UCLA Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry : UCLA Portal

Website:

Alex Levine's Home Page.

Email Address:

alevine@chem.ucla.edu

Office Address:

Student Office
Young Hall 3086

Work Address:

Young Hall 3044A

Fax Number:

1 (310) 206-4038

Work Phone Number:

1 (310) 794-4436

Associate Professor
Chemistry and Biochemistry, Physical Chemistry

Member
California NanoSystems Institute

A Short Biography:

Professor Levine received his B.S. in Mathematics and Physics at UCLA and received his Ph.D. at UCLA in 1996. He was a postdoctoral researcher at Exxon Research & Engineering Co. from 1996 to 1998. He then was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania from 1998 to 2001. After a year as a postdoc at UCSB, he joined the faculty of the Department of Physics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. In 2005 he joined the faculty of the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry at UCLA.

Awards and Honors:

AT&T Graduate Fellowship ; Phi Beta Kappa Phi Beta Kappa Scholarship ; Julian Schwinger Graduate Fellowship ; Election to Mathematics Honors Society ; Election to Phi Beta Kappa ; Sigma Pi Sigma Joined Physics Honor Society Sigma Pi Sigma ; University of California Four Year Regents Scholarship ; Freshman Honors Society ; Golden Key Honors Society ; American Physical Society Materials Research Society Society of Rheology

Research Interest:

The Levine group does theoretical research on the elasticity and dynamics of biomaterials focusing on the mechanical properties of the semiflexible biopolymer networks such as those found in the cytoskeleton and on the mechanics/dynamics of viscous and viscoelastic membranes. To better understand the mechanical properties of the cytoskeleton and other semiflexible polymer networks, they are working to develop an extension of the theory of rubber elasticity that takes into account elastic energy stored in filament bending as well as filament stretching. Additionally, they are exploring the statistical mechanics of non-equilibrium networks in which the filaments are stochastically tensed by molecular motors. This motor activity has been show to play a large role in the determining the elastic moduli of the F-actin networks. The Levine group has also been exploring the effect of curvature and topology on hydrodynamics in membranes. This work is currently being augmented by more detailed studies of the mobility of transmembrane proteins.

Image: schematic of affine vs. nonaffine deformation. In the case of affine deformation, each sub-volume shown in green and grey deforms in the same way as the entire material (light blue) under a uniformly imposed shear (green arrows).

Detailed Biography:

Alex Levine has been a faculty member at UCLA since July of 2005. Before that he was an assistant professor of Physics at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. He has done postdoctoral work at Exxon Research & Engineering Co., UPENN, and UCSB. He received his Ph.D. from UCLA in 1996 where he did research on the non-equilibrium statistical mechanics of sedimenting suspensions and on the fractional quantum hall effect. In addition, he worked with Sue Coppersmith at AT&T Bell Labs on the dynamics of driven charge density waves. He is currently a member of the California Nanosystems Institute and the UCLA representative on the Science Steering Committee of the Institute for Complex Adaptive Matter. He is the co-organizer of the Frontiers in Microrheology Workshop to be held at UCLA in February 2008. He currently works on a variety of problems at the interface of soft condensed matter physics and biophysics.

Publications:

Mark L. Henle and Alex J. Levine Effective Viscosity of a Dilute Suspension of Membrane-bound Inclusions, Physics of Fluids, 2009; 21: 033106.

Moumita Das and Alex J. Levine The effect of network architecture on the mechanics of disordered biopolymer, Physical Review E., 2009; To be submitted: .

Moumita Das, Don Blair, and Alex J. Levine The effect of topological defects on sublimation kinetics in, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009; To be submitted: .

Mark L. Henle and Alex J. Levine The mobility of point and extended particles on spherical viscous interfaces, Physical Review E, 2009; To be submitted: .

Jeremy D. Schmit and Alex J. Levine The role of solitonic excitations in intermolecular adhesion in undoped, Physical Review E, 2009; Submitted: .

Moumita Das, Alex J. Levine, and F.C. MacKintosh Buckling and force propagation along intracellular, Europhysics Letters, 2008; 84: 18003.

Robert Brewster and Alex J. Levine Effects of Cohesion on the Surface Angle and Velocity Profiles of Sand, Physical Review E, 2008; Accepted: .

YongKeun Park, Catherine Best-Popescu, Kamran Badizadegan, Ramachandra R. Dasari, Michael S. Feld, Tatiana Kuriabova, Mark L. Henle, Alex J. Levine, and Gabriel Popescu Measurement of red blood cel l mechanics during morphological changes, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2008; Submitted: .

Tatiana Kuribova and Alex J. Levine Nanorheology of viscoelastic shells: Applications to viral capsids,, Physical Review E, 2008; 77: 031921.

F. C. MacKintosh and Alex J. Levine Non-equilibrium mechanics and dynamics of motor-activated gels, Physical Review Letters, 2008; 100: 018104.

Robert Brewster, Leonardo Silbert, Gary S. Grest, and Alex J. Levine Relationship between interparticle contact lifetimes and rheology in gravity-driven granular ﬂows, Physical Review E, 2008; 77: 061302.

Robert Walder, Alex J. Levine, and Michael Dennin Rheology of two-dimensional F-actin networks associated with a lipid interface, Physical Review E, 2008; 77: 011909.

David Schwab, Robijn F. Bruinsma, and Alex J. Levine Rhythmogenic Neuronal Networks and k-Core Percolation, Physical Review Letters, 2009; Submitted: .

Jeremy D. Schmit and Alex J. Levine Statistical model for intermolecular adhesion in pi-conjugated systems, Physical Review Letters, 2008; 100: 198303.

Mark L. Henle, Ryan McGorty, A.D. Dinsmore, and Alex J. Levine The effect of curvature and topology on membrane hydrodynamics, Europhysics Letters, 2008; 84: 48001.

Biswaroop Mukherjee and Alex J. Levine The effect of colored noise on stochastic resonance, American Journal of Physics, 2008; .

Alex J. Levine and F.C. MacKintosh The mechanics and ﬂuctuation spectrum of active gels, J. Phys. Chem., 2008; Accepted(De Gennes Memorial Issue): .

Alex J. Levine and F.C. MacKintosh The mechanics and ﬂuctuation spectrum of active gels, , 2008; Accepted: .

Mark L. Henle and Alex J. Levine Capillary wave dynamics on supported viscoelastic films: Single and double layers, Physical Review E, 2007; 75: 021604.

Mark L. Henle and Alex J. Levine Capillary wave dynamics on supported viscoelastic films: Single and double layers, Physical Review E, 2007; 75: .

Ali Naji, Alex J. Levine, and P.A. Pincus Corrections to the Saffman-Delbruck mobility for membrane bound proteins, Biophysical Journal: Biophysical Letters, 2007; 93: L49-L51.

Moumita Das, F.C. MacKintosh, and Alex J. Levine Effective medium theory of semiflexible filamentous networks, Physical Review Letters, 2007; (99): 038101.

M.L. Henle and Alex J. Levine Erratum: Capillary wave dynamics on supported viscoelastic films: Single and double layers, Physical Review E, 2007; 75: 059909(E).

B.A. DiDonna and Alex J. Levine Filamin cross-linkers as rheology regulators in F-actin networks, Physical Review E, 2007; 75: 041909.

Robert Brewster, Leonardo Silbert, Gary S. Grest, and Alex J. Levine Relationship between two-particle contact lifetimes and rheology in gravity driven granular flows, Physical Review E, 2007; Submitted: .

L.E. Silbert, G.S. Grest, R. Brewster, and A.J. Levine Rheology and Contact Lifetimes in Dense Granular Flows, Physical Review Letters, 2007; (99): 068002.

M. Atakhorrami, J.I. Sulkowska, K.M. Addas, G.H. Koenderink, J.X. Tang, A.J. Levine, F.C. MacKintosh, and C.F. Schmidt Correlated ﬂuctuations of microparticles in viscoelastic solutions: Quantitative measurement of material properties by microrheology in the presence of optical traps, Physical Review E, 2006; 73(061501): .

B.A. DiDonna and Alex J. Levine Filamin cross-linked semiflexible networks: Fragility under strain, Physical Review Letters, 2006; (97): 068104.

J.R. Savage, D. Blair, A.J. Levine, R.A. Guyer, and A.D. Dinsmore Imaging the Sublimation Dynamics of Colloidal Crystallites , Science, 2006; 314(5800): 795-798.

Buddhapriya Chakrabarti and Alex J. Levine The nonlinear elasticity of an alpha-helical polypeptide: Monte Carlo studies, Physical Review, 2006; (E 74): 031903.

Jeremy D. Schmit and Alex J. Levine Intermolecular adhesion in conducting polymers, Physical Review E 71, 2005; (051802): .

David A. Head, Alex J. Levine, and F.C. MacKintosh Short-range deformation of semiflexible networks: deviations from continuum elasticity., Physical Review E 72, 2005; (061914): .

R. Brewster, J. Landry, G.S. Grest, and A.J. Levine Breakdown of Bagnold scaling in cohesive granular flows, Physical Review E 72, 2005; (061301): .

David A. Head, Alex J. Levine, and F.C. MacKintosh Mechanical response of semiﬂexible networks to , Physical Review E, 2005; 72(061914): .

Alex J. Levine, T.B. Liverpool, and F.C. MacKintosh Dynamics of extended bodies in viscous films and membranes, Physical Review Letters, 2004; 93(038102): .

Alex J. Levine, David A. Head, and F.C. MacKintosh The Deformation Field in Semiflexible Networks, Journal of Physics, Condensed Matter, 2004; 16(S2079): .

Alex J. Levine, David A. Head, and F.C. MacKintosh The elasticity of semiflexible networks, Proceedings of the XIVth Congress on Rheology. ed. The Korean Society of Rheology, 2004; .

Alex J. Levine, T.B. Liverpool, and F.C. MacKintosh The mobility of extended bodies in viscous films and membranes, Physical Review E, 2004; 69(021503): .

Buddhapriya Chakrabarti and Alex J. Levine The nonlinear elasticity of an alpha-helical polypeptide, Physical Review E 71, 2004; (031905): .

David A. Head, Alex J. Levine, and F.C. MacKintosh Deformation of cross-linked semiflexible polymer networks, Physical Review Letters, 2003; 91(108102): .

David A. Head, Alex J. Levine, and F.C. MacKintosh Distinct regimes of elastic response and deformation modes of cross-linked cytoskeletal and semiflexible polymer networks, Physical Review , 2003; E 68(061907): .

David A. Head, F.C. MacKintosh, and Alex J. Levine Non-universality of elastic exponents in random bond-bending networks., Physical Review , 2003; E 68(025101): .

D.T. Chen, E.R. Weeks, J.C. Crocker, M.F. Islam, R. Verma, J. Gruber, A.J. Levine, T.C. Lubensky, and A.G. Yodh Rheological Microscopy:Local Mechanical Properties from Microrheology, Physical Review Letters, 2003; 90(108301): .

Victor Breedveld and Alex J. Levine Shear induced diffusion in dilute suspensions of charged colloids, Soft Materials, 2003; 1: 235-244.

Alex J. Levine and F.C. MacKintosh Dynamics of viscoelastic membranes, Physical Review, 2002; E 66(061606): .

K.M. Addas, J.X. Tang, A.J. Levine, and C.F. Schmidt Extracting local and bulk viscoelasticity of entangled FD virus solutions by two-bead microrheology, Biophysical Journal, 2002; 82(1): 2432.

Karim M. Addas, Alex J. Levine, Jay X. Tang, and Christoph F. Schmidt One- and Two-Particle Microrheology in Entangled Solutions of fd Virus, Physical Characterization of Biological Materials and Systems Symposium. Boston, MA USA 26 Nov. - 30 Nov. 2001. Warrendale, PA, USA Materials Research Society, 2002; .

Deniz Ertas, Thomas C. Halsey, Alex J. Levine, and Thomas G. Mason Stability of monomer-dimer piles, Physical Review, 2002; E 66(051307): .

R. Bruinsma, F. Rondelez, and A. Levine Flow-Control led Island Growth in Langmuir Monolayers, European Physics Journal E, 2001; 6: 191.

Alex J. Levine and T.C. Lubensky The response function of a sphere in a viscoelastic two–ﬂuid medium, Physical Review E, 2001; 63: 041510-1.

Alex J. Levine and T.C. Lubensky Two–point microrheology and the electrostatic analogy, Physical Review E, 2001; 65: 011501.

Randall D. Kamien and Alex J. Levine Boundary Effects in Chiral Polymer Hexatics, Physical Review Letters, 2000; 84: 3109.

Alex J. Levine and T.C. Lubensky One- and two–particle microrheology, Physical Review Letters, 2000; 85: 1774.

A. Levine, S. Ramaswamy, E. Frey, and R. Bruinsma; Eds. Moti Lal, R.A. Mashelkar, B.D. Kulkarni, V.M. Naik Hydrodynamic Screening in Stokesian Fluidized Beds, Structure and Dynamics of Materials in the Mesoscopic Domain, 1999; 195-206.

Amy B. Herhold, Deniz Erta¸s, Alex J. Levine, and Hubert E. King Jr. Impurity induced slowing of nucleation in emulsiﬁed liquids, Dynamics in Small Conﬁning Systems IV Symposium, Boston, MA USA 30 Nov. – 3 Dec. 1998, 1999; 85-96.

Amy B. Herhold, Deniz Erta¸s, Alex J. Levine, and Hubert E. King Jr. Impurity mediated nucleation in hexadecane-in-water emulsions, Physical Review E, 1999; 59: 6946.

T. G. Mason, A. J. Levine, D. Ertas, and T. C. Halsey The Critical Angle of Wet Sand Piles, Physical Review E, 1999; 60: R5044.

Martin-D. Lacasse, Gary S. Grest, and Alex J. Levine Capillary-wave and chain-length eﬀects at poly- mer/polymer interfaces, Physical Review Letters, 1998; 80: 309.

Alex J. Levine and Thomas C. Halsey How Sandcastles Fall, Physical Review Letters, 1998; 80: 3141.

Alex J. Levine and Scott T. Milner Star Polymers and the Failure of Time-Temperature Superposition , Macromolecules, Macromolecules, 1998; 31(24): 8623-8637.

S. N. Coppersmith, T. C. Jones, L. P. Kadanoﬀ, A. Levine, J. P. McCarten, S. R. Nagel, S. C. Venkataramani, and Xinlei Wu Self-Organized Short-Term Memories, Physical Review Letters, 1997; 78: 3983.

Shechao Feng, Alex Levine, and Lan Yin; ed D. C Glattli, M. Sanquer, and J. Tran Thanh Van Suppression of the Josephson Effect and Little-Parks Oscil lations in the Quantum Hal l Eﬀect, Coulomb and Interference Effects in Small Electronic Structures, 1994; (Editions Frontieres): .

Shechao Feng, Alex Levine, and Lan Yin Suppression of the Josephson Effect by Quantum Fluctuations in the Fractional Quantum Hal l State, Physical Review B, 1994; 50: 11045.

Alex Levine, Ph.D.