Faculty and Staff Directory
Dallas K. Bates
Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Improving and developing new methods for heterocycle synthesis
- Creating novel applications for sulfoxides and other reactive sulfur species
Lanrong Bi
Associate Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Chemical biology: development of novel molecular probes for DNA sequencing analysis and disease gene discovery
- Medicinal chemistry: development of new imaging and therapeutic agents towards cancer and cardiovascular disease; Design and synthesis of novel prodrugs of peptides and peptide mimetics.
Lois A. Blau
Chemistry Learning Center Director
Undergraduate Advisor, First-Year Students
Special Advisor for Undergraduate Research/Cooperative Education
Richard E. Brown
Professor Emeritus, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Applied quantum chemistry, Computational chemistry
- Gas phase acidities of carbon acids
- Structure and stability of gas phase complexes
- The Transition State Structure and Stable Conformations of the Myo-Inositol Phosphates
- The mechanisms for biological activity of Old Yellow Enzyme (OYE) and D-Amino Acid Oxidase (DAAO)
- Mechanisms of organic reactions
Paul Charlesworth
Associate Professor, Chemistry
Undergraduate Advisor, Second-Year Students
Adjunct Associate Professor, Cognitive and Learning Sciences
Research Interests
- Chemical education
- Technology-supported learning
- Online and Blended Classrooms
- Flipped Classrooms
- Spatial Ability
Bahne C. Cornilsen
Professor, Chemistry
Special Advisor for Double-Major Students, Minor Students, and Other Cases
Research Interests
- The nickel electrode used in Ni-hydrogen and Ni-Cd batteries (the active cathode material is actually a nickel hydroxide or oxyhydroxide)
- Prediction of vibrational spectra
- Influence of point defects on vibrational spectra
- Vibrational spectra of minerals
Tarun K. Dam
Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Molecular basis of glycan (carbohydrate)-mediated biological functions
- Glycan binding proteins or lectins
- Glycan detection
- Mechanistic glycobiology
- Macromolecular communication
- Biomolecular thermodynamics
Shiyue Fang
Associate Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Organic synthesis, including the synthesis of natural and unnatural useful molecules and the development of synthetic methodologies.
Sarah A. Green
Professor, Chemistry
Research Interests
- Origin and fate of DOC in terrestrial, lake, and marine environments
- Methods for detection of free radicals, photochemical transformations of natural and anthropogenic organic compounds in the environment
- Oxidative degradation reactions
- Response of aquatic systems to climate change
- Effects of electrostatic charge and ionic strength on fast reaction kinetics
- Behavior of metal-contaminated sediments in the Lake Superior basin
- Fluorescence-based analytical methods
Research Interests
- Synthesizing, processing, and characterizing polymers and composites or nanoparticles
- Stimulus-response nanoparticles for drug delivery
- Electrospinning of nanofibers for tissue scaffolds
- Structured nanoparticles for low-leaching wood preservation
- Biocomposites and biofibers
- Studies of controlled nanoscale interfaces of rice-hull reinforced composites
- Engineered wood- or biopolymer-reinforced composites having improved processing, longevity, moisture resistance, and mechanical properties
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Synthesis, characterization, and biomedical and sensing applications of water-soluble conjugated glycopolymers, glycodendrimers, glyconanopaticles, conjugated polyelectrolytes, small redox-active carbohydrate conjugates, and functional carbon nanotube arrays
Marshall W. Logue
Professor Emeritus, Chemistry
Research Interests
- Application of organic synthesis to carbohydrates, C-nucleosides, and nucleotide analogues
- Reactions of carbohydrate cyclic ortho esters with organosilicon reagents
- Developing short and high-yield syntheses for glycosyl alkynyl ketones
- Synthesis of nucleotide analogues, including acyclic C- nucleotide analogues, that have phosphate group masked as phosphate esters
Rudy Luck
Associate Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Low-valent molybdenum complexes capable of activating dinitrogen
- Synthesis and characterization of heteronuclear quadruply bonded metal-metal complexes
- Molecular dihydrogen compounds
- Catalytic applications of metal-oxo/peroxo systems in the area of epoxidation of olefins
- Construction of metallo-framework cluster materials
Lynn R. Mazzoleni
Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Understanding the identities, occurrence, and transformation of aerosol organic compounds
- Identifying organic aerosol constituents from a variety of atmospheric environments
- Exploration of new LC column chemistries with ultrahigh pressure pumps for fast and thorough separations
- Aqueous reaction pathways
Pushpalatha Murthy
Professor, Chemistry
Research Interests
- Structure, metabolism, and biological role of phosphoinositides in plant cells
- Catalytic and structural aspects of phytases, including specificity of hydrolysis, molecular weight and subunit structure, amino acid sequence, and molecular biology
- Biosynthesis, subcellular localization, and biological role of novel scyllo-inositol containing phosphoinositides
Kelley M. Smith
Lab Supervisor
Links of Interest
Dario Stacchiola
Adjunct Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Understanding the elemental chemical processes on simple model surfaces under pristine conditions
- Synthesis of metal and oxide nanoparticles deposited on novel film oxides, and their multi-technique characterization by photoelectron and infrared spectroscopies and scanning probe microscopy, in combination with theoretical models
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Understanding the molecular recognition features and assembly mechanisms of gene regulation
Ashutosh Tiwari
Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Research Interests
- Protein aggregation diseases
- Consequences of protein misfolding in vitro and how it relates to misfolding in vivo
- Molecular crowding
"If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them."
—"Walden" - H.D. Thoreau
—"Walden" - H.D. Thoreau
Loredana Valenzano
Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Links of Interest
Reviewer for:
- Journal of Materials Chemistry
- Journal of Physical Chemistry C
- CrystEngComm
- Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics
- New Journal of Chemistry
- Applied Surface Sciense
- Journal of Solid State Chemistry
- Computational Material Science
Research Interests
- Theoretical and computational chemistry and physical chemistry
- Electronic structure theory applied to molecules (organic, inorganic) and materials (molecular crystals, MOFs)
- Molecular adsorption on surfaces and in cavities
- Solvent effects on properties of molecules and solids with particular interest toward hydrated versus vacuum conditions
- Multi-scale computational modeling
- Synergistic collaboration with experimentalists to combine different techniques to solve some "puzzles" of Nature...
John G. Williams
Professor Emeritus, Chemistry
Research Interests
- Modeling of Thermoset Cure
- Phase-change mechanism and the properties of the resultant thermoset solid
- Rheology of Curing Resins
- Developing closed-loop control of composite processing
- Molecular Basis for Deformation and Fracture in Polymers
"The RNA regulatory system might have been essential prerequisite to both the evolution of developmentally sophisticated multicellular organisms and the rapid expansion of phenotyptic complexity into uncontested environment"
Yinan Yuan
Research Assistant Professor, School of Forest Resources and Environmental Science
Areas of Expertise
- Identification and characterization of natural antisense transcripts in woody plants
- Alternative splicing and salicylic acid metabolism in populus
- Sequencing complex plant genome through gene-enriched methods
