Meni Wanunu
Affiliated Faculty, Bioengineering
Associate Professor, Physics
Contact
- m.wanunu@northeastern.edu
- 202 Dana Research Center
360 Huntington Avenue
Boston, Massachusetts 02115
Office
- 617.373.7412
Research Focus
development of next-generation DNA and RNA sequencing methods; nanopores as molecular sensors; bioinspired sustainability solutions; optical and electrical analysis of biomolecular systems; electron microscopy and electron-beam shaping of nanomaterials
Research Overview
development of next-generation DNA and RNA sequencing methods; nanopores as molecular sensors; bioinspired sustainability solutions; optical and electrical analysis of biomolecular systems; electron microscopy and electron-beam shaping of nanomaterials
Selected Research Projects
- Direct Picogram DNA and RNA Sequencing Using Nanopore Zero-Mode
- – Principal Investigator, National Institutes of Health
- Engineering Tunable Portal Hybrid Nanopores for High- Resolution Sequence Mapping
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Nanopores in 2D Materials
- – Principal Investigator, Oxford Nanopore Technology
- Recognition Tunneling for Single Molecule RNA Sequencing
- – Co-Principal Investigator, National Institutes of Health
- Two-Dimensional Nanopores with Electro-Optical Control for Next Generation Biotechnological Applications
- – Co-Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Understanding Transport in Biomimetic Carbon Nanotube Porin Membranes for Water Treatment and Osmotic Energy Harvesting
- – Co-Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
Selected Publications
- P. Tripathi, L. Shuai, H. Joshi, H. Yamazaki, W.H. Fowle, A. Aksimentiev, H. Fenniri H, M. Wanunu, Rosette Nanotube Porins as Ion Selective Transporters and Single-Molecule Sensors, Journal of the American Chemical Society, 142, 2020, 1680-1685
- X. Kang, M.A. Alibakhshi, M. Wanunu, One-Pot Species Release and Nanopore Detection in a Voltage-Stable Lipid Bilayer Platform, Nano Letters 19, 2019, 9145-9153
- M. Mojtabavi, A. VahidMohammadi, W. Liang, M. Beidaghi M. Wanunu, Single-Molecule Sensing Using Nanopores in Two- Dimensional Transition Metal Carbide (MXene) Membranes, ACS Nano, 13, 2019, 3042-3053

Apr 24, 2023
Rouhanifard Receives $3.4M NIH Grant to Discover RNA Modification Sites Using Pseudouridine Modified mRNA
BioE Assistant Professor Sara Rouhanifard was awarded a $3.4 million NIH R01 grant for “Synthetic mRNA Control Set for Nanopore-Based Pseudouridine Modification Profiling in Human Transcriptomes.” The research has the potential to vastly increase insight into the epitranscriptome—changes in chemical modifications of RNA that can affect gene expression within cells—which could help identify new therapeutic targets and lead to new classes of drugs.
Nov 02, 2022
2022 Stanford University Annual Assessment of Author Citations
The following COE professors are among the top scientists worldwide selected by Stanford University representing the top 2 percent of the most-cited scientists with single-year impact in various disciplines. The selection is based on the top 100,000 by c-score (with and without self-citations) or a percentile rank of 2% or above. The list below includes […]

Jan 28, 2022
Measuring Viral Concentrations and Infectivity
BioE Assistant Professor Sara Rouhanifard and Affiliated Faculty Meni Wanunu were awarded a $250K PFI-TT NSF grant for “Developing an integrated platform for high accuracy measurements of viral particle count and infectious titer.”
Apr 09, 2019
FY20 TIER 1 Award Recipients
25 COE faculty and affiliates were recipients of FY20 TIER 1 Interdisciplinary Research Seed Grants for 18 different projects representing up to $900K dollars of investment in research.

Aug 21, 2018
$1M NSF Grant to Advance the Study of Single-Molecule Research
BioE Professor Jeffrey Ruberti (co-PI) along with bioengineering affiliated and College of Science faculty, including Professor Mark Williams (PI), and Associate Professors Penny Beuning (co-PI), Meni Wanunu (co-PI), and Ke Zhang (co-PI) were awarded a $1M NSF grant for the “Acquisition of a Lumick’s SuperC-TRAP correlative optical tweezers and fluorescence microscope (CTFM) system.”
Mar 19, 2015
FY16 TIER 1 Award Recipients
18 COE faculty and affiliates were recipients of FY16 TIER 1 Interdisciplinary Research Seed Grants for 11 different projects representing over $400K dollars of investment in research.
Apr 04, 2012
FY13 TIER 1 Award Recipients
27 COE faculty and affiliates were recipients of FY13 TIER 1 Interdisciplinary Research Seed Grants for 21 different research projects.