National Center for Design of
Biomimetic Nanoconductors

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Kevin Leung

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Kevin Leung is a Staff Scientist in the department of Biomolecular materials and Interfaces at Sandia National Laboratories. His research interests include theory and simulation of aqueous biological molecules, proteins, and ion channels, multiscale methods to treat complex systems, bio-nano interface research, and liquid and solid state condensed matter physics and statistical mechanics.

Research

Leung’s current projects include:

• Nanomechanical actuation, where the objective is to study transition metal porphyrins and biological ion channels to consider large scale conformational changes triggered by localized stimuli
• DNA wrapped carbon nanotubes where the objective is to investigate structural and functional aspects of tailor-made DNA strands to disperse and sort carbon nanotubes
• Desalination where the objective is to investigate the exclusion of salt from silica based nanoporous materials
• Aluminum corrosion where the objective is to model water-oxide interfaces at multiple lengthscales and
• Oxide fuel cell where the objective is to study the use of solid state oxide membranes to transport oxygen ions for fuel cell and hydrogen production applications.

Leung partners with Susan Rempe in projects at the classical-quantum boundary.  His involvement is critical to the development of the proton hopping modeling and simulations.

Related Publications

Leung K.and S.B. Rempe. 2004. Ab initio molecular dynamics study of formate ion hydration. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 126:344-351.

Leung K.and S.B. Rempe. 2005. Ab initio molecular dynamics study of glycine intramolecular proton transfer in water. J. Chem. Phys. 122:18405-18.

Leung K. and S.B. Rempe. 2005. Ab initio rigid water: Effect on water geometry, ion hydration, and thermodynamics. Sandia Technical Report.

Leung K., Rempe S.B., and C.D. Lorenz. (2005). Salt permeation and exclusion in silica and graphitic pores. Sandia Technical Report.

Leung K., Rempe S.B., Schultz P.A., Sporviero E., Batista V.S., and M.E. Chandross. 2005. Density functional theory study of transition metal porphine adsorption on gold surface and electric field induced conformation changes. Sandia Technical Report.

Related Links

Sandia National Laboratories

The National Center for Design of Biomimetic Nanoconductors is funded by Grant Number PHS 2 PN2 EY016570B from the National Institutes of Health through the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research and is based at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Partner institutions include Yale University, University of Southern California, University of Chicago, Illinois Institute of Technology, Sandia National Laboratories, Argonne National Laboratory, Oxford University, Wabash College, University of California, Davis, nanoHUB at Purdue University, and the University of New Mexico.