Cees Dekker
Cornelis (Cees) Dekker (born April 7, 1959 in Haren , NL) is a Dutch physicist and university professor at the Technical University of Delft . Since 2010 he has also been director of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience Delft. Dekker is an international expert in the field of nanoscience.
His current area of expertise is molecular biophysics, the interface between physics and biology . With the help of nanotechnology , the properties of individual biomolecules are measured. Dekker has made several fundamental discoveries in the field of carbon nanotubes in the past . At times he was the most cited physicist in the Netherlands with this work. Today he studies the biophysics of molecules in the biological cell using single-molecule techniques.
In addition to his scientific work, he is also interested in the relationship between faith and science.
Scientific career
Dekker received his PhD in physics from Utrecht University in 1988 . He was then appointed "Assistant Professor" there and was also temporarily visiting researcher at IBM Research in Yorktown Heights (USA). In 1993 he moved to the Technical University of Delft , where he was Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Professor (a chair for excellent young scientists) from 1999 and was appointed University Professor for Molecular Biophysics in 2000. In 2007 he became a Distinguished University Professor, and in 2010 he was given the newly created Chair of Bionanosciences in Delft. Since 2012 he has also been director of the Kavli Institute for Nanosciences in Delft.
Dekker is known for his very successful research in the field of carbon nanotubes in the 1990s. Dekker's group discovered many new basic electrical properties of these particular molecules. He also investigated the use of these “nanotubes” in molecular electronics. His research group was the first in the world to fabricate a transistor based on a single nanotube molecule.
Since 2000 Dekker has shifted his research field to the field of biophysics and nanobiology . His current research focuses on three areas:
- Nanoholes for the analysis of biomolecules such as B. DNA ;
- Biophysics of chromatin at the single molecule level;
- Biophysics of bacteria and "bottom up" -Biology.
His research is moving more and more towards synthetic biology or synthetic cells (and their cell division).
Because of his great scientific merits, he was elected a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences (KNAW) in 2003 , and subsequently became a member of the Institute of Physics (IOP, 2004) and the American Physical Society (APS, 2006). In 2006 he was appointed Senior Professor in Delft.
Dekker has received numerous national and international scientific awards and honorary doctorates for his scientific achievements. In 2003 he received the NWO Spinoza Prize . Dekker's work is cited exceptionally often: around 3,000 citations per year, with over 43,000 citations in total. His H index is 83 (as of December 2015). In 2012 Dekker headed the research consortium “Frontiers of Nanoscience” (Nanofront), which received funding of € 51 million from NWO and the universities of Delft and Leiden. Dekker has received two ERC Advanced Grants. In 2015 Dekker received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences .
Since 2017, Clarivate Analytics has been one of the favorites for a Nobel Prize in Physics ( Clarivate Citation Laureates , formerly Thomson Reuters Citation Laureates ) due to the number of his citations .
Belief and science
Dekker is a Christian and a member of a charismatic free church in Delft. He is convinced that there is no conflict between science and belief , but that the two are in harmony. He sees his Christian faith more as an incentive for his scientific work than an obstacle. From time to time he can be seen on TV talk shows, in which he speaks to like-minded people or guests who think differently about his convictions. Dekker has worked as an editor and co-author on several books on faith and science. In 2015 Dekker published a children's book together with Corien Oranje in which he describes the harmony of creation and evolution.
Cees Dekker is married and has three children.
Web links
swell
- ↑ official website
- ↑ The 2017 Clarivate Citation Laureates - Clarivate. (No longer available online.) In: clarivate.com. Archived from the original on September 20, 2017 ; accessed on September 21, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Dekker, Cees |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Dekker, Cornelis (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Dutch nanoscientist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 7, 1959 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Haren , Netherlands |