Lane Baker
  • Professor
  • Department Head
  • Dr. Carl D. McAfee '90 Endowed Chair in Analytical Chemistry
Research Areas
  • Analytical
  • Energy
  • Instrumentation
  • Materials
  • Nanoscience
  • Surface

Research Interests

The Baker research group (bakergrp) is interested in electrochemical measurement and instrumentation, with special attention to ion transport and electron transfer at small scales. This opens the door to asking and answering questions in biology, materials science, and environmental measurements. We have developed a suite of electrochemical imaging applications that utilize Scanning ion Conductance Microscopy (SICM) for such measurements. SICM employs nanoscale pipettes for local interrogation and can be applied to quantitative analytical and electrochemical measurements. We have significant interests in single-entity electrochemical measurements, including ion transport at biological interfaces and electron transfer at catalytic nanoparticles. Additional areas of enquiry include surface charge at the nanoscale, electrospray from nanoscale emitters, new methods of high-throughput analysis, applications of machine learning for electrochemical data interpretation, and new carbon materials for electrochemistry.

Selected Publications

  • Zhu, C.; Jagdale, G.; Gandolfo, A.; Abney, R.; Zhou, L.; Bish, D.; Raff, J.D.; Baker, L.A. Surface Charge Measurements with Scanning Ion Conductance Microscopy Provides Insights into Nitrous Acid Speciation at the Kaolin Mineral-Air Interface, Enviro. Sci. Tech., 2021, 55, 12233-12242. doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.1c03455

  • Huang, K.; Castiaux, A.; Podicheti, R.; Rusch, D.B.; Martin, R.S.; Baker, L.A. A Hybrid Nanofiber/Paper Cell Culture Platform for Building a 3D Blood-brain Barrier Model, Small Methods, 2021, 2100592. doi.org/10.1002/smtd.202100592

  • Zhu, C.; Huang, K.; Wang, Y.; Alanis, K.; Shi, W.; Baker, L.A. Imaging with Ion Channels, Anal. Chem., 2021, 93, 5355-5359. doi.org/10.1021/acs.analchem.1c00224

  • Choi, M.; Siepser, N.P.; Jeong, S.; Wang, Y.; Jagdale, G.; Ye, X.; Baker, L.A. Probing Single-Particle Electrocatalytic Activity at Facet-Controlled Gold Nanocrystals, Nanoletters, 2020, 20, 1233-1239. dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.nanolett.9b04640

  • Huang, K.; Zhou, L.; Alanis, K.; Hou, J.; Baker, L.A. Imaging effects of hyperosmolality on individual tricellular junctions, Chem. Sci., 2020, 11, 1307-1315. dx.doi.org/10.1039/C9SC05114G