Erik Hobbie

Professor and Director - Graduate Program in Materials & Nanotechnology

Faculty

Physics

Erik Hobbie smiling confidently at camera.

Erik Hobbie received his Ph.D. and BS degrees in Physics from the University of Minnesota. He was a National Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow in polymer physics at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg Maryland from 1990 to 1992, and a senior research scientist at NIST for several years after that before coming to NDSU in the fall of 2009. He directs the graduate program in Materials and Nanotechnology at NDSU, where he is a professor in both Physics and Coatings and Polymeric Materials.

Areas of Study & Research

Research in the Hobbie group is focused on the synthesis, processing and characterization of colloidal nanocrystals or quantum dots. Specific materials of interest include silicon-carbide nanocrystals, silicon nanocrystals, perovskite nanocrystals, metal nanocrystals and single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs). We are also interested in the self-assembly of these nanomaterials and their use in high-performance polymer nanocomposite films for applications in lighting (LEDs and displays), energy (photovoltaics and flexible electronics), and biomedical engineering (fluorescent tagging, sensing and drug delivery).

Publications

Select Recent Publications

Size-Dependent Radiative Relaxation in Silicon Quantum Dots: Impact of Targeted Size, S. A. Thomas, M. Sefannaser, R. J. Petersen, K. J. Anderson, D. S. Kilin, T. A. Pringle, E. K. Hobbie, Phys. Rev. Mater. 2025, 9, 076004.

https://journals.aps.org/prmaterials/abstract/10.1103/d6p5-jc18

Temperature Dependent Photoluminescence of Surface Passivated 2D-Layered Silicon Carbide Nanocrystals, Naif S. Alharthi, Salim A. Thomas, Reed J. Petersen, Kenneth J. Anderson, Todd A. Pringle, Dmitri Kilin, Erik K. Hobbie, J. Phys. Chem. C 2025, 129, 10145.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpcc.5c01576

Colloidal 2D-Layered SiC Quantum Dots from a Liquid Precursor: Surface Passivation, Bright Photoluminescence, and Planar Self-Assembly, Salim A. Thomas, Naif S. Alharthi, Reed J. Petersen, Ahmed Aldrees, Sakurako Tani, Kenneth J. Anderson, Joseph Granlie, Todd A. Pringle, Yongki Choi, Dmitri Kilin, Erik K. Hobbie, ACS Nano 2024, 18, 39, 26848.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsnano.4c08052

Impurity Induced Confinement Effects in Size-Separated Mn-Doped CsPbCl3 Nanocrystals, Aaron A. Forde, Salim A. Thomas, Reed J. Petersen, Dmitri S. Kilin, and Erik K. Hobbie, Phys. Rev. Mater. 2024, 8, 066001.

https://journals.aps.org/prmaterials/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.8.066001

Silicon-Carbide Nanocrystals from Nonthermal Plasma: Surface Chemistry and Quantum Confinement, Reed J. Petersen, Salim A. Thomas, Kenneth J. Anderson, Todd A. Pringle, Sylvio May, and Erik K. Hobbie, J. Phys. Chem. C 2022, 126, 12935.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpcc.2c03948

Bright Silicon Nanocrystals from a Liquid Precursor: Quasi-Direct Recombination with High Quantum Yield, Todd A. Pringle, Katharine I. Hunter, Alexandra Brumberg, Kenneth J. Anderson, Jeffrey A. Fagan, Salim A. Thomas, Reed J. Petersen, Mahmud Sefannaser, Yulun Han, Samuel L. Brown, Dmitri S. Kilin, Richard D. Schaller, Uwe R. Kortshagen, Philip Raymond Boudjouk, and Erik K. Hobbie, ACS Nano 2020, 14, 3858.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsnano.9b09614

Brightly Luminescent CsPbBr3 Nanocrystals through Ultracentrifugation, Aaron A. Forde, Jeffrey A. Fagan, Richard D. Schaller, Salim A. Thomas, Samuel L. Brown, Matthew B. Kurtti, Reed J. Petersen, Dmitri S. Kilin, and Erik K. Hobbie J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 2020, 11, 7133.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpclett.0c01936