Tania Mohamed & Stuart Mehrens, UConn Chemistry Undergraduate Students Since 2012, the Chemistry Department at the University of Connecticut (UConn) has been actively developing international collaborations with other Universitas 21 institutions (the leading global network of research universities), such as Fudan University and Shanghai Jiaotong University (SJTU) in China. The partnership has provided great channels […]
The Scarcity of Helium
Dr. Nicholas Leadbeater offers WAMC Radio an analysis of the widespread uses of helium. A possible shortage of this element has sparked debate as to who has the rights to its use. Therefore, as helium may become more strictly regulated, helium-filled party balloons may soon come to an end. For full story, courtesy of WAMC […]
Breaking Bad’s Bad Chemistry
UConn Today As the final episodes of Breaking Bad became available for the first time on Netflix this week, UConn chemistry professor Nicholas Leadbeater offered a three-part examination of the chemistry behind the hit television show. On Monday, he discussed why Walter White’s meth was so unique. On Tuesday, he discussed White’s use of acids […]
A New Way to Create Porous Materials
UConn Today A team of UConn chemists has discovered a new way of making a class of porous materials that allows for greater manufacturing controls and has significantly broader applications than the longtime industry standard. The process, more than three years in the making and outlined in the December 2013 edition of Nature Communications, has […]
Chemistry Provides Student with Marketable Skills
UConn Today Before Sun Products Corp. hired UConn chemistry major Casey Camire as a summer intern, students studying engineering typically dominated the internship application pool. Many companies, like Trumbull, Conn.-based Sun Products, which develops and markets household cleaning supplies, typically look first for chemical engineering college students when recruiting for their internship programs. But chemistry […]
Chemist Discovers New Way to Stabilize Proteins
UConn Today A UConn research team has found a way to stabilize hemoglobin, the oxygen carrier protein in the blood, a discovery that could lead to the development of stable vaccines and affordable artificial blood substitutes. The team’s novel approach involves wrapping the polymer poly(acrylic acid) around hemoglobin, protecting it from the intense heat used […]
Not Quite Frankenstein
UConn Today Where can you watch a group of inanimate objects come together, form a cohesive structure, and start displaying what looks very much like organic behavior? You might say this sounds like a modern-day Frankenstein. But for a real-life example, you could visit the laboratory of psychologist James Dixon in Storrs, Conn. Dixon and […]
TEDxUConn: 21st Century Alchemy
TEDxUConn Faced with the world’s finite supply of fossil fuels, scientists are looking to other sources for their chemical feedstocks. One option is to convert biomass, such as plant material, vegetation, or agricultural waste, to commodity chemicals. This has advantages in economic, environmental and societal terms. But how can we achieve this goal? Dr. Nicholas […]
Bloodless sensors monitor diabetes patients
The Daily Campus According to the 2011 National Diabetes Fact Sheet from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 25.8 million people in the U.S. have diabetes. This statistic includes both Type I and Type II diabetes. Diabetes is a serious, life-changing disease that requires blood sugar levels to be monitored many times a […]
Chain Reaction: NSF Programs Are Initiators of Chemist’s Success
Jennifer Bento Author Jennifer Bento is a graduate student in the Polymer Program at UConn in the research group of Chemistry Professor Doug Adamson. In her reflection below, Jen describes the implications on her career path that resulted from her participation in the UConn chemistry REU program. She connects this experience to choosing UConn for […]