Jonathan Varsanik, Ph.D.

Dr. Varsanik has a wide range of technical experience including software and electrical engineering to nanotechnology. He holds patents in the areas of nanofabrication as well as electromagnetic modeling, simulation, and testing.

In earlier studies, Dr. Varsanik developed an integrated optic / fluidic detection device; work that involved design, simulation, fabrication, and testing, for both optical and fluidic operation. Through this work, he has built expertise in clean room fabrication techniques, as well as electrical and optical testing. He has experience in the techniques of wet and dry etching, photolithography, e-beam lithography, plasma surface treatments, polymer adhesion testing, wafer bonding, waveguide diffusion, prism coupling, modal analysis, optical polishing, and optical-fiber coupling, as well as characterization tools including scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM).

In other work, Dr. Varsanik developed a novel material using RF MEMS resonators, called a metamaterial. Through electromagnetic modeling, simulation, and RF device testing, it was shown that this metamaterial can achieve electromagnetic properties that are not found in any natural materials. A patent was issued for this work.

As the head of curriculum for an education-based international social startup, Dr. Varsanik led the development and refinement of a software engineering curriculum. He has led teams in the development of educational projects in Java. He managed the day-to-day educational operations and worked on the long term vision for that organization. He has also provided technical information for a book published on artificial intelligence and innovation.

Kong DS, Varsanik J, Griffith S, Jacobson JM. Conductive nanostructure fabrication by focused ion beam direct writing of silver nanoparticles. The Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology B 2004; 22:2987.

Conference Papers

Azenkot S, Golfinopoulos T, Marcus A, Springmann A, Varsanik J. Overcoming barriers among Israeli and Palestinian students via computer science. Proceedings, SIGCSE, 2011.

Varsanik J, Teynor W, LeBlanc J, Clark H, Krogmeier J, Yang T, Crozier K, Bernstein J. Sub-wavelength plasmonic readout for direct linear analysis of optically tagged DNA. Proceedings, SPIE, Vol. 7577, 75770Q, 2010.

Varsanik J, Teynor W, LeBlanc J, Clark H, Bernstein J, Krogmeier J, Yang T, Crozier K. Fabrication of nanofluidic sensor chip with sub-wavelength plasmonic readout for optical tags. 3rd International Conference on NanoBiotechnology, 2009.

Weinberg M, Candler R, Chandorkar S, Varsanik J, Kenny T, Duwel A. Energy loss in MEMS resonators and the impact of inertial and RF devices. Transducers 2009; 688–695.

Kong DS, Anant V, Salomon A, Delhagen W, Nair H, Varsanik J, Jacobson JM. Nanostructure fabrication by direct E-beam writing of purely inorganic nanoparticles. EIPBN, 2003.

Presentations

Varsanik J. Sub-wavelength plasmonic readout for direct linear analysis of optically tagged DNA. SPIE BioPhotonics West, San Francisco, CA, 2010.

Varsanik J. Fabrication of nanofluidic sensor chip with sub-wavelength plasmonic readout for optical tags. 3rd International Conference on NanoBiotechnology, San Francisco, CA, 2009.

Varsanik J. Nano-fluidic device with plasmonic readout for DNA identification. DARPA N/MEMS Fundamentals, June 2008.

• Draper Fellow, Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, 2005–2011
• Head of Curriculum, Middle East Education through Technology, 2008–2011