Dolores Bozovic

Soft Condensed Matter

Office: 3-112 Knudsen
Phone: (310) 825-6176
email

Educational Background:

• Ph.D. in Physics, Harvard University, 2001
• B.A. in Physics, Stanford University, 1995

• 2005-present: Assistant Professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles, CA
• 2001-2005: Postdoctoral Associate, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Rockefeller University, New York, NY

Research Interest:

• My current research interests fall at the interface between physics and sensory neuroscience, and focuses at understanding the basic processes of hearing. The first step in our processing of sound is mediated by hair cells, specialized cells of the inner ear that detect mechanical stimuli and transduce them into electrical signals that are passed on to the rest of the brain. These cells display remarkable properties; they can detect displacements smaller than 1 nm, and yet can withstand loud sounds, covering a range of about 6 orders of magnitude. Further, they can amplify incoming stimuli and sustain prolonged oscillations, despite being immersed in a dissipative fluid environment. The mechanisms behind hair cell activity are still not fully elucidated, making hearing one of the least understood senses. Research in this laboratory is aimed at addressing some of these long-open questions.

Selected Publications

• Martin, P., Bozovic, D., Choe, Y. & Hudspeth, A. J. (2003) Spontaneous oscillation by hair bundles of the bullfrog’s sacculus. J. Neurosci. 23:4533-4548.
• Bozovic, D. & Hudspeth, A. J. (2003) Hair-bundle movements elicited by transepithelial electrical stimulation of hair cells in the sacculus of the bullfrog. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 100:958-963.
• Bozovic, D., Bockrath, M., Hafner, J. H., Lieber, C. M., Park, H. & Tinkham, M. (2003) Plastic deformations in mechanically strained single-walled carbon nanotubes. Phys. Rev. B 67:34407-34410.
• Bozovic, D., Bockrath, M., Hafner, J. H., Lieber, C. M., Park, H. & Tinkham, M. Electronic properties of mechanically induced kinks in single-walled carbon nanotubes. (2001) App. Phys. Lett. 78:3693-3695.
• Liang, W., Bockrath, M., Bozovic, D., Hafner, J. H., Lieber, C. M., Tinkham, M. & Park, H. (2001) Fabry-Perot interference in a nanotube electron waveguide. Nature 411:665-669.
• Bockrath, M., Liang, W., Bozovic, D., Hafner, J. H., Lieber, C. M., Tinkham, M. & Park, H. (2001) Resonant electron scattering by defects in single-walled carbon nanotubes. Science 291:283-285.