Chad Mirkin

  • The Mirkin Research Group
  • Director, International Institute for Nanotechnology
  • George B. Rathmann Professor of Chemistry
  • McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science

Chad Mirkin is the Director of the International Institute for Nanotechnology, the George B. Rathmann Professor of Chemistry, Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Professor of Materials Science & Engineering, and Professor of Medicine. He is a chemist and a world renowned nanoscience expert, who is known for his development of spherical nucleic acid (SNA) nanoparticle conjugates, nanoparticle-based biodetection schemes, the invention of Dip-Pen Nanolithography, and contributions to supramolecular chemistry. He is the author of over 500 manuscripts and over 444 patents worldwide, and the founder of four companies, Nanosphere, NanoInk, AuraSense, and AuraSense Therapeutics, which are commercializing nanotechnology applications in the life science and semiconductor industries. At present, he is listed as the most cited chemist in the world (Thomson Reuters), and the top most cited nanomedicine researcher in the world (Nanomedicine Registry). Dr. Mirkin has been recognized for his accomplishments with over 70 national and international awards. He is a Member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science & Technology (PCAST, Obama Administration), and the only chemist (one of only 11 scientists, engineers, and medical doctors) to be elected to all three US National Academies (the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences, and the National Academy of Engineering).

He is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Mirkin has served on the Editorial Advisory Boards of over twenty scholarly journals. He is the founding editor of the journal Small, one of the premier international nanotechnology journals, and he has co-edited three bestselling books. Dr. Mirkin holds a B.S. degree from Dickinson College (1986, elected into Phi Beta Kappa) and a Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the Pennsylvania State University (1989). He was an NSF Postdoctoral Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology prior to becoming a professor at Northwestern University in 1991.