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Congratulations 2011 Graduates!

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Hooding ceremonyIt’s again time of the year that we say congratulations and goodbye to some of our friends. Yesterday, 2011 UT Fall Graduate Hooding Ceremony was hosted in Thompson-Boling Assembly Center & Arena. While more are graduating, four Chemistry Ph.D students were able to attend and being hooded on the stage.

Please join us in congratulating 2011 graduates and wish them good luck with their future career and life! For those who just became alumni of this Department, we hope you could keep in touch with us, and come back to see us!

View more pictures of the hooding ceremony.

Alan Cramer Paper Accepted in JACS

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Synthesis of Aziridines from Alkenes and Aryl Azides with a Reusable Macrocyclic Tetracarbene Iron Catalyst. Alan Cramer, a third year graduate student in Dr. Jenkins’ group, published a paper about synthesis of Aziridines in Journal of American Chemical Society (JACS).

Co-authored with Professor Jenkins, Cramer is the first author of this paper Synthesis of Aziridines from Alkenes and Aryl Azides with a Reusable Macrocyclic Tetracarbene Iron Catalyst.

In this paper, the two researchers expanded upon previous examples of catalytic aziridination, which utilize the more atom economical azide funtional group as the nitrene transfer reagent.  They demonstrated that their catalyst could perform the first ever examples of catalytic aziridination with tri- and tetra-substituted alkenes, as well as, electron donating aryl azides. “Our new iron tetra-NHC catalyst can perform these reactions not only at very low catalyst loading, but it can also be easily separated and recycled up to an additional three times.” Cramer said. Since the aziridine functional group is found in natural products and also used in pharmaceuticals, broadening the scope of the aziridination reaction is significant.

Alan CramerBorn and raised in Powder Springs, GA, Cramer always wanted to be a chemist. He received his Bachor of Science degree in Chemistry from Kennesaw State University in 2008 and joined Jenkins Group a year later.

Working towards Ph.D., Cramer’s rearch has been focusing on organometallic synthesis with a special interest in structure and bonding and how these characteristics can be tuned from a molecular orbital stand point.  His current research involves trying to stabilize high energy metal ligand multiple bonds and performing oxidative group transfer reactions from them with various substrates.

Founded in 1879, JACS is the flagship journal of the American Chemical Society and the preeminent journal in the field. This periodical is devoted to the publication of fundamental research papers in all areas of chemistry and publishes approximately 16,000 pages of Articles, Communications, Book Reviews, and Computer Software Reviews a year. Published weekly, JACS provides research essential to the field of chemistry and is the most cited journal in chemistry field as reported in the 2010 Journal Citation Report© Thomson Reuters.

Last year, Cramer also co-authored a paper 18-Atom-Ringed Macrocyclic Tetra-imidazoliums for Preparation of Monomeric Tetra-carbene Complexes that was published in Organometallics, another American Chemical Society publication with a high Impact Factor of 3.888, ranked in the top ten in citations, impact factor, articles published and immediacy index in both categories.

Kovac Appointed Director of College Scholars Program

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Jeff KovacDr. Jeff Kovac, Professor of Chemistry, was appointed the new Director of College Scholars Program in the College of Arts and Sciences.

Being a faculty member in the Chemistry Department since 1976, Kovac directs the department undergraduate programs, serves as the Director of the Tennessee Governor’s Schools for Science and Engineerigthe and also directed the Tennessee Science Olympiad State Tournament in 2009. He recently received Chancellor’s Honor for his excellent work in academic outreach.

The College Scholars Program is an interdisciplinary honors program in the College of Arts and Sciences. The program was founded to support highly motivated and academically talented students who have clear goals for their undergraduate education, and who cannot attain those goals within the traditional requirements structure of the College.

Once admitted to the program, a Scholar is exempt from all the course distribution requirements for undergraduates in the College of Arts and Sciences. Instead, each Scholar works with a faculty member who serves as a Mentor, with the Director of College Scholars, and with others to design a unique curriculum to meet the Scholar’s individual educational goals.  For more information, please visit CSP web site.

Xiaojun Wang Receives ACS Travel Award

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Xiaojun WangChemistry graduate student Xiaojun Wang in Professor Mays Group is selected as one of two recipients of American Chemical Society (ACS) Graduate Travel Award to attend 2012 ACS National Meeting in San Diego.

This Travel Award is sponsored by the ACS Division of Polymer Chemistry’s Membership Committee. Each year, the Committee provides funding for two polymer graduate students to travel to ACS National Meeting and present their research results.

Wang will be delivering a presentation entitled “Microstructure Effects on Self-assembly of Polystyrene-b-Sulfonated Poly(cyclohexadiene)” to address an unexplored issue regarding self-assembly behavior of strong electrolyte block copolymers derived from dienes.

Wang is very excited for receiving this award. “I felt very excited and honored,” he said. “That means recognition of my research among all the applicants. And I am very grateful to my advisor, Prof. Jimmy Mays, who has supervised my research, fully supported this travel award application and gave me a strong recommendation.”

Wang obtained his Bachelor of Engineering in Material Science and Engineering at East China University of Science and Technology and a Master degree in Macromolecular Chemistry and Physics at Fudan University. He joined Prof. Jimmy Mays’ group in 2007 to pursue his Ph.D. in Polymer Chemistry.

Wang’s research mainly focuses on synthesis of well-defined linear and branched polymers by anionic polymerization, post-modification, morphological study of sulfonated and fluorinated polymers, and self-assembly of amphiphilic block copolymers in aqueous system.

With full devotion to his research, Wang had first-authored and co-authored multiple publications in Soft Matter, Biomacromolecules and European Polymer Journal. Currently, he is working on an invited review for Soft Matter, collaborating with researchers at Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences in Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

Wang is also recently selected the Excellence in Graduate Polymer Research Symposium which will take place at the ACS Sandiego meeting starting on Sunday, March 25, 2012.

UT Celebrates National Chemistry Week

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Dr. Al Hazari Magic ShowMembers of the American Chemical Society (ACS) nationwide will be celebrating National Chemistry Week (NCW) October 16-22.

During this week, ACS members will have the opportunity to present the positive aspects of chemistry, promote science education, and to heighten the public awareness of the contributions chemistry has made to society and to everyday life.

The NCW theme for this year is “Chemistry — Our Health, Our Future” Members will explore the positive impacts of chemistry as it relates to nutrition, hygiene, and medicine.

One of the activities that is planned by the East Tennessee Section of ACS is the 21st anniversary of Dr. Hazari’s “THE MAGIC OF CHEMISTRY SHOW.” The event will be held at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville Dabney-Buehler in Room 555, on Tuesday, October 18, 7:00-8:00 pm. Kids ages 2-102 years are invited to attend this free admission show.

Since the NCW theme for this year is about Health, a donation of a bar of soap for East Tennessee area needy is requested. No show reservations are necessary and questions may be addressed to Dr. Al Hazari (ahazari@utk.edu ; 865-974-1065). Paid parking is available at the UT University Center Parking Garage.

Best Featured in Pregame Showcase

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Michael BestKNOXVILLE – Michael Best, associate professor in the department of chemistry, will be speaking at this week’s Pregame Showcase on “Bioorganic Chemistry: Advancing the Frontiers of Medicine.”

The showcase will take place Saturday, October 15, before the Vols’ home game against Louisiana State University. The showcase will begin at 1:30 p.m., two hours before the game’s kickoff. Featuring a thirty-minute presentation followed by a fifteen-minute question-and-answer session, each showcase is free and open to the public and held in the Carolyn P. Brown Memorial University Center Room 213. Light refreshments are provided, and guests have a chance to win door prizes. Guests who complete a registration form receive a 10 percent discount coupon for game day purchases from the UT Bookstore.

The presentation will focus on bioorganic chemistry research performed in Best’s laboratory and cover the fundamentals of bioorganic chemistry by discussing how his lab goes about designing, creating, and applying organic molecules to study important biological processes, particularly those relevant to disease.

“Specifically, we will discuss recent efforts by my lab to develop inhibitors of the target protein autotaxin, which is of significant interest since this protein is overstimulated in many human cancers,” Best said. “My laboratory has also developed small molecule probes corresponding to an important family of lipids that has been implicated in diverse processes, including the onset of cancer and diabetes, as well as HIV-1 virus proliferation.”

Best teaches graduate and undergraduate classes in organic chemistry and is passionate about mentoring graduate, undergraduate, and pre-collegiate students. He leads the annual mentoring day on behalf of the Department of Chemistry, which brings local high school students to campus to learn about chemistry education and research.

Best has received more than $1.2 million in funding for his research, including the National Science Foundation Career Award in 2010. He has published his work in thirty research.

Department Hosted 2011 Board of Visitors Annual Meeting

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2011 Board of Visitors Annual MeetingDepartment of Chemistry hosted 2011 Board of Visitors Annual Meeting on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 in Buehler Hall 511.

Eight BOV members participated in this year’s meeting and 19 students from all five divisions presented their posters during the Students Poster Competition. Heidi Bostic from Best group and Chris Bennett from Camden group won the poster awards with Nan Chen from Barnes group, Sneha Belapure from Campagna group, and Xiaojun Wang from Mays group as runner-ups.

View More Pictures

Chris Bennett Paper Accepted in JACS

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Chris Bennett Paper Accepted in JACSChris Bennett, a fourth year graduate student in Dr. Camden’s group, published a paper on two-photon properties of molecules in JACS.

Bennett and Camden have worked on this project with their collaborators Dr. Lasse Jensen and Daniel Silverstein at Penn State University for the past two years. They compared experimentally measured resonance hyper-Raman spectra to first-principles calculations of the resonance hyper-Raman intensity and found excellent agreement between the two. The finding not only demonstrated that first-principles calculation of hyper-Raman intensities are now possible for large molecules such as R6G, but also indicated that resonance hyper-Raman will now be a routine aid for probing multiphoton processes.

“As two-photon spectroscopy gains popularity, it is important to fully understand the mechanisms and principles that guide it.” Bennett explains the importance of his work. “Our explorations of hyper Raman spectroscopy are an attempt to understand those principles.  We are working to uncover the mysteries in this aspect of science, to help bring it into the realm of popular scientific methods.”

Chris BennetPrior to joining Camden group, Bennett obtained his Bachelor of Science degree from the Wofford College in 2003 and Master of Arts from the Wake Forest University in 2004. He also serves as the secretary for the East Tennessee Section of the American Chemical Society.

Bennett’s research has been focusing on understanding the principles behind the enhancement in surface enhanced hyper Raman scattering (SEHRS).  “This project is a direct result of the explorations in that work.” said Bennett. “The theory observed here will help “flush out” the mechanisms of enhancements in further studies.”

Founded in 1879, JACS is the flagship journal of the American Chemical Society and the preeminent journal in the field. This periodical is devoted to the publication of fundamental research papers in all areas of chemistry and publishes approximately 16,000 pages of Articles, Communications, Book Reviews, and Computer Software Reviews a year. Published weekly, JACS provides research essential to the field of chemistry and is the most cited journal in chemistry field as reported in the 2010 Journal Citation Report© Thomson Reuters.

Earlier this year, Bennett also published an article about Probing One-Photon Inaccessible Electronic States with High Sensitivity on ChemPhysChem, a scientific journal published by John Wiley & Sons since 2000.

Vighter Iberi Paper Accepted in NanoLetters

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plasma_imagingVighter Iberi, a third year graduate student in Dr. Camden’s group, published a paper on plasmon imaging in NanoLetters.

In the paper, the researchers obtained spatial maps of the localized surface plasmon modes of high-aspect-ratio silver nanorods using electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) and correlated to optical data and classical electrodynamics calculations from the exact same particles, thus demonstrating EELS mapping to be an invaluable technique for elucidating complex and overlapping plasmon modes.

Since nanostructures continue to be fabricated with ever reducing size and increasing complexity, Camden suggested that studies such as this could “ultimately provide a unified picture of optical and electron beam excited plasmons demonstrating that plasmon maps derived from EELS excitation have direct relevance for the plethora of processes relying on optical excitation of plasmons.” Camden also feels that the correlated measurements described in Vighter’s paper will”deepen our understanding of structures used for surface enhanced spectroscopies, sensor devices, sub-diffraction limit wave-guiding, and energy harvesting.”

Vighter IberiThe Camden group, formed in 2008, is working to develop new applications of plasmonic nanostructures and to understand fundamental features of the molecule-plasmon couplings underlying these applications. This published study fits into the whole group’s project because “a thorough understanding of SERS enhancement factors largely depends on the plasmonic properties of these nanostructures currently being investigated.” said Vigther.

Vighter O. Iberi (JR) is originally from Nigeria and earned his Bachelor Degree of Science from the Campbellsville University in 2008 prior to joining Camden group in 2009. His current research area involves the study of surface plasmons in metallic nanostructures and their application to Single Molecule Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SMSERS).

Out of 63 journals in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, Nano Letters is #2 in Impact Factor: 12.219*; #2 in citations, with 61,066 total cites.

*Based on the 2010 Journal Citation Reports®

Dr. Best Joins Editorial Board of Chem. Phys. Lipids and Publishes Articles in Acc. Chem. Res. and ASBMB

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Michael BestDr. Michael Best recently accepted an invitation to join the Editorial Advisory Board of the journal “Chemistry and Physics of Lipids”. This journal, published by Elsevier, featuring an impact factor of 2.86, is focused on the properties and biological activities of lipids, which play key roles in both normal physiological processes and those associated with disease. “I am excited to assist in steering the future direction of this influential journal.” said Best. This acheivement has also been recognized by QUEST, an online magazine highlighting UT faculty and students’ accomplishments.

In addition, Best was recently invited to provide an article for a special issue of the journal “Accounts of Chemical Research”. This publication currently possesses one of the highest impact factors among journals associated with chemistry (21.84). Accounts of Chemical Research publishes focused review articles that primarily describe work performed in the author’s own laboratory. Best was invited to contribute to this special issue by guest-editor Dr. Carolyn Bertozzi, Professor of Chemistry at UC-Berkeley and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. The special issue revolves around the profound advances that have resulted from the field of bioorthogonal reactions and “click chemistry”. Best’s article focuses on work from his lab as well as others in which this chemistry has been extended to study the biological properties of lipids relating to diseases such as cancer. Joining Best as co-authors on this article are graduate students in his lab Meng Rowland and Heidi Bostic.

Meng, Heidi, Dr. Best and Chi-Linh after escaping Alcatraz to attend the 2010 ACS Meeting in San Francisco

Meng, Heidi, Dr. Best and Chi-Linh after escaping Alcatraz to attend the 2010 ACS Meeting in San Francisco

Finally, Best was also invited to provide a feature article for the monthly ASBMB Today. For those who are more on the chemical side of the fence, ASBMB Today, published by the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB), is essentially the equivalent for this society that corresponds to Chemistry & Engineering News for the American Chemical Society (ACS). Best’s article focuses on recent advances in the design, synthesis and application of lipid probes for studying biological properties.