Manos Gkikas received his MSc and PhD in Chemistry from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece in 2013, where he focused on polymer science and organic chemistry. After working as a postdoctoral scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Chemical Engineering, he joined UMass Lowell, Department of Chemistry, in 2016 as an Assistant Professor. His research interests include ligand-specific X-ray nano-contrast agents for cancer/arthritis/lung inflammation diagnostics, hemostatic nanomaterials, Alzheimer's disease drug delivery formulations, water vapor barrier coatings for flexible films/electronics, cationic polymerization-derived poly(olefins), and functional butyl rubber materials. He has strong collaborations with UMass Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Texas A&M, and the Biomedical Imaging Center at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and is a member of the UML Center for Pathogen Research and Training (CPRT), the UMass NeuroNexus Initiative, and the UMass Center for Clinical and Translational Science.