Research Opportunities in Chemistry
High-quality research programs are active in synthetic and physical organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, bioorganic and biological chemistry, biophysics, and physical and computational chemistry. Undergraduate students can choose to work in any of these areas as early as their freshman year. Some undergraduates stay for an additional year to conduct more comprehensive projects as part of the BA/MA program. Students in the PhD program are extensively involved in research under the active advisement of their faculty mentor.
Biochemistry/Biophysics
: Linking the structure of protein aggregates to the cellular outcomes of neurodegenerative disease
: Dynamics of computationally designed and naturally occurring proteins
: Enzyme mechanism and dynamics study, plus gene function assignment
Computational Chemistry
: Use of ab initio computational modeling to understand the mechanism for asymmetric induction with organocatalysts
Jimenez-Hoyos Lab: New electronic structure methods for quantum chemical problems
: Use of ab initio computational modeling to understand the properties of π-conjugated molecules and mechanistic analysis of pericyclic reactions
: Protein molecular dynamics simulations and design, algorithm development
: Virtual inhibitor screening and protein molecular dynamics simulations
(Integrative Sciences): Molecular dynamics simulations, network analysis
Frisch Lab (Tishler Professor): Prediction of molecular structure, properties and reaction mechanisms
Drug Design
: Development of natural product analogs as anticancer, antiviral, and antifungal therapeutic agents
: In vitro and in vivo studies toward neurodegenerative and cancer therapeutics
: In silico, in vitro and in vivo studies toward antibacterial drug discovery and development
Inorganic Chemistry
Westmoreland Lab: Development of MRI contrast agents, NMR properties of aqueous solutions of paramagnetic ions
Nanochemistry
: Design and synthesis of discrete π-conjugated compounds for use in organic electronic and optoelectronic materialsGonzalez-Pech Lab: Design, synthesis, and characterization of nanomaterials for environmental applications.
Organic Chemistry
: Organic molecules as asymmetric catalysts, synthesis of complex, biologically active natural products and their analogs: Synthesis and characterization of organic chromophores
: Methods to synthesize functional polymers focusing on renewable feedstocks, material reprocessing, and polymer end of life
: Design, synthesis, and analysis of π-conjugated molecules and pericyclic reactions
: Transition-state and mechanism-based enzyme inhibitor design
Physical Chemistry
: Time-resolved spectroscopy on π-conjugated moleculesJimenez-Hoyos Lab: Properties of strongly correlated molecules and excited states in molecular aggregates
: Protein nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), dynamics of fluorescent molecules
Westmoreland Lab: Fundamental aspects of coupled group/multielectron transfer reactions
Polymer Chemistry
: Use of systemically designed polymer scaffolds to study photophysical phenomena: New methods to synthesize functional polymers with a focus on using renewable feedstocks, material reprocessing, and polymer end of life
: Use of self-assembly and dynamic covalent chemistry to design and assemble host-guest systems and discrete macromolecular aggregates.
Summer Financial Support
Ten weeks of full-time in the summer allows students to bring to fruition the work they have done part-time during the academic year. All undergraduate students are eligible for a stipend for a 10-week period during the summer proceeding the junior and senior years. The stipend includes subsidized housing benefits and is sufficient to support students in the Middletown area. A few students also receive these stipends for the freshman sophomore summer. Many of our chemistry students receive their summer support through the Research in the Sciences Summer Program. Additional students are supported form the individual faculty research plans. Approximately, 60 students each summer will complete research in their area of interest: Biology, Chemistry, Earth and Environmental Science or Molecular Biology and Biochemistry that finishes with a poster session.