SINAN KETEN, PH.D.

Biographical Sketch
A. PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION
Bogazici University (Turkey)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Civil Engineering
B.S., June 2005
Civil and Environmental Engineering ME., June 2006
Civil and Environmental Engineering Ph.D.,June 2010

B. APPOINTMENTS
Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering (joint appointment with Civil & Environmental
Engineering), Northwestern University, since September 2010.
C. PRODUCTS (42 peer reviewed publications, 1292 citations, h-index:17 [Google])
5 most closely related publications (* as corresponding author)
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L. Ruiz, Y. Wu, S. Keten*, Tailoring water structure and transport in nanotubes with
tunable interiors, Nanoscale, 2014, accepted, doi:10.1039/C4NR05407E.
D. Hsu, Wenjie Xia, S. Arturo, and S. Keten*, "A systematic method for
thermomechanically consistent coarse-graining: A universal model for methacrylate-based
polymers", Journal of Chemical Theory and Computation, 2014, 10 (6), pp 25142527.
L. Ruiz, S. Keten*, "Thermodynamics vs. Kinetics Dichotomy in the Linear Self-Assembly
of Mixed Nanoblocks", Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, 2014, 5 (11), pp 20212026.
E. Hamed, T. Xu, S. Keten*, "Poly(ethylene glycol) conjugation stabilizes the secondary
structure of alpha-helices by reducing peptide solvent accessible surface area,
Biomacromolecules, 2013, 14 (11), pp 40534060.
S. Keten, Z. Xu, B. Ihle, M. J. Buehler, Nanoconfinement controls stiffness, strength and
mechanical toughness of -sheet crystals in silk, Nature Materials, 2010, 9, p. 359-367.

5 other significant publications (* as corresponding author)

6.

B. Abberton, W.K. Liu, S. Keten*, "Coarse-grained Simulation of Molecular Mechanisms

of Recovery in Thermally Activated Shape-memory Polymers, Journal of the Mechanics
and Physics of Solids, 2013, 61(12), pp. 26252637.
7. B. Sinko, S. Mishra, L. Ruiz, N. Brandis, S. Keten*, "The dimensions of biological
cellulose nanocrystals maximize fracture strength, ACS Macro Letters, 2014, 3, pp 6469.
8. S. Keten, M. J. Buehler, Nanostructure and molecular mechanics of dragline spider silk
protein assemblies, Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 2010, 7(53), p 1709-1721.
9. M. J. Buehler, S. Keten, Colloquium: Failure of molecules, bones, and the Earth itself,
Reviews of Modern Physics, 2010, 82(2): p. 1459-1487. Highlighted by M. Buchanan,
Learning from Failure, Nature Physics, 2009, 5(705).
10. S. Keten and M.J. Buehler, Geometric confinement governs the rupture strength of H-bond
assemblies at a critical length scale. Nano Letters, 2008, 8(2): p. 743-748.

D. SYNERGISTIC ACTIVITIES
Societal Activities: Vice-Chair, ASCE EMI Molecular Scale Modeling & Experimentation
Committee, Associate Track Chair, World Congress of Biomechanics, 2014, Track
secretary and co-chair, ASME NEMB 2013, 2015, Symposium organizer, ASME IMECE
2011-2014, ASCE EMI 2012-2014, SES 2011, 2013. Member of ASCE EMI Biomechanics
Committee, ASME Soft Materials Committee, MRS Task force on landscapes and
opportunities; Recipient of MRS Graduate Student Award, ASME Applied Mechanics
Division Haythornthwaite RIG Award.
Editorial Activities: Member of the editorial board for BioNanoScience and ACS
Biomaterials Science and Engineering Journals; peer reviewer for 30+ journals.
Panel Service: Proposal Panelist/Reviewer for NSF Biomechanics and Mechanobiology,
Mechanics of Materials, SI2, Structural Materials, DOE Biomolecular Materials Programs.
Northwestern University Service: Member of the High-Performance Research Computing
Committee, Library Committee, and CEE Faculty Advisory Committee. Designed and
taught Multi-scale Modeling & Simulation in Mechanics II, Computational Nanodynamics.
Invited/Keynote/Plenary Lectures: Invited to give lectures at Sabanci University (Turkey),
Army Research Laboratory, ETH Zurich (Switzerland), Purdue University, Tsinghua
University, Xian Jiaotong University (The Peoples Republic of China), University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of California Berkeley, Georgia Institute of
Technology, Iowa State University, University of Illinois - Chicago, The Molecular Foundry
(LBNL), American Physical Society, Materials Research Society, Asia-Pacific Congress on
Computational Mechanics (Singapore), Society of Engineering Science, CISM Advanced
and Bioinspired Nanomechanics Summer School (Italy), T. Tezduyar 60th Birthday
Conference (Japan), Annual Beckman Foundation Symposium, Symposium on Technology
for Design and Construction, Northwestern University.
E. COLLABORATORS AND OTHER AFFILIATIONS
(1) Collaborators and Co-Editors
Brett Helms, Molecular Foundry, LBNL; Cate Brinson, Northwestern University; Linda
Broadbelt, Northwestern University; Jan Carmeliet, ETH-Zurich, Dominique Derome, EMPA,
Adri van Duin, Pennsylvania State University; Horacio Espinosa, Northwestern University, Phil
LeDuc, Carnegie Mellon University, Wing Kam Liu, Northwestern University, Sonbinh Nguyen,
Northwestern University; John Torkelson, Northwestern University; Ting Xu, University of
California-Berkeley; Zhiping Xu, Tsinghua University, China.
(2) Graduate and Postdoctoral Advisors
Markus J. Buehler Massachusetts Institute of Technology, PhD advisor
Jerry Connor Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Masters thesis advisor.
(3) Thesis Advisor and Postgraduate-Scholar Sponsor
Post-doctoral Associates 4 total: Dr. Chen Shao, Dr. Elham Hamed, Dr. Meng Shen
(coadvisor Rich Lueptow), Dr. Marco Alsina Corvalan (co-advised with J.F. Gaillard)| Doctoral
Students - 8 total: Luis Ruiz (TAM), Brendan Abberton (TAM, co-advised with Wing Kam
Liu); Wenjie Xia (CEE), David Hsu (ME); Bobby Sinko (ME), Xin Qin (TAM), Zhaoxu Meng
(CEE), Elizabeth DeBenedictis (ME) Master Students Danielle Ma (ME), Yuanqiao Wu
(ME) Undergraduate 4 total: Jake Song, Matthew Sullivan, Katherine Yun, Shawn Caeiro |
Former group members: Graduate - Shawn Mishra, 2013 (MS, ME), Undergraduate - Max
Goldmeier, Eric Schwenker, Paige VonAchen, Nick Brandis.