Sol Gruner
John L. Wetherill Emeritus Professor of Physics
Overview
Biological physics; polymer and other soft condensed matter physics; x-ray and synchrotron radiation science; scientific instrumentation and technique development; development of novel x-ray detectors
Research Focus
My research is aimed at understanding the structure and properties of proteins, lyotropic liquid crystals, block co-polymers and mesoporous composites. Examples include the effects of pressure on protein assemblies, the synthesis and properties of polymer-based nanocomposites, the interaction between membrane proteins and lipid bilayers, and techniques to determine protein structure from microcrystals. The work is diverse and is characterized by collaborations with biologically- and chemically-oriented scientists, the development of new instrumentation and techniques, especially as involves x-rays and synchrotron radiation. I also believe that physicists are tool makers and, in consequence, everyone in the group is involved in instrumentation and technique development as applied to the materials listed, above.
Research Associates and technical staff associated with the group
Marty Novak, Hugh Philipp, Mark Tate, Durgesh Rai
Graduate Students
Co-advised with others: Divya Gadkari and Paxton Thedford
Publications
Publications may be found at http://bigbro.biophys.cornell.edu/publications/.
In the news
- CHESS celebrates 75 years of synchrotron light
- Superconducting quantum material has an organic twist
- Neil Ashcroft, world-renowned theoretical physicist, dies at 82
- Guinness World Record for micro view into hidden worlds
- Garbage to gold: getting good results from bad data
- Electron microscope detector achieves record resolution
- New electron microscope sees more than an image