Stephen Ronald Quake (born 1969) is an American scientist, inventor and entrepreneur. He earned his

B.S. A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...

in physics and

M.S. A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast to ...

in mathematics from

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

in 1991 and his D.Phil. in physics from

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

in 1994 as a

Marshall Scholar The Marshall Scholarship is a postgraduate scholarship for "intellectually distinguished young Americans ndtheir country's future leaders" to study at any university in the United Kingdom. It is widely considered one of the most prestigious sc ...

. His thesis research was in statistical mechanics and the effects of knots on polymers. He did his postdoctoral work at Stanford in single-molecule biophysics with

Steven Chu Steven ChuCornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

. Quake was elected a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy ...

in 2013 for achievements in single-cell analysis and large-scale integration of microfluidic devices. He has also been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the American Physical Society, the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the recipient of numerous international awards, including the Human Frontiers of Science Nakasone Prize, the

Jacob Heskel Gabbay Award The Jacob and Louise Gabbay Award in Biotechnology and Medicine or Gabbay Award is an annual prize established in 1998 by the Jacob and Louise Gabbay Foundation to recognize outstanding work in the biomedical sciences. The award is administered by ...

(2015), the MIT-Lemelson Prize for Innovation, the Raymond and Beverly Sackler International Prize in Biophysics, the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award, the American Society of Microbiology’s Promega Biotechnology Award, and the Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing’s Pioneer of Miniaturization Award. He has founded or co-founded several companies, including Fluidigm, Helicos Biosciences, Verinata Health, Quanticel Pharmaceuticals, Moleculo, Cellular Research and Immumetrix. Since October 2016, he has been leading as the co-president of

Biohub Chan Zuckerberg Biohub (CZ Biohub), or simply Biohub, is a nonprofit research organization. In addition to supporting and conducting original research, CZ Biohub acts as a hub and fosters science collaboration between UC Berkeley, UC San Franci ...

. Quake is known for his new approaches to biological measurement. He has made contributions to the field of

microfluidics Microfluidics refers to the behavior, precise control, and manipulation of fluids that are geometrically constrained to a small scale (typically sub-millimeter) at which surface forces dominate volumetric forces. It is a multidisciplinary field tha ...

, including the invention of microfluidic large scale integration, and developed applications of microfluidics to structural biology, drug discovery, and molecular affinity measurements. He has also made contributions to the field of

genomics Genomics is an interdisciplinary field of biology focusing on the structure, function, evolution, mapping, and editing of genomes. A genome is an organism's complete set of DNA, including all of its genes as well as its hierarchical, three-dim ...

, including single molecule DNA sequencing, techniques to perform single cell gene expression and genome sequencing, the development of non-invasive prenatal diagnostics to replace amniocentesis, prenatal genome sequencing, non-invasive tests for heart transplant rejection, and the development of approaches to sequence and analyze an individual's immune system. His genome was the subject of clinical annotation by a large team in the Stanford Hospital. Quake is also known as a former academic adviser to

He Jiankui He Jiankui (; ; born 1984) is a Chinese biophysics researcher who was an associate professor in the Department of Biology of the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) in Shenzhen, China. Earning his Ph.D. from Rice University ...

, the controversial scientist who was involved with, purportedly, the first gene-edited babies.

References

External links

Stephen Quake's group at Stanford University
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Quake, Stephen Living people 1969 births Stanford University alumni Alumni of the University of Oxford Stanford University School of Engineering faculty Stanford University School of Medicine faculty Howard Hughes Medical Investigators American biophysicists American bioengineers Marshall Scholars Members of the National Academy of Medicine