2025-08-21
- The American Chemical Society has selected chemistry Prof. M. Christina White as the 2026 recipient of the Herbert C. Brown Award for Creative Research in Synthetic Methods. The 2026 ACS national award winners were announced Aug. 18. The prestigious H.C. Brown award was established in 1997...
Posted: 2025-08-21
- 2025-08-12 - Two graduate students in chemistry have been recognized with awards from the American Chemical Society for their leadership in mentoring and research safety.Chang Jiang — Leadership in Mentoring Chang Jiang is a PhD student in chemistry advised by Jefferson Chan. Jiang also received the Gary Schuster Mentoring Award this year. The ACS Leadership in Mentoring award highlights outstanding...Posted: 2025-08-12
2025-08-11 - Three faculty members in the Department of Chemistry have received promotions. Josh Vura-Weis has been promoted to full professor by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. And Hee-Sun Han and Lisa Olshansky have been promoted to associate professor and awarded tenure by the university. This summer, the University of Illinois Board of Trustees approved the promotions of all three...Posted: 2025-08-11
2025-08-05 - As an Illinois undergraduate, Makenna Pinkham was afraid of failing Organic Chemistry I her sophomore year, but that fear quickly faded, and she started looking forward to the 8 a.m. class taught by Jordan Axelson, director of undergraduate studies, and senior lecturer.“Dr. Axelson did everything in her power to make the content digestible, interesting and even fun,” said Pinkham, a 2025...Posted: 2025-08-05
2025-07-30 - With a new five-year, $15 million award, the U.S. National Science Foundation has renewed its support of the Molecule Maker Lab Institute, a research collaboration focused on developing artificial intelligence tools for quick, accessible discovery and synthesis of molecules for applications in medicine, energy, industry and more.Headquartered at the...Posted: 2025-07-30
2025-07-29 - Chemistry professor Paul J. Hergenrother has been selected an American Chemical Society Fellow for 2025 in recognition of his exceptional contributions to science. The group of 36 ACS Fellows was announced July 28, 2025. The ACS Fellows Program was created by the ACS Board of Directors in...Posted: 2025-07-29
Crowdsourcing chemistry: Illinois researchers attract international interest with Kaggle Competition2025-07-18 - Inspired by their own recent chemical discoveries for solar energy development using machine learning, a research team at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign was curious what other data-driven chemical discoveries could be possible if they could access a broader machine learning approach.The team, which included chemistry professors ...Posted: 2025-07-18
2025-07-17 - The ACS Division of Medicinal Chemistry has selected Illinois chemistry Ph.D. student Rachel Schaaf as a recipient of this year’s Predoctoral Fellowships.These fellowships recognize outstanding predoctoral students engaged in medicinal chemistry research. Fellows are selected based on scientific merit, research potential, and academic record, and receive stipend support for continued graduate...Posted: 2025-07-17
2025-07-16 - Two Illinois chemistry graduates, Michelle Bishka and Yilun Li, have been awarded 2025 Certificates of Undergraduate Excellence by the Royal Society of Chemistry.The RSC awards the certificates as part of its recognition program for university students in North America who have shown...Posted: 2025-07-16
2025-07-15 - Inspired by the human immune system that is constantly developing antibodies to combat pathogens, University of Illinois researchers in the lab of chemistry professor Angad P. Mehta are using synthetic biology and synthetic immunology methods to develop new antibodies and medical treatments with the hope of combating viruses, drug-resistant...Posted: 2025-07-15
2025-07-15 - As a Beckman Postdoctoral Fellow, Viviana Palacio-Betancur will begin research this fall on bridging molecular-scale interactions and macroscopic behavior of liquid crystal. Palacio-Betancur earned her Ph.D. in molecular engineering from the University of Chicago in 2023, and she is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Chemistry at Illinois. She will collaborate this fall...Posted: 2025-07-15-
2025-07-14 - Flightpath Biosciences, Inc., a clinical stage biotechnology company focused on the development of precision therapeutics targeting bacterial pathogens, has licensed a class of antibiotics developed at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The original antibiotic agent, lolamicin, effectively treated bacterial infections in animal models of disease — without wiping out beneficial microbes...Posted: 2025-07-14
2025-07-02 - As director of the Center for Nanoparticle Research in the Institute for Basic Science at Seoul National University in South Korea, Dr. Taeghwan Hyeon (PhD, ’96, Suslick) leads efforts to develop uniformly sized nanoparticles. Measuring 1 to 100 nanometers in diameter, nanoparticles offer increased strength and durability, as well as improved electrical conductivity, over traditional...Posted: 2025-07-02
2025-06-24 - Chemistry Ph.D. student Anna DeBernardo has had an interest in chemistry since high school and planned, at least, to minor in chemistry in college. But her interest in coding led her to computational chemistry and ultimately, she discovered a strong connection with theoretical chemistry. "Especially in how it allows me to apply rigorous mathematics to meaningful problems," said DeBernardo,...Posted: 2025-06-24
2025-06-23 - The School of Chemical Sciences (SCS) and the Department of Chemistry have recognized a group of faculty members and graduate students for their commitment to excellence in the classroom in the 2024-25 academic year.Two chemistry faculty members and four graduate students in chemistry received the annual SCS awards for excellence in teaching and five additional chemistry graduate students...Posted: 2025-06-23