channel
• 2007, first real-time detection of strand exchange in homologous recombination by RecA
• 2007, discovery of a low persistence length of ends of microtubules
• 2007, resolved the mechanism of biosensing with carbon nanotubes
• 2008, first observation of protein-coated DNA translocation through nanopores
• 2008, resolved the origin of the electrophoretic force on DNA in nanopores
• 2008, discovered a significant velocity increase of microtubules in electric fields
• 2008, discovered an anomalous electro-hydrodynamic orientation of microtubules
• 2008, resolved the origin of noise in carbon nanotubes in liquid
• 2009, discovery of a new phenotype for bacteria in narrow slits