Rate My Professor Jennifer Dionne

Jennifer Dionne is a Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy, and Professor, by courtesy, of Radiology at Stanford University in the Engineering faculty. She also serves as Senior Associate Vice Provost of Research Platforms/Shared Facilities, deputy director of Q-NEXT, a DOE National Quantum Initiative center, and co-founder of Pumpkinseed, which develops quantum sensors for the immune system. Dionne earned B.S. degrees in Physics and Systems Science and Mathematics from Washington University in St. Louis in 2003, an M.S. and Ph.D. in Applied Physics from the California Institute of Technology in 2005 and 2009, respectively, under Professor Harry Atwater, and completed postdoctoral training in Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley in 2010 under Professor Paul Alivisatos. She joined Stanford University as an Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering in 2010, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2016, and to Full Professor in 2024. From 2020 to 2023, she was Stanford’s Inaugural Vice Provost of Shared Facilities, overseeing instrumentation modernization and user support. She previously directed the Photonics at Thermodynamic Limits Energy Frontier Research Center and co-directed the TomKat Center for Sustainable Energy.

As a pioneer of nanophotonics within Engineering, Dionne develops methods to observe and control chemical and biological processes at nanometer-scale resolution, targeting global health and sustainability challenges. Her research includes culture-free pathogen detection and antibiotic susceptibility testing, amplification-free nucleic acid and protein detection and sequencing, and atomic-scale imaging of light-driven reactions. Notable publications encompass “Driving energetically unfavorable dehydrogenation dynamics with plasmonics” (Science, 2021), “High quality factor phase gradient metasurfaces” (Nature Nanotechnology, 2020), “Rapid identification of pathogenic bacteria using Raman spectroscopy and deep learning” (Nature Communications, 2019), “Nanophotonic Platforms for Chiral Sensing and Separation” (Accounts of Chemical Research, 2020), and “Atmospheric-pressure ammonia synthesis on AuRu catalysts enabled by plasmon-controlled hydrogenation and nitrogen-species desorption” (Nature Energy, 2025). Dionne has received the NSF Alan T. Waterman Award (2019), NIH Director’s New Innovator Award (2019), Moore Inventor Fellowship (2018), Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (2014), Sloan Research Fellowship (2015), Adolph Lomb Medal (2016), and Materials Research Society Outstanding Young Investigator Award (2017). She serves as Associate Editor of Nano Letters, collaborates with artists for science outreach, and has organized conferences including the Plasmonics/Nanophotonics Gordon Conference. Her work has appeared in NPR, The Economist, Science, Nature, and Oprah’s “50 Things that will make you say ‘Wow’!”.