Dr. Liang-Chieh Ma received his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington. He has his M.S. and B.S degrees also in Materials Science and Engineering from Western Michigan University and Feng Chia University (Taichung, Taiwan), respectively. Before joining VCU, Dr. Ma has been working as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the departments of Bioengineering at the University of Texas at Arlington and in the departments of Materials science at the University of North Texas. Dr. Ma joined VCU at 2021 as a research scientist in Electrical and Computer Engineering Department. He is also the manager of the Virginia Microelectronics Center (VMC).

Dr. Ma’s research efforts are mainly focused on the application of nanotechnology in design and fabrication of nanostructured electronic devices and biosensors. In the field of nanostructured electronic device, he has discovered a new method and fabricated a single electron device to suppress the leakage current which is an important issue for most of the semiconductor devices. The idea by utilizing nanoparticles inside the device and the vertical stacking layered structure has a great valuable for current semiconductor device manufacturing in the concerning of low power consumption and high sensitivity. In the field of biosensor application, he developed a novel method to trap nanoparticles in a double nanohole (DNH) nanoapertures integrated on top of solid-state nanopores (ssNP). The conventional nanopore biosensors are enhanced by the Nanoaperture-focused plasmons for extending the duration of electrical sensing by up to four orders of magnitude. This could benefit the sensitivity of the nanopore sensor while the concentration of the target is very low. This device and methods for sensing also provide label-free detection using localized plasmon resonance measurements coupled with an electrical sensing nanopore system.

With extensive hands-on experience in the cleanroom for semiconductor processing, micro/nano fabrication, and various characterization technologies, Dr. Ma is actively working on integrating new technology and capabilities into the VMC operations and expanding infrastructure. He is always supporting the researchers at VMC by providing technical advices based on his previous experience.