2013 School News
The
Zimmerman research group has developed a small-molecule compound that could lead to therapeutic treatment for myotonic dystrophy, an as-yet untreatable disease.
UIUC News Bureau article.
Nicholas Connolly, Michael Richards and Akash Moradia won the BP challenge nationally. The ChBE undergrads will join other winning teams for a two-week field trip of the BP operational hubs in the North Sea.
ChBE article.
Two ChBE undergraduates received the Illinois Club's "Make a Difference' scholarships. Grant Blazina teaches young students about science and Sarah Huang is president of the Haiti Clean Stove project.
ChBE article.
Hyunjoon Kong,
Steven Zimmerman and coworkers are developing a polymer coating that could help an individual's stem cells target inflamed cells to regrow healthy tissue and calm inflammation.
C&EN article.
Murphy students, Jie An Yang (2013 Dissertation Award in Materials Chemistry), Hoa Tri Phan (undergrad visitor from Vietnam) and Shruti Vaidya (high school student) and Murphy published an article in Nano Letters describing how cancer cells are slowed down by gold nanoparticles whereas normal cells are not.
Nano Letters article.
The ChBE Undergraduate Research Symposium occurred on April 12. Emre Sevgen, Eftalda Becka and Patrick Corona were awarded first, second, and third place respectively. Greater than 30 ChBE undergraduate students were awarded over $64,000 total, in scholarships and awards for 2013.
ChBE Research Symposium article,
ChBE Scholarship article.
John Rogers and fellow researchers have developed a new class of tiny, injectable optoelectronic devices for use in optogenetic research in the brain.
UIUC News article.
Chemistry graduate students, Stephen Ammann, Brandon Burkhart, Jacob Faucheaux, Jessica Pearson, Michelle Richter, and Aaron Routzahn, have been awarded 2013 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships.
Chemistry article.
Prashant Jain was selected by the American Chemical Society to receive the 2013 Unilever Award in recognition of his molecular, nano-optic and imaging research.
Chemistry article.
Martin Burke was chosen as the second Kavli Foundation Emerging Leaders in Chemistry Lecturer. He will deliver his talk at the Fall 2013 National ACS Meeting.
Chemistry article.
Brendan Harley recently received a NSF Career Award. The award will further his group's development of a synthetic bone marrow biomaterial to aid the study of hematopoiesis and hematopoietic diseases.
ChBE article.
The
Schroeder and
Katzenellenbogen research groups collaborated to develop a new class of fluorescent probes for studying biological processes at the single molecule level.
ChBE article.
Paul Hergenrother and collaborators have designed an innovative type of biosensing laser that achieves super-high detection resolution – a "first-of-its-kind" technology. Their research was featured on the April 7, 2013 cover of Lab on a Chip.
Engineering News article.
Danielle Mai (
Schroeder group graduate student) is a 2013 National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship recipient. She does research in fundamental polymer engineering, specifically with branched polymers.
ChBE article.
Chemical Engineering doctoral student Kathryn Trenshaw is one of five students to receive a 2013 Apprentice Faculty Grant from the Education Research and Methods (ERM) Division of the American Society for Engineering (ASEE).
ChBE article.
Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering alumnus
Ashlee Ford Versypt has been named the 2013 Frederick A. Howes Scholar in Computational Science.
ChBE article.
The
Silverman group has developed DNA catalysts that perform a protein-like function, by changing the phosphorylation state of peptides and proteins. Their research paper can be found in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
UIUC News Bureau article.
The
Lu research group has devised a dynamic and reversible method to assemble nanoscale structures using the protein streptavidin, desthiobiotin, and biotin.
UIUC News Bureau article,
video.
ChBE graduate student Brian Rosen was awarded a Fulbright research fellowhip to do postdoctoral work with the U.S. and Israeli Air Forces at Tel Aviv University.
ChBE article.
The Protein Society announced
Wilfred van der Donk as the 2013 Emil Thomas Kaiser Award recipient. He was cited for his "groundbreaking research utilizing chemistry to investigate enzymatic reactions".
Chemistry article.
Flexible, stretchy batteries are being developed by
John Rogers and colleagues. They reported their work in Nature Communications.
BBC News article,
NBC News article.
Charles Schroeder received a National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award, which will allow Schroeder and his research team to push into uncharted territory with molecular-level studies of branched polymer chains using new single molecule tools.
ChBE article.
Predictive Computing for Condensed Matter, headed by
So Hirata, was one of 7 teams chosen by the U.S. Dept. of Energy to lead collaborative research for computational chemistry & physics for materials. See
SciDAC web site.
Matt Hermes, a graduate student in the
Hirata group, is one of two recipients of the prestigious ACS Graduate Student Award in Computational Physical Chemistry in 2012. Through this award, Matt will receive cpu time on the NCSA Blue Waters.
Kandis Gilliard, a graduate student in the
Hirata group, is a winner of the 2013 Spring ACS Women Chemists Committee (WCC)/Eli Lilly Travel Grant Award.
Mary Kraft and co-workers have developed new techniques to visualize cell membrane organization, with surprising results.
UIUC News Bureau article,
C&EN article (4-29-13).
The
Hergenrother lab has devised a method to synthesize complex and diverse small molecules from natural products. See
C&E News highlight of Nature Chemistry paper,
Science Daily article (2-27-2013).
Wilfred van der Donk and graduate student Weixin Tang determined the structure of the enterococcal cytolysin, a virulence factor associated with infection. The work was published in Nat. Chem. Biol.
UIUC News Bureau Article.
Dana Dlott will receive the 2013 Award in Experimental Physical Chemistry from the American Chemical Society in November. He is being honored "for experimental techniques and measurements that advance our understanding of vibrational energy in molecules and materials".
Paul Hergenrother and colleague David Boothman have entered into a license agreement with StemPar Sciences. The company plans to utilize their compounds to develop cancer therapeutics.
Business Wire article.
Eric Oldfield and collaborators have discovered a compound that is effective against drug-resistant Staph infections in mice. Their findings may allow scientists to produce antibiotics that the bacteria are less likely to become resistant to.
UIUC News Bureau article.
SCS News — 2012
