Dr. Mineo Yamakawa is a Research Scientist in Biomedical & Life Sciences R&D division of Digital Health Group at Intel Corporation, located in Santa Clara, California. Previously he was part of the Microsystems (MEMS) division of Technology Manufacturing Group/Corporate Technology Group and was a key engineer/scientist to create an Intel's first biotechnology project in 2000. He has a unique combination of cross-disciplinary training and the accomplishments of more than 15 years of scientific/medical research in molecular biophysics as well as more than 10 years of consumer product development and engineering management in industries. Dr. Yamakawa received his BS in Applied Physics from Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan and his Ph.D. in Physiology and Biophysics from the University of Oklahoma, Health Sciences Center. During his early research years at the University of Pennsylvania and University of Vermont in 1980s, he pioneered and published in broadly interdisciplinary research areas, involving molecular genetics, protein/biochemical kinetics, in vivo physiology, and digital signal processing. He is a long time member of ACM and IEEE societies.
As the complex behaviors and patterns of nano-scale interactions between organic and inorganic materials are among the most difficult to decipher, new scientific methodologies based on the existing tools have to be continuously developed and improved. By taking advantage of the recent advances in computational power and nano-scale chemical processing, we have developed a new molecular signaling agent that is based on self-contained Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering, called COIN, or Composite Organic-Inorganic Nanotag. Its first practical application has led to the development of a highly sensitive, high-resolution molecular marker with a signature-encodable shell, which could be used in traditional assays, identifying specific target biomolecular species in experimental samples.
