George Whitesides

About

George M. Whitesides, born August 3, 1939, in Louisville, KY, is a distinguished chemist and professor at Harvard University. He received his A.B. degree from Harvard University in 1960 and completed his Ph.D. at the California Institute of Technology in 1964 under the guidance of J.D. Roberts. Whitesides was a faculty member at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1963 to 1982 before joining Harvard's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology in 1982. He served as Department Chairman from 1986 to 1989 and held the position of Mallinckrodt Professor of Chemistry from 1982 to 2004. Currently, he is the Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers University Professor. His research areas include analytical chemistry, energy, related inorganic materials, origins of life, physical and chemical physics. Whitesides has made significant contributions to the field of chemistry through his research and leadership, and he is recognized as a prominent figure in the scientific community.

Research topics

• Materials science
• Computer Science
• Nanotechnology
• Artificial Intelligence
• Engineering
• Chemistry
• Geometry
• Mathematics
• Data science
• Crystallography

Selected publications

• An outlook on microfluidics: the promise and the challenge

  Lab on a Chip · 2022 · 314 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  This perspective considers ways in which the field of microfluidics can increase its impact by improving existing technologies and enabling new functionalities. We highlight applications where microfluidics has made or can make important contributions, including diagnostics, food safety, and the production of materials. The success of microfluidics assumes several forms, including fundamental innovations in fluid mechanics that enable the precise manipulation of fluids at small scales and the de…

  PublisherDOI

• Nonlinear Phenomena in Microfluidics

  Chemical Reviews · 2022 · 98 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  This review focuses on experimental work on nonlinear phenomena in microfluidics, which for the most part are phenomena for which the velocity of a fluid flowing through a microfluidic channel does not scale proportionately with the pressure drop. Examples include oscillations, flow-switching behaviors, and bifurcations. These phenomena are qualitatively distinct from laminar, diffusion-limited flows that are often associated with microfluidics. We explore the nonlinear behaviors of bubbles or d…

  PublisherDOI

• A buckling-sheet ring oscillator for electronics-free, multimodal locomotion

  Science Robotics · 2022-02-09 · 86 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Locomotion of soft robots typically relies on control of multiple inflatable actuators by electronic computers and hard valves. Soft pneumatic oscillators can reduce the demand on controllers by generating complex movements required for locomotion from a single, constant input pressure, but either have been constrained to low rates of flow of air or have required complex fabrication processes. Here, we describe a pneumatic oscillator fabricated from flexible, but inextensible, sheets that provid…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Programmable soft valves for digital and analog control

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2022-09-26 · 85 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  In soft devices, complex actuation sequences and precise force control typically require hard electronic valves and microcontrollers. Existing designs for entirely soft pneumatic control systems are capable of either digital or analog operation, but not both, and are limited by speed of actuation, range of pressure, time required for fabrication, or loss of power through pull-down resistors. Using the nonlinear mechanics intrinsic to structures composed of soft materials-in this case, by leverag…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Smart Thermally Actuating Textiles

  Advanced Materials Technologies · 2020 · 69 citations

  Abstract Soft robots have attracted attention for biomedical and consumer devices. However, most of these robots are pneumatically actuated, requiring a tether and thus limiting wearable applications that require multiple controlled actuators. By pairing liquid‐vapor phase change actuation with a textile‐based laminated manufacturing method, smart thermally actuating textiles (STATs) eliminate the need for a pneumatic tether. STATs are lightweight and unobtrusive for wearable applications and ex…

  DOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant R01GM030367

  NIH · $5.1M · 2012

• Micron- to Millimeter-scale Self Assembly

  NSF · $632k · 2005–2010

• NIH Grant R37GM030367

  NIH · $5.0M · 2001

Frequent coauthors

• Donald E. Ingber

  Boston Children's Hospital

  83 shared

• Emanuele Ostuni

  59 shared

• Piotr Garstecki

  Institute of Physical Chemistry

  56 shared

• Younan Xia

  The Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering

  46 shared

• Richard Smith

  Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

  41 shared

• Ralph G. Nuzzo

  39 shared

• Xingyu Jiang

  Zhejiang University

  39 shared

• Jinming Gao

  The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center

  38 shared

Labs

• Whitesides GroupPI

Education

• B.S., Chemistry

  University of California, Los Angeles

  1972

• Ph.D., Chemistry

  Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  1976

Similar researchers at Harvard University

• Stuart L. Schreiberh-214
• E. J. Coreyh-150
• Daniel G. Nocerah-123