David Carroll (born January 13, 1963) is a U.S.

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

, materials scientist and nanotechnologist, Fellow of the American Physical Society, and director of the Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials at Wake Forest University. He has contributed to the field of nanoscience and nanotechnology through his work in nanoengineered

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

therapeutics A therapy or medical treatment (often abbreviated tx, Tx, or Tx) is the attempted remediation of a health problem, usually following a medical diagnosis. As a rule, each therapy has indications and contraindications. There are many different ...

nanocomposite Nanocomposite is a multiphase solid material where one of the phases has one, two or three dimensions of less than 100 nanometers (nm) or structures having nano-scale repeat distances between the different phases that make up the material. The id ...

-based display and lighting technologies, high efficiency nanocomposite

photovoltaics Photovoltaics (PV) is the conversion of light into electricity using semiconducting materials that exhibit the photovoltaic effect, a phenomenon studied in physics, photochemistry, and electrochemistry. The photovoltaic effect is commercially us ...

and thermo/piezo-electric generators.

Education

Carroll earned his BS (1985) in

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

from NC State University (

Raleigh, NC Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southea ...

) and his

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

(1993) in physics from

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a Private university, private liberal arts college, liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a Men's colleges in the United States, men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Epis ...

in (

Middletown, CT Middletown is a city located in Middlesex County, Connecticut, United States, Located along the Connecticut River, in the central part of the state, it is south of Hartford. In 1650, it was incorporated by English settlers as a town under its ...

) with Dr. Dale Doering (thesis advisor). Carroll's thesis examined the

thermodynamics Thermodynamics is a branch of physics that deals with heat, work, and temperature, and their relation to energy, entropy, and the physical properties of matter and radiation. The behavior of these quantities is governed by the four laws of the ...

of charged defects in

complex oxide A complex oxide is a chemical compound that contains oxygen and at least two other elements (or oxygen and just one other element that's in at least two oxidation states). Complex oxide materials are notable for their wide range of magnetic and el ...

materials. As a postdoctoral associate for Professor Dawn Bonnell at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

(

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

), Carroll worked on the application of scanning probes to size and dimension related phenomena in oxide supported metal

nanoclusters Nanoclusters are atomically precise, crystalline materials most often existing on the 0-2 nanometer scale. They are often considered kinetically stable intermediates that form during the synthesis of comparatively larger materials such as semico ...

. From there Carroll became a research associate at the Max-Planck-Insitut für Metallforschung (MPI) in Stuttgart, Germany under the direction of Professor Manfred Rühle. His primary research was on nanoscale phenomena at

metal A metal (from Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electricity and heat relatively well. Metals are typicall ...

ceramic A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcelain ...

interfaces using a combination of

microscopy Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view objects and areas of objects that cannot be seen with the naked eye (objects that are not within the resolution range of the normal eye). There are three well-known branches of micr ...

techniques. At the MPI Carroll first began working with

carbon nanotubes A scanning tunneling microscopy image of a single-walled carbon nanotube Rotating single-walled zigzag carbon nanotube A carbon nanotube (CNT) is a tube made of carbon with diameters typically measured in nanometers. ''Single-wall carbon nan ...

and their variants. Specifically, Carroll was the first to identify the signature for one-dimensional behavior in multiwalled nanotubes (the so-called van Hove Singularities) as well as the signatures for defect states for those systems. This work helped to open the door to the use of scanning probe spectroscopies in understanding the

electronics The field of electronics is a branch of physics and electrical engineering that deals with the emission, behaviour and effects of electrons using electronic devices. Electronics uses active devices to control electron flow by amplification ...

of low-dimensional

systems A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. A system, surrounded and influenced by its environment, is described by its boundaries, structure and purpose and express ...

.D.L. Carroll, P. Kinlen, S. Raman, P. Redlich, M. Rühle, X. Blasé, J.C. Charlier, S. Curran, S. Roth, and P.M. Ajayan, "Boron-Doped Nanotubes, Density of States from Tunneling Spectroscopy" Molecular Nanostructures, ed. H. Kuzmany, World Scientific Publishers, NY NY, (1997) 134–137

Research

Carroll's research contributions have been in the areas of: Growth and assembly of novel

nanostructures A nanostructure is a structure of intermediate size between microscopic and molecular structures. Nanostructural detail is microstructure at nanoscale. In describing nanostructures, it is necessary to differentiate between the number of dimensi ...

Optics Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultraviole ...

of nanostructures and Nano-photonics,

Quantum In physics, a quantum (plural quanta) is the minimum amount of any physical entity (physical property) involved in an interaction. The fundamental notion that a physical property can be "quantized" is referred to as "the hypothesis of quantizati ...

-functional properties of nanophase blends, Organic material nanocomposite devices and technologies including

organic photovoltaics An organic solar cell (OSC) or plastic solar cell is a type of photovoltaic that uses organic electronics, a branch of electronics that deals with conductive organic polymers or small organic molecules, for light absorption and charge transport t ...

, lighting systems, and IR sensors,

Biomedical Biomedicine (also referred to as Western medicine, mainstream medicine or conventional medicine)

-nanotechnology including smart therapeutics,

hyperthermia Hyperthermia, also known simply as overheating, is a condition in which an individual's body temperature is elevated beyond normal due to failed thermoregulation. The person's body produces or absorbs more heat than it dissipates. When extreme ...

approaches to Cancer, advanced/responsive tissue scaffolding technology, and biological-technology

signal transduction Signal transduction is the process by which a chemical or physical signal is transmitted through a cell as a series of molecular events, most commonly protein phosphorylation catalyzed by protein kinases, which ultimately results in a cellula ...

. In 1997, Carroll moved to Clemson University (SC) as an assistant professor where he received early promotion and tenure in the department of physics. While at Clemson he established a program in organic devices based upon carbon nanotube nanocomposites demonstrating enhanced

lifetime Lifetime may refer to: * Life expectancy, the length of time a person is expected to remain alive Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Lifetime (band), a rock band from New Jersey * ''Life Time'' (Rollins Band album), by Rollins Band * ...

and performance in organic light-emitting diodes (OLED) for the first time. This work was among the first to establish that nanotube-based nanocomposite systems could be used to enhance a variety of organic device performance metrics. In 2003, Carroll's group moved to Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC to establish the Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials. With this move the research team expanded its work into biomedical nanotechnologies and continued to push the state-of-the-art in performance of organic electronics, announcing the development of highly efficient lighting devices based on field activation of polymers (FIPELs) and fabrics that generate power from body heat in recent years. Carroll's team at the NanoCenter at Wake Forest University was among the first to realize morphology control in organics through the use of heating or multiple solvents setting the world record for the highest efficiency organic solar cells at the time. Since becoming faculty, Carroll has published over 240 articles in scholarly journals (h-index = 40). He has published 1 textbook: "One Dimensional Metals" and edited two books on nanoelectronics. He holds 44 patents with numerous patent filings. Carroll is a frequent speaker at international conferences with more than 150 invited talks in the past few years. Since 2003, six different spin-off companies have been based on technologies from his labs.

Personal

Prof. Carroll has become a well known speaker on the topic of technology and human society. He has appeared on numerous television and radio programs including the History Channel, CNN, NPR, BBC, and CNBC as well as in newspapers and popular magazines around the world.

References

External links

Wake Forest Center for NanotechnologyPower Felt uses nanotubes to generate power
heat-to-electricity invention; March 25, 2012 {{DEFAULTSORT:Carroll, David 1963 births Living people North Carolina State University alumni University of Pennsylvania Wesleyan University alumni Clemson University faculty Wake Forest University faculty 21st-century American physicists American nanotechnologists Fellows of the American Physical Society