Maker Spotlight: Jendai Robinson

Name: Jendai Robinson
Home: Mountain View, California
Makerspace: University of Cincinnati and NASA Ames Research Center
Day Job: Ph.D. Candidate and NASA Harriet G. Jenkins Fellow

Chemistry : Sensors : Biohacking

For many makers, working at NASA would be a dream come true. Jendai Robinson is actually living that dream, working as a maker, chemist, and researcher at the NASA Ames Research Center. With a background in chemistry and mathematics, Jendai now creates novel sensors that can be used to sense heavy metals such as lead and mercury, as well as neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin.

While Jendai’s current work would be interesting enough on its own, it’s Jendai’s journey through her school years that makes her a truly remarkable maker. She shared this story recently with a STEM Stars Summer Camp group:

During my freshman year of high school I was not a very good student because I did not go to class. I wanted to hang out with the “cool kids” so I cut class. After seeing the road that I was heading down, I saw that it was not going to help my situation any (growing up in an unsafe neighborhood with an overprotective and strict mother). So I found that academics and sports were going to be my way out.

I began to sign up for every activity imaginable so that I did not have to go home, and even applied and got accepted to a gifted and talented program at my school. Not only did I excel in academics but I also excelled in athletics.

I went on to college as a chemistry major with a biochemistry track in mind and initially wanted to go to medical school, but after my first internship at Virginia Commonwealth University I changed my mind to chemistry with a mathematics minor and wanted to go to graduate school. I did a second internship at the University of Cincinnati, and a third at Western Washington University, which eventually led me to internships at NASA Ames Research Center and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

Jendai shows off a radio frequency amplifier board that she put together, she explains, “for a miniaturized laser heterodyne radiometer (mini-LHR). Laser heterodyne radiometry is a technique used to amplify weak signals produced from a radio antenna by mixing them with a strong local oscillator. You can then use a different form of this technique to measure the concentration of trace gases in the atmosphere by measuring their absorption of sunlight in the infrared range.”

These are scanning electron micrographs of vertically aligned carbon nanofiber electrode arrays (high-density on the left and low-density on the right). These fibers are able to conduct electricity and can be used for sensing applications (environmental, biological, etc.) when paired with a potentiostat (an instrument that controls the voltage difference between a working and reference electrode).

You can find Jendai on
NASA | LinkedIn | The Sagle Group

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