Dr. Natalia Farkas is an associate researcher in the Microsystems and Nanotechnology Division of the Physical Measurement Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). She received a M.S. in Physics and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Akron. Her doctoral research, for which she received the AVS Nellie Yeoh Whetten Award in 2005, concerned the development of novel materials and methods for lithographic patterning of nanometer-scale structures. Her work at NIST has focused on pre-clinical dimensional and analytical chemical characterization of self-assembled nanoparticle delivery systems having encapsulated gene therapy and magnetic resonance imaging contrast agents, and, most recently, on the development of validated multi-technique measurement methods for the standardization of nanoparticle reference materials.