Craig Szymanski Email & Phone Number

Sterling, Virginia, United States

Back at Thorlabs! Always liked it here. Working in a pretty similar capacity as before with a greater emphasis on improving documentation.

Chicago, Illinois, United States

Served as day to day technical lead for all Nikon Instruments operations in the Chicago metro area and northern IllinoisProspected existing customers for new systems and upgrades as well as networking to find new customers at existing accounts.Coordinated sales discussions, qualifications calls, and demo with Chicago account sales managers.Improved support in Chicago area to turn previously neglected or frustrated customers into enthusiastic reference labs.Led all training, support, and most demos for 5 major university accounts and a number of smaller colleges, biotechs, and other labs.

Sterling, Va

Acted as resident global applications scientist in the main office for all production ready wide-field, confocal, 2-photon, and 3-photon microscope products for Thorlabs Imaging Systems.Managed demonstration facility in Virginia with up to seven live microscopes at a time for prospective customer visits, imaging of received samples, and support of technical support capabilities. Created technical support knowledge base for microscopy products at Thorlabs to assist with troubleshooting, employee training, and support.Frequently worked with production, software, engineering, and other groups in Virginia and other Thorlabs business units to solve difficult customer issues and create better systems to prevent issues in the future. Provided on-site and remote training and support for customers across the United States and around the world.Provided on-site support and training, an average of once per month for up to two weeks at a time, traveling extensively in the US and as far away as Taiwan and Australia.Designed new protocols, wiring diagrams, and optical trains as needed as customer needs change and update.Integrated Arduino units into microscope setups for controlling triggering in complex custom orders.Responded to customer requests for support for half of all advanced technical questions and experimental requirements for the Thorlabs Imaging Systems division.Designed new ratiometric imaging technique using existing hardware, meeting requirements for customer purchase.Coordinated and executed setup of, training on, and tear down of fully operational multiphoton microscope systems at multiweek teaching courses at leading US research institutions up to three times per year.

Richland, Wa

Developed new protocols for x-ray imaging of mammalian cells and correlation with super-resolution fluorescence microscopy.Served as chief synchrotron experimenter traveling to two national synchrotron facilities with over 100 shifts with scanning transmission x-ray microscopes (STXM) alone.Coordinated with numerous visiting users, postdocs, and scientists to help design fluorescence and x-ray experiments around their research needs.Programmed custom user interface for analysis of x-ray imaging data in Matlab.Created high throughput methods of oxidation state analysis of metal oxide nanoparticles during endocytosis using x-ray microscopy.Invented an in situ electrochemical STXM holder taking it from concept to working prototype in less than three weeks.Developed methods for correlation of fluorescence and STXM data to determine colocalization of lysosomes with untagged metal oxide nanoparticles.Programmed mathematical models for analysis of STXM data to determine oxidation states in battery materials.Developed correlative techniques for super-resolution structured illumination fluorescence microscopy (SIM) with time of flight – secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS).Coordinated with seven other lab scientists with their STXM research projects by consultation and travel to Advanced Light Source and Canadian Light Source to operate and train them on x-ray microscopes and other x-ray techniques.

Atlanta, Ga

Created an automated set of functions for analysis of 2D single particle tracking trajectories for determining particle mobility, efficiency, trajectory length, and other characteristics for use by non-proficient Matlab users.Published a new method of differentiating vesicles in live cells by their instantaneous velocity histograms and movement efficiency.Published improved protocols for imaging quantum dots in live cells in fluorescence microscopy and transmission electron microscopy.Developed an improved method for measuring particle internalization using fluorescence quenching and flow cytometry.Modified design and programming of existing custom built microscope to enable three- color fluorescence imaging of live cells.Performed and optimized one- and two-photon total internal reflection microscopy.Created a program for overlapping images from multiple fluorescence channels using an improved algorithm.

Clemson, Sc

Designed and built a confocal and wide field single molecule fluorescence microscope. Developed control and interface software for both scanning and kinetic confocal fluorescence studies. Acquired single- and multi-photon single molecule imaging including particle tracking and intracellular fluorescence correlation spectroscopy.Developed simulations of exciton diffusion and energy transfer within nanoparticles. Performed data analysis including convolutions, fluorescence correlation analysis, change point detection algorithms, single value decomposition, and regression analysis of exponential and non-exponential kinetics schemes.Incorporated multiple models of CCD and APD detectors with instrument control computers for kinetics, spectroscopy, widefield, and hyperspectral imaging. Developed and characterized photophysics of conjugated polymer nanoparticles.

Phd, Chemistry

Research focused on single particle imaging and photophysics of conjugated polymer nanoparticles.

Bs, Chemical Engineering And Chemistry, Double Major

Activities and Societies: Active in Iota chapter of Alpha Chi Sigma professional chemistry fraternity.