DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY NEWSLETTER

Spring 2016, Vol. V

It is a great pleasure to finally bring you this newsletter after an unduly long break from the previous edition in 2012. Since then, the Chemistry department has un-dergone great changes. In fact, I became Chair in the late summer of 2014, when then department Chair John Toscano ac-cepted the position of vice dean of Arts and Sciences. After faculty discussions, I was elected as Chair for a three-year term, having been a member of the de-partment for 24 years. It has been a chal-lenge, but interesting and exciting to be directly involved in the departmental workings, such as teaching and the un-dergraduate program, operations and budgets, and hiring.

I hope you enjoy this newsletter and appreciate the changes and advances that have occurred in Chemistry; there will be more to come in future newslet-ters!

Congratulations to Professor John Toscano! John was recently named vice dean of science and research infrastruc-ture at the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Toscano serves as liaison with the chairs of the school’s natural science departments to ensure the highest qual-ity undergraduate experience, particular-ly in introductory level courses, as well as to think through space planning and infrastructure needs and opportunities for interdisciplinary endeavors. He is an important partner to the science chairs and the dean in the recruitment of fac-ulty and issues concerning tenure and promotion, and he represents the school and cultivates ties with other science-in-tensive divisions of the university, as well as with external institutions for scientific research. Moreover, Dr. Toscano works with the university’s technology transfer office and maintains responsibility for re-search reporting and compliance issues.

A highly accomplished scientist, Dr. Toscano’s main interests are currently focused on the study of the fundamental chemistry and biochemistry of nitroxyl (HNO). HNO has been shown to have biological activity distinct from that of its redox cousin, nitric oxide (NO), but many mechanistic questions remain. Re-cent interest in HNO has been catalyzed by research suggesting that it may be a novel therapeutic for the treatment of

heart failure.Dr. Toscano received his bacca-

laureate degree in chemistry from Princ-eton University and his doctoral degree in organic chemistry from Yale University. After completing a National Institutes of Health postdoctoral fellowship in or-ganic chemistry at Ohio State University, he joined the Johns Hopkins University Department of Chemistry in 1995 as an assistant professor. He became a full pro-fessor in 2003, vice-chair of the depart-ment in 2004, and served as chair from 2005 to 2011 and again from 2013 to 2014.

Letter from the Chair John Toscano Named Vice Dean of Science and Research Infrastructure

Be on the lookout for our

Winter 2016 Newsletter!

Faculty FarewellsFour valued and longstanding members of our department retired from our faculty ranks - Doug Poland, Da-

vid Draper, Jerry Meyer, and Gary Posner. We thank them for their service and wish them each the best!

David E. Draper, Vernon Krieble Pro-fessor Chemistry, was the mainstay of biophysics in our department and a pil-lar of the wider biophysics community at Hopkins for over 33 years. From early in his career here he played a central role in the inception and development of the university-wide reorganization of Biophysics into what is now known as the Program in Molecular Biophysics. For nearly a decade David was its Director and guided its steep ascent to what many regard as one of the best Biophysics pro-grams in the country. David is a first-class physical chemist and biologist with a deep understanding of thermodynamics. David was a superior colleague and our Department Chair from 1994 to 1998. We wish him and Ruth all the best in Portland and their beloved Northwest.

Gerald J. Meyer, Bernard N. Baker Pro-fessor of Chemistry, joined our depart-ment in 1991 and served as Department Chair from 2011 to 2013. He very re-cently moved to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as Professor in their Chemistry Department. This op-portunity for Jerry was too much to overlook, and he will be taking a lead-

ership role in their Energy Frontier Re-search Center, which overlaps with his own research programs in light-to-elec-trical energy conversion, chemical sens-ing, and photocatalysis. Jerry was a valu-able colleague here at Hopkins and we wish him the best of luck at UNC!

Douglas Poland, a member of our de-partment since 1969 (and Department Chair from 1983 to 1987), was a major contributor to the field of statistical me-chanics. This field unifies physical chem-istry in that given the energy levels of quantum mechanics, one can calculate the free energy of thermodynamics (and all of the other functions of thermody-namics). Thus, statistical mechanics joins the microscopic with the macroscopic. Doug’s research involved understanding phase transition and singularities as well as order-disorder transitions in biologi-cal macromolecules, including proteins and DNA. Doug was also an excellent and beloved teacher, both at the gradu-ate level and in our freshman introduc-tory chemistry sequence. His steady-ing influence on our department will be greatly missed!

Gary Posner has had a tremendous im-pact as an internationally recognized or-ganic chemistry researcher in his almost 47 years at JHU, with particular contri-butions in the areas of organocopper chemistry and synthetic organic chemis-try methodology. Above all, Gary spent much of his career studying medicinal chemistry, with numerous contributions to both the primary and patent literature in the areas of antimalarial compounds and vitamin D analogues. In the organic chemistry community, he has been rec-ognized by many invitations to distin-guished lectureships and awards. In JHU Chemistry, he was an outstanding col-league, especially in his contribution to serve a term as department Chair. Gary was also recognized as an outstanding teacher and has received several JHU-wide awards for excellence in teaching. Finally, the Chemistry department is in-credibly grateful that Gary has chosen to donate funds to recognize and support outstanding advanced graduate students, through the Gary H. Posner Fellowship in Organic Chemistry. Thus, his name and positive influence on JHU Chemistry will rightfully last for many years to come.

While pursuing an academic career at Johns Hopkins University is a full-time job, students in the Chemistry Depart-ment still find time to lead a rich extra-cirricular life. Here are some recent highlights from student life:

Blessing Deeyaa of the Rokita lab has taken an active role in organizing and leading JHU’s National Organization for Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE) chapter. Her dedication and pro-active management even earned

her a JHU Diversity Recognition Award!

The Buckeyballs, the official soccer team of the JHU Chemistry Department, is looking to return to the GRO soccer championship where it suffered a heart-breaking overtime loss last summer. As the previous generation of players like Tim Magnanelli, Miranda Gallagher, and Suzanne Adam take steps to grad-uate, the team is transitioning to a new generation of players like Ben Frank, Sandy Ciborowski, and Carlton Fol-

ster. We wish them the best of luck this season!

Last but not least, a big thank you to all Chemistry students who participated in the JHU Sustainability Network’s ef-fort to recycle obsolete instruments! Led by our building manager Boris Steinberg, over 2000 pounds of ob-solete laboratory instruments, com-puters, and electronics were recycled. - the equivalent mass of a black rhino!

Student Life

Dr. Tom Kempa, who joined the department in July 2015, re-ceived his Ph.D. from Harvard University with Charles M. Lie-ber, completing his postdoctoral studies with Daniel G. Nocera at Harvard. Tom’s research in-terests are in the general area of solid-state materials chemistry and experimental physical chem-istry. Tom’s research group works toward building and characteriz-ing new classes of solid-state sys-tems that can enable advances in energy conversion, self-assembly of photonic and meta materi-als, and biophysical probes. His group will explore perovskite and oxide-based 2D materials

and sperlattices, novel strate-gies for kinetic assembly, and inorganic nanoprobes for interrogation of cellular net-works. To accomplish this sci-ence, his group will use a rich array of gas-phase and inor-ganic synthetic methods and a number of solid-state optical and structural characteriza-tion techniques.

Dr. Thomas Kempa

Welcome New Chemistry Department Faculty!

designs and materials discovery for the advancement of sustain-able technologies in energy con-version and storage. Utilizing core principles in coordination chemistry, materials synthesis, electron and ion transport, pho-tochemistry, and electrocatalysis, her laboratory will explore 1) the synthesis and characterization of molecular catalysts for small molecule activation, 2) the tuning of bulk properties of molecular materials for energy storage, and 3) the development of nanopo-rous materials as a scaffold for artificial photosynthesis.

Dr. Sara Thoi, who joined the department in July 2015, re-ceived her Ph.D. from the Uni-versity of California, Berkeley with Christopher J. Chang and completed her postdoc-toral studies at the California Insitute of Technology with Sossina M Haile. Broadly, her group is interested in the in-tersection between molecular

Dr. V. Sara Thoi

Dr. Rebekka Klausen

Dr. Bekka Klausen, who joined the department in July 2013, completed her doctoral stud-ies at Harvard University under the guidance of Eric Jacobsen, where she explored mechanistic details of asymmetric catalysis. She completed her postdoctoral work at Columbia University, working with Colin Nuckolls on the development of silicon-based molecular materials for molecu-lar electronics. Bekka is building a very interdisciplinary research program here at JHU involving the synthesis and characteriza-tion of novel “low dimensional” materials engineered at the molecular level to have specific electronic properties. Among her recent targets are molecu-larly well-defined silicon nano-particles and “doped” graphene

networks. These types of ma-terials are expected to be at the forefront of modern or-ganic and molecular electron-ics research. Bekka brings a very unique perspective to this field, where she will put careful and thoughtful reac-tion design and development to bear on the synthetic chal-lenges posed by these materi-als. In addition to innovative synthetic chemistry, Bekka’s research also entails sophis-ticated electronic charac-terization spanning from the molecular regime to the bulk macroscale.

Clockwise from the left: Rebekka Klausen, Thomas Kempa, Lan Cheng, Sara Thoi.

Dr. Lan Cheng

Dr. Lan Cheng, who joined the department in January 2016, received his Ph.D. from Peking University in China with Wenjian Liu and then did his postdoctoral studies with Jürgen Gauss at Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz in Germany and with John Stanton at University of Texas at Austin. Lan’s research inter-est lies in the development of novel electronic-structure methods and applications of the new methods in chemi-cal and spectroscopic studies. Lan’s research group works on theories, algorithms, and

computer programs for treating relativistic effects in computa-tions of molecular energies and properties, to extend the ap-plicability of quantum-chemical machinery to the entire periodic table. Both the fully relativistic theories employing the Dirac equation and the cost-effective “electrons-only” two-compo-nent relativistic theories, which is computationally reminiscent to the non-relativistic theory, are being explored. The relativ-istic quantum-chemical methods and computer programs devel-oped are used to study a variety of chemical and spectroscopic problems involving heavy ele-ments with special emphasis on lanthanides and actinides chem-istry.

Promotions and HiresIn addition to the new faculty members, the Chemistry Department has

added a few new faces to its staff and promoted several lecturers.

Tyrel McQueen was promoted to Associate Professor in July 2015. Tyrel joined Hopkins Chemistry in 2010 as an Assistant Professor and has been a rising star ever since. Tyrel specializes in solid state chemistry materials, focused on the discovery of new phenomena through the design and synthesis of new materi-als. Tyrel is also a principal investigator in the Department of Energy supported In-stitute for Quantum Matter at Hopkins. In addition, he was recently named the director of the Platform for the Acceler-ated Realization Analysis & Discovery of Interface Materials (PARADIM) at JHU. A list of his most recent awards can be found in our Faculty Awards section.

Louise Pasternack was promoted to Teaching Professor in July 2013. Louise joined Hopkins Chemistry in 2001 as a Senior Lecturer. As director of the In-troductory Chemistry Laboratory, she has taught thousands of Hopkins under-graduates, mainly freshmen. She played a big role in the planning of the new Un-dergraduate Teaching Laboratory and has implemented a number of significant im-provements to the lab course. Recently, she and Paul Dagdigian were awarded a Gateway Sciences Initiative grant to develop and implement peer-led team learning groups for the Introductory Chemistry lecture course. This program has proved very helpful and popular; this year approximately 30% of the class has participated. This success has catalyzed an expansion of the program to addi-tional introductory math and science courses.

Jane Greco was promoted to Associ-ate Teaching Professor in July 2014. Jane joined Hopkins Chemistry in 2006 as a Senior Lecturer. She modernized and taught our Introductory Organic Chem-

istry Laboratory until 2012, when with funding from the Gateway Sciences Ini-tiative she developed and offered a new course, Chemical Equilibrium and Reac-tivity with Lab. Jane was also involved in subsequent funding from the Gateway Sciences Initiatives, which together with her new Chemical Equilibrium course, has allowed our department to revamp our freshman curriculum in important ways. Rather than having a “one size fits all” introductory chemistry sequence, we now can offer an advanced alternative for those who are adequately prepared and also remedial help for those who need it. Jane has been a major contributor to this transformation.

Eric Hill was hired as a Lecturer in July 2015. Eric joined Hopkins Chemistry as a Teaching Postdoc in August 2013. With the help of Jane Greco, Eric designed and implemented Chemical Chirality, which introduces freshman and Chemistry Ma-jors to enantioselective synthesis, mod-ern methods of characterization and in-dependent research. To date, greater than 40% of these students have undertaken Chemistry related research within the University. Eric coordinates the biannual Undergraduate Poster Session, providing students of advanced labs an opportuni-ty to present their independent projects at a multidisciplinary, faculty-attended event. Eric also directs Chemistry with Problem Solving; a supplemental course to Introductory Chemistry, which tar-gets incoming freshman with less rigor-ous science and math backgrounds. To date, greater than 95% of enrolled stu-dents have passed their corresponding section of Intro Chem.

Sunita Thyagarajan joined the depart-ment as a Lecturer in August 2014. She is presently involved in teaching the large

Introductory Chemistry –I and –II classes for the Fall and Spring semesters respec-tively. Prior to coming to Johns Hopkins, Sunita taught Introductory Chemistry and Organic chemistry for 5 years at Montgomery College in Rockville, MD. She also worked briefly on the Human Microbiome Project at the J. Craig Venter Institute in the department of Genomic Medicine. Currently, Sunita is involved in developing a Project-based Introductory Chemistry lab for Fall 2016. She is also working with the School of Nursing to develop an online chemistry pre-requi-site course for the Fall of 2016.

Joel A. Tang was hired to manage the NMR Core Facility in May 2014. Joel obtained his PhD from the University of Windsor in 2008 with a research fo-cus in solid-state NMR spectroscopy of inorganic and organometallic materials. He then went to New York University as a post-doc associate and worked on improving NMR sensitivity through hard-ware development and chemical interac-tions. Afterwards, he joined the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHM-FL) in Tallahassee, FL, as a post-doc as-sociate to study lithium ion batteries in situ using NMR and stray-field imaging. He began gaining managerial experience in 2012 with a position at the CSICOMP NMR facility at the University of Toronto where he helped users with experimen-tal setup, data interpretation and system maintenance. Dr. Tang brings extensive experience and knowledge of NMR spec-troscopy to Hopkins. He has made an impact in the department by implement-ing an extensive NMR and EPR training program, providing summer workshops on advanced NMR techniques, improving user efficiency in data acquisition, assist-ing users with their research needs, and keeping a well maintained NMR facility.

We are pleased to announce an abun-dance of awards from our graduate stu-dent body over the past several years:

Daniel Diaz Romero , a graduate stu-dent in the Karlin lab, was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship. Daniel began his studies in the spring of 2013 on the US Chile Equal Opportunity Scholarship, a four year scholarship awarded by the Fulbright Foreign Student Program. The Fulbright Foreign Student Program en-ables graduate students from more than 155 countries worldwide to study in the United States, with approximately 4,000 awarded each year.

Herdeline Ann Ardoña, a graduate student in the Tovar lab, was awarded

both the 2014 Schlumberger Founda-tion’s Faculty for the Future Fellowship and the 2015 Howard Hughes Medi-cal Institute’s International Student Re-search Fellowship. The Schlumberger Foundation granted $6.3 million to 168 women scientists through its Faculty for the Future program for the 2014-2015 academic year. This annual program awards grants to women scientists from developing countries to pursue PhDs and postdoctorate studies in scientific and engineering disciplines. The HHMI selected 45 students in 2015 for fellow-ships to help them complete their gradu-ate studies; Herdeline is one of two stu-dents from the Philippines to receive the fellowship.

Benjamin Trump, a graduate student in the McQueen lab, was awarded the Ludo Frevel Crystallography Scholarship from the International Center for Diffraction Data. Since 1991, the ICDD has awarded $429, 750 to aspiring crystallographers. Ben was one of 13 students to receive the scholarship in 2014.

Reid Messersmith, a graduate stu-dent in the Tovar lab, was awarded the Achievement Rewards for College Sci-entists Fellowship for the academic year of 2015-2016. The ARCS Foundation Metropolitan Washington honors out-standing scholars annually, awarding each graduate student $15,000 each year. Reid was one of 27 PhD candidates to receive the scholarship in 2015.

Student Awards

Faculty Awards

Craig Townsend was awarded the 2013 I.A. Scott Medal. The I.A. Scott Medal is sponsored by the ACS Texas A&M Sec-tion and the Texas A&M University De-partment of Chemistry. The annual award recognizes excellence in biological chemistry research.

Chris Falzone was awarded the Krieg-er School of Arts and Sciences (KSAS) 2014 Excellence in Teaching Award. This award is sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Alumni Association and the KSAS Dean’s Office. Dr. Falzone, a major contributor to our Introductory Organic Chemistry sequence, was recognized for his teach-ing excellence during this year’s com-mencement ceremonies.

Tyrel McQueen has received a small bounty of awards in recent years. First, he was awarded the 2013 ACS Exxon-Mobil Award Faculty Fellowship in Solid State Chemistry; this fellowship recog-nizes young scientists who have made substantial contributions to the disci-pline of solid-state chemistry and show potential to emerge as leaders in their

field. Then in 2014, Tyrel was awarded the Alfred P. Sloan Research Felllow-ship. The Sloan Foundation awards 126 two-year fellowships each year to young scientists for distinguished performance and unique potential to make substantial contributions in their fields; Tyrel was one of three JHU scientists to receive the fellowship in 2014. Finally, Tyrel was awarded the 2014 Research Corporation for Science Advancement Cottrell Schol-ar Award. The Cottrell Scholar Award is awarded annually to early-career faculty members who excel as both teachers and researchers.

Kenneth Karlin was awarded the 2014 ACS Fellowship. The American Chemical Scoiety elects fellows annually for their outstanding contributions and service to chemistry and society. Ken was one of 99 ACS members to be elected fellows in 2014.

Rebekka Klausen was recently hon-ored by the US Department of Energy. Dr. Klausen is one of 44 young scientists across the country chose to receive

grants from the US Department of Ener-gy’s Office of Science under the agency’s Early Career Research Program. This annual award supports the development of individual research programs of out-standing scientists early in their careers.

Kit Bowen was recently honored with the Department of Defense’s MURI grant. The DOD’s Multidisciplinary Uni-versity Research Initiative (MURI) pro-gram funs research teams that overlap in more than one traditional science and engineering discipline. A total of 55 aca-demic institutions are expected to par-ticipate in these 22 research efforts.

Art Bragg was awarded the 2015 NSF CAREER Award. The Faculty Early Ca-reer Development (CAREER) Program is a Foundation-wide activity that offers the National Science Foundation’s most prestigious awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teach-er-scholars through outstanding research, education, and the integration of educa-tion and research within the context of the mission of their organizations.

Bachelor Degrees AwardedPhD Degrees AwardedStudent2013Achey, DarrenArbogast, LukeBelecki, KatherineFakhari, FazelGaudelli, NicoleHill, EricLi, YangLi, YuqiMorris, FrancineMott, BryanPeterson, RyanRosenberg, SamanthaSlack, RachelTaheri, AtefehUzasci, LernaWall, BrianWeil, Amy2014 Bitter, JulieBuonaugurio, AngelaChailkind, BrianGuthrie, DarylHu, KeKeceli, GizemKim, SungheeMa, QianliMcQuilken, AlisonO’Donnell, RyanSan Pedro, JoannaSaracini, ClaudioStreifel, BejaminVierling, RyanWard, WilliamWeng, LiweiWidger, LelandZhu, Xiaolei2015Anderson, BreeanaBloom, StevenBoucher, LaurenBrigham, Erinn Buytendyk, AllysonCottingham, PatrickGhosh, Souradyuti Graham, JacobHeflin, Kathryn Hematian, ShabnamLee, Jung YoonNeu, Heather Newman, AdamOutlaw, Victor Sanders, AllixSheckelton, John Wallace, David Wang, YiZhang, Xinxing

Advisor

MeyerTolmanTownsendRokitaTownsendTownsendYuKarlinMeyersPosnerKarlinFairbrotherPosnerMeyerSchnaarTovarStivers

FairbrotherBowenOstermeierToscanoMeyerToscanoKarlinDagdigianGoldbergMeyerGreenbergKarlinTovarMeyersMeyerGreenbergGoldbergYarkony

StiversLetckaBoschMeyer BowenMcQueenGreenberg BowenMeyers KarlinKarlinGoldberg TownsendTownsend Tovar McQueen McQueenBowen Bowen

Current Position

Assistant Prof., Kutztown UniversityPostdoctoral Associate, NIST NRCAssistant Prof., VCUDental Student, UMBPostdoc, Harvard UniversityLecturer, JHU Chemistry Dept.Research Assoc., University of UtahChemist, Entegris Inc.IRACDA Fellow, AECOMResearch Scientist, NCATSPostdoc, JHSPH Dept. of ToxicologyMatl. Science Engineer, KennametalPostdoc, NIDAPostdoc, UC-DavisReference Standards Scientist III, USPPostdoc, UIUCPostdoc, University of Pennsylvania

Research Chemist, NISTSr. Scientist, Excel Inc. AberdeenPostdoc, Harvard UniversityPostdoc, JHU (Toscano Lab)Postdoc, UNC-Chapel HillPostdoc, JHU (Toscano Lab)Catalent Pharma Solutions, NCPostdoc, University of StuttgartPostdoc, Georgetown UniversityORAU Fellow, Army Research LabPostdoc, Salk Institute-Bio. StudiesPostdoc, LBNLNRC Postdoc Research Assoc., NRLORISE Fellow, USAMRICDResearch Associate, BNLPostdoc, University of PennsylvaniaPostdoc, UK-CAERPostdoc, JHU (Yarkony Lab)

Research Staff, IDAPostdoc Princeton UniversityPostdoc, JHSPH (Bosch Lab)Asst. Journal Manager, AIP PublishingResearch Staff Member, Analyst Postdoc, USCResearch Intern, JHU Biology Dept. Postdoc, University of ChicagoUnknown Postdoc, CaltechPostdoc, Northwestern UniversityPostdoc, UMBGraduate Scholar, Bayer CropScienceResearch Associate, UW-MadisonPostdoc, NCI Postdoc, JHU (McQueen Lab)Fellow, The Data IncubatorUnknownPostdoc, JHU (Bowen Lab)

Gifts to the Department

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John P. Anhalt Earl W. Baker Barton Family Charitable Fund Randolph Barton Jr. Maurice M. Bursey Mark L. Campbell Jeff Jin-Wen Chang Marc J. Chapdelaine Haiyan Dai Anthony L. Dent Joseph B. DiGiorgio David A. Edmonson John P. Ferraris Fidelity Charitable Fund Thomas E. Gompf Andrew R. Griswold Morton W. Huber Beatrice Kulier

Charles P. Kulier Albert L. Lutz Wilford L. Mendelson Foil A. Miller Amanda J. Morris A. Scott Neese James E. Oliver Brian A. Payne Pfizer Foundation Gerald J. Putterman Ronald E. Pyle Milton Sack Roosevelt Shaw Carlyle B. Storm Yuji Takahata Kelly A. Van Houten Harold W. Wack

The Department of Chemistry thanks all donors for their generous support!

2013Caron, Joseph Checketts, Christie Collins, Anthony Echegaray, GabrielFlores, EduardoHaselton, Nathan Hazra, DiaHo, AnthonyHo, Royce Iannarelli, Kayla Ibanez, Christian Lee, Joohyung Lim, AlaneMiller, DavidOh, Melissa Schwarzchild, Sarah Sivakumaren, Sindu CarmenSowers, JamesTrutzer, IrisYau, EricYoo, Je Min2014August, EdwardAuvenshine, DillonGeronimo, PatHamm, AlexanderHaqqani, MahaHe, JeanHeath, JacquelineHenry, Roger

Holl, MaxwellKim, DavidSloane, JackStrull, JessicaTakahashi, CyrusUrheim, Ellen2015Barber, RossCollins, AnthonyGranger, JonathanGranja, JeffreyGriswold, AndrewHarper, ThomasHosseini, MahdiehLatifi, ArdianMaling, EmilyMo, WendyNg, StephaniePatel, KishanPatel, KrishnaRyberg, EricTassis, EvanWitkiewicz, StephenWoltornist, RyanWood, Ryan