Fontecchio is an expert in electro-optics, liquid crystals, polymer dispersed liquid crystals, holography, remote sensing, color filtration, wearable technology and electrically switchable Bragg gratings. He is the director of the Drexel Nanophotonics Lab and founding director of the Center for the Advancement of STEM Teaching and Learning Excellence (CASTLE), where he leads trans-disciplinary research on STEM pedagogy.
His research involves fundamental investigations of liquid crystal interactions to develop novel devices. He has also investigated the materials development of polymer/liquid crystal systems for optimization of electro-optical characteristics. Fontecchio's background is in physics, holding bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees from Brown University. He was a NASA Graduate Student Research Fellow at Goddard Space Flight Center where he investigated Holographically-formed Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystal technology for space borne remote sensing applications. He traveled to Tokyo, Japan in the summer of 2000 as part of the National Science Foundation Summer Institute, where he studied polymer-stabilized liquid crystal devices at the NTT Cyberspace Laboratories. He has also served as a Visiting Lecturer in Physics at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth campus.
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