I graduated from U.C. Berkeley's Physics Department in 2005 after completing a dissertation in experimental astrophysics. After a brief postdoctoral period there I moved to U.C. San Diego to study isotope systematics in Mark Thiemen's Lab in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.  In the Fall of 2011, I joined the Physics Department at CSU San Marcos. 

I am interested in a wide variety of problems in environmental science, atmospheric chemistry, astrophysics, and planetary science and I approach these topics from both an experimental and theoretical perspective. 

Recent research topics include:

• Understanding the formation of the Solar System using oxygen isotopes
• Infrared spectroscopy and Imaging of natural materials with 10-20 nanometer lateral resolutions (Hayabusa and OSIRIS-REx)
• Micrometeorite Hypervelocity impacts into solids
• Origins of Water on the Moon
• Nanoplastics in the Environment
• Space Weathering and Isotope Exchange
• Mass-transport in silicate melts (Soret diffusion and isotopic fractionation)
• Understanding the formation of the Solar System using oxygen isotopes
• Infrared spectroscopy of materials with 10-20 nanometer lateral resolutions
• Transport of 35S from natural (cosmic-ray produced) and anthropogenic (Fukashima) sources in the atmosphere
• Oxygen isotopic composition of photochemical species in Earth's atmosphere
• Hypervelocity impacts into ultra-low density solids called aerogels (NASA Stardust Mission)

Visit the Dominguez Lab website for more information.

U.C. Berkeley, Physics, Ph.D., 2005

Thesis: Fluorescent Aerogels for the Capture and Identification of Hypervelocity Extraterrestrial Particles

U.C. Berkeley, Physics, M.A., 2001

U.C. Berkeley, Physics with Honors, B.A., 1998

Undergraduate Thesis: Use of Neural Networks for the Correction of Radiation Damage in Gamma-Ray Spectrometers

• Chair and Professor of Physics, Dept. of Physics, Cal State University San Marcos, July 2022-
• NASA OSIRIS-REx Mission Science Team, 2022-
• JAXA Hayabusa2 Preliminary Examination Team: Mineralogy and Petrology subteam
• Visiting Scholar, Center for Astrophysics and Space Science (CASS), at University of California San Diego, 2021-
• Interim Director of the National Latino Research Center (NLRC), at Cal State University San Marcos, 2020-2021
• Professor, Dept. of Physics, Cal State University San Marcos, Fall 2020-
• Associate Professor, Dept. of Physics, Cal State University San Marcos, Fall 2015-2020
• Assistant Professor, Dept. of Physics, Cal State University San Marcos, Fall 2011-2015
• Visiting Scholar, Dept. of Chemistry and Biochemistry, U.C. San Diego, Fall 2011-2013
• Associate Project Scientist, Dept. of Chemistry and Biochemistry, U.C. San Diego (2011)
• Postdoctoral Researcher, U.C. San Diego, Dept. of Chemistry and Biochemistry (2005-2010)
• NASA Stardust Preliminary Examination Team, Cratering Sub-team Member
• Postdoctoral Researcher, U.C. Berkeley, Space Sciences Laboratory (2005)
• Graduate Student Researcher, U.C. Berkeley (1998-2005)
• National Physical Science Consortium Fellow, Corning Inc. (Summers of 1999 and 2000)
• Graduate Student Instructor, U.C. Berkeley (Fall 1998, Spring 1999, Fall 2000)

Complete Vitae

Publications

(*=undergraduate student, **=graduate student)

T. Nakamura, … Gerardo Dominguez…(71 of 211 co-authors), Formation and evolution of carbonaceous asteroid Ryugu: Direct evidence from returned samples, Science, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abn8671 (2022).

 

Gerardo Dominguez, How Metallicity Affects Volatile Abundances: Implications for Planetary System Formation, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, , staa168, https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa168, March (2020).

 

C. Zhu, S. Gobi, M. J. Abplanalp, R. Frigge, J.J. Gillis-Davis, G. Dominguez, K. Miljkovic, R.I. Kaiser, “Regenerative water sources on surfaces of airless bodies”, Nature Astronomy, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-019-0900-2, (2019).

 

A. Westphal, J.C. Bridges, D.E. Brownlee, A. Butterworth, B.T. De Gregorio, G. Dominguez, G. Flynn, Z. Gainsforth, H.A. Ishii, D. Joswiak, L. Nittler, R.C. Ogliore, R. L. Palma, R.O. Pepin, T. Stephan, M.E. Zolensky, The Future of Stardust Science, Meteoritics and Planetary Science, 52, 1858-1898 (2017).

 

G. Dominguez, A.S. Mcleod, Z. Gainsforth, P. Kelly, H.A. Bechtel, F. Keilmann, A. Westphal, M. Thiemens, D.N. Basov, Nanoscale infrared spectroscopy as a non-destructive probe of extraterrestrial samples, Nature Communications, 5, 5445 (2014).

 

A. S. McLeod, P. Kelly,  M. D. Goldflam, Z. Gainsforth,  A. J. Westphal,  G. Dominguez, M. H. Thiemens, M. M. Fogler, D. N. Basov, Model for quantitative tip-enhanced spectroscopy and the extraction of nanoscale-resolved optical constants, Physical Review B, 90, 085136 (2014).

 

S. Dai, Z. Fei, Q. Ma,  A. S. Rodin, M. Wagner, A. S. McLeod, M. K. Liu, W.  Gannett,W. Regan, K. Watanabe, T. Taniguchi, M. Thiemens, G. Dominguez, A. H. Castro Neto, A. Zettl, F. Keilmann, P. Jarillo-Herrero, M. M. Fogler, D. N. Basov, Tunable Phonon Polaritons in Atomically Thin van der Waals Crystals of Boron Nitride, Science, 343, 1125-1129 (2014).

 

M. Wagner, Z. Fei, A.S. McLeod, A.S. Rodin, W. Bao, E.G. Iwinski, Z. Zhao, M. Goldflam, M. Liu, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, M.M. Fogler, A.H. Castro Neto, C. N. Lau, S. Amarie, F. Keilmann, and D.N. Basov, ,NanoLetters 14, 894-900 (2014).

 

Z.Fei, A. S. Rodin, W. Gannett, S. Dai, W. Reagan, M. Wagner, M. K. Liu, A. S. McLeod, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, Antonio H. Castro Neto, F. Keilmann, A. Zettl, R. Hillenbrand, M. M. Fogler, D. N. Basov, Electronic and plasmonic phenomena at graphene grain boundaries, Nature Nanotechnology, 8, 821-825 (2013)

 

C. Salvo*, J. Gormally* and G. Dominguez, Simultaneous Measurement of δ2H, δ17O, and δ18O in H2O using a Commercial Cavity Ringdown Spectrometer, Analytica Chimica Acta, 804, 176-179 (2013).

 

S. M. Jones, M. S. Anderson, G. Dominguez, A Tsapin, Thermal calibrations of hypervelocity capture in aerogel using magnetic iron oxide particles, Icarus, 226, pp. 1-9 (2013).

G. Dominguez, G. Wilkins, M.H. Thiemens, Dominguez et al. reply, Nature 482, E1(2012).              

L.M. Zhang, G. O. Andreev, Z. Fei, A. S. McLeod, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, A. H. Castro-Neto, D. N. Basov, M. M. Fogler, Near-field spectroscopy of silicon dioxide thin films, Phys. Rev. B., 85, 075419 (2012).  

M. Thiemens, S. Chakraborty, G. Dominguez, The Physical Chemistry of Mass Independent Isotope Effects and Their Observation in Nature, to appear in Annual Reviews of Physical Chemistry, (2012).

Z. Fei, G. O. Andreev, W. Bao, L. M. Zhang, A. S. McLeod, C. Wang, M. K. Stewart1, Z. Zhao, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, M. M. Fogler, M. Tauber, A. Castro-Neto, C. N. Lau, F. Keilmann, D. N. Basov, Infrared Nanoscopy of Dirac Plasmons at the Graphene-SiO2interface, NanoLetters, 11, 4701-4705 (2011).

A. Priyardashi, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, Evidence of neutron leakage at the Fukushima nuclear plant from measurements of radioactive 35S in California, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108, 1442, (2011).

A. Priyardashi, G. Dominguez, J. Savarino,  M. Thiemens, Cosmogenic 35S: A unique tracer to Antarctic atmospheric chemistry and the polar vortex, Geophysical Research Letters, 38, (2011).

G. Dominguez, G. Wilkins*, M. Thiemens, On the Soret Effect and Isotopic Fractionation in High-Temperature Silicate Melts, Nature, 473, 70-73, (2011).

R. Shaheen, A., Abramian*, J. Horn, G. Dominguez, R. Sullivan**, M. H. Thiemens, Detection of Oxygen Isotopic Anomaly in Terrestrial Atmospheric Carbonates and Its Implications to Mars, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107,20213-20218 (2010).

Winner of the 2010 Cozzarelli Prize

G. Dominguez, A Heterogeneous Chemical Origin for the 16O-enriched and 16O-depleted Reservoirs of the Early Solar System, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 713, L59-L63 (2010).

A. Ault**, C. Gaston**, Y. Wang*, G. Dominguez, M. Thiemens, K. Prather, Characterization of the Single Particle Mixing State of Individual Ship Plume Events measured in the Port of Los Angeles and Long Beach.  Environmental Science and Technology, 44, 1954-1961 (2010). 

L. Brothers**, G. Dominguez, A. Abramian*, A. Corbin*, B. Bluen*, and M. Thiemens, Optimized Low-Level Liquid Scintillation Spectroscopy of 35S for Atmospheric and Biogeochemical Applications, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107, 5311-5316 (2010).

G. Dominguez, Time Evolution and Temperatures of Hypervelocity Generated Tracks in Aerogel, Meteoritics and Planetary Science, 44, 1431 (2009).

G. Dominguez, G. Wilkins*, M. Thiemens, A Photochemical Model and Sensitivity Study of the Triple-Oxygen Isotopic Composition of NOy, HOx, and H2O2 in a Polluted Boundary Layer, Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions, 9, 13355-13406, (2009).

Fabian, P., Rollenbeck, R., Spichtinger, N., Brothers**, L., Dominguez, G., and Thiemens, M.: Sahara dust, ocean spray, volcanoes, biomass burning: pathways of nutrients into Andean rainforests, Advances in Geosciences, 22, 85-94, (2009).

G. Dominguez, T. Jackson, L. Brothers**, B. Nguyen*, B. Barnett*, M. Thiemens, Discovery and measurement of an isotopically distinct source of sulfate in Earth¿s atmosphere, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 105, 12769 (2008).

J. M. Trigo-Rodríguez, G. Domínguez, M. J. Burchell, F. Hörz, J. Llorca, Bulbous Tracks Arising From Hypervelocity Capture In Aerogel, Meteoritics and Planetary Science, 42, 75 (2008).

M.J. Burchell, S.A.J. Fairey, P. Wozniakiewicz, D.E. Brownlee, F. Hörz, A.T. Kearsley, T.H. See, P Tsou, A. Westphal, S.F. Green S.F., J.M. Trigo-Rodríguez, G. Dominguez, Characteristics of cometary dust tracks in Stardust aerogel and laboratory calibrations, Meteoritics and Planetary Science, 42, 23 (2008).

D. Brownlee, P. Tsou, J. Aleon, G. Dominguez (33rd author, alphabetical) et al. , Comet 81P/Wild 2 Under a Microscope, Science 314, 1711 (2006).

F. Hörz, R. Bastien, J. Borg, G. Dominguez (8th author, alphabetical) et al.,  Impact Features on the Stardust Collector and implications for Wild 2 Coma Dust, Science, 314, 1716, (2006).

S. Brennan, K. Luening, P. Pianetta, J. Bradley, G. Graham, A. Westphal, C. Snead, G. Dominguez, Near Edge Absorption Spectroscopy of Interplanetary Dust Particles, Phys. Scripta, 2005, T115 (2005).

G. Dominguez, A.J. Westphal, M.L.F Phillips, S.M. Jones, G.A. Graham, A.T. Kearsley & G. Drolshagen, Passive Detector Technology for the Capture of Micrometeroids and Orbital Debris: Calorimetric Aerogels, Proceedings of the 4th European Conference on Orbital Debris., ESA/ESOC Darmstadt Germany, 18-20th of April, (2005).

G. Dominguez, A.J. Westphal, S.M. Jones, M. L. F. Phillips, Energy Loss and Impact Cratering in Aerogels: Theory and Experiment.Icarus, v. 172, pgs. 613-624. (2004).

G.A. Graham, P.G. Grant, R.J. Chater, A.J. Westphal, A.T. Kearsley, C. Snead, G. Domínguez, A.L. Butterworth, D.S. McPhail, G. Bench, J.P. Bradley, Investigation of ion beam techniques for the analysis and exposure of particles encapsulated by silica aerogel: Applicability for Stardust. Meteoritics and Planetary Science 39, 1461-1474 (2004).

G. Domínguez, A.J. Westphal, S.M. Jones, M.L.F. Phillips, Fluorescent Impact Cavities in a Titatium Doped Al2O3-SiO2 Aerogel:  Implications for the Velocity Resolution of Calorimetric Aerogels.  Journal of Non-Crystalline Solids, v. 350C pp 385-390.  (2004).

G. Domínguez, A.J. Westphal , M.L.F. Phillips, S.M. Jones,  A Fluorescent Aerogel for Capture and Identification of Extraterrestrial Dust, The Astrophysical Journal, v. 592, pgs. 631-635 (2003).