Adah Almutairi (; born November 1, 1976) is a
scientist
A scientist is a person who Scientific method, researches to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences.
In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engag ...
and
professor
Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...
at the
University of California, San Diego (UCSD). Her work focuses on
nanomedicine
Nanomedicine is the medical application of nanotechnology, translating historic nanoscience insights and inventions into practical application. Nanomedicine ranges from the medical applications of nanomaterials and biological devices, to n ...
,
nanotechnology
Nanotechnology is the manipulation of matter with at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometers (nm). At this scale, commonly known as the nanoscale, surface area and quantum mechanical effects become important in describing propertie ...
,
chemistry
Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...
and
polymer science
Polymer science or macromolecular science is a subfield of materials science concerned with polymers, primarily synthetic polymers such as plastics and elastomers. The field of polymer science includes researchers in multiple disciplines inclu ...
.
Early life and education
Almutairi was born on November 1, 1976, in
Portland
Portland most commonly refers to:
*Portland, Oregon, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon
*Portland, Maine, the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maine
*Isle of Portland, a tied island in the English Channel
Portland may also r ...
,
Oregon
Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...
,
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
to
Saudi parents.
Academic career
She obtained her Ph.D. in
materials chemistry
Materials science is an interdisciplinary field of researching and discovering materials. Materials engineering is an engineering field of finding uses for materials in other fields and industries.
The intellectual origins of materials scien ...
from
University of California, Riverside
The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Riverside, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of Cali ...
, with a focus on electron delocalization and molecular structure in 2005. She completed her postdoctoral studies in chemistry and chemical engineering at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...
, from 2005 to 2008. At Berkeley, Almutairi worked with
Jean Fréchet
Jean M.J. Fréchet (born August 1944) is a French-American chemist and professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is best known for his work on polymers including polymer-supported chemistry, chemically amplified photore ...
where she developed several
nanoprobes for
in vivo
Studies that are ''in vivo'' (Latin for "within the living"; often not italicized in English) are those in which the effects of various biological entities are tested on whole, living organisms or cells, usually animals, including humans, an ...
molecular imaging
Molecular imaging is a field of medical imaging that focuses on imaging molecules of medical interest within living patients. This is in contrast to conventional methods for obtaining molecular information from preserved tissue samples, such as h ...
. She joined the
University of California, San Diego
The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego in communications material, formerly and colloquially UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California, United States. Es ...
in 2008. Almutairi is a Board of Trustees Member with the
Future Investment Initiative.
Awards and Honors
Almutairi received the
NIH Director's New Innovator Award
National Institutes of Health Director's New Innovator Award is a research initiative first announced in 2007 designed to supports exceptionally creative, early-career investigators who propose innovative, high-impact projects. The focus is specif ...
in 2009.
She is a 2016
Kavli Fellow and 2023
TAKREEM Laureate.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Almutairi, Ghadah
Scientists from Portland, Oregon
Occidental College alumni
Living people
University of California, Riverside alumni
21st-century American chemists
Saudi Arabian women chemists
Saudi Arabian chemists
21st-century American women engineers
21st-century American engineers
Saudi Arabian women engineers
American chemical engineers
American women chemical engineers
1976 births
American people of Saudi Arabian descent
Arab chemists