Chemistry and Biochemistry

Celebrate the class of 2025 with a slideshow featuring some of their favorite moments!

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY, PHYSICS - One mathematical equation can open a world of possibilities. And that's what this College of Arts and Sciences graduate student is finding. Jesse Hall, a physics doctoral candidate, worked with theoretical physical chemistry professor Marina Guenza to develop the new model that could help advance the development of new drugs and sustainable materials.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY, ANTHROPOLOGY - Two University of Oregon faculty members have been named 2024 fellows by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), joining 471 other newly elected members whose work has distinguished them in the science community and beyond. This year’s fellows and their areas of research are Darren Johnson, chemistry and biochemistry, and Stephen Frost, anthropology.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY- Antibiotic resistance could pose a problem for humans in the future. Farmers use antibiotics in livestock to combat pathogens, which could result in human consumers being immune to the drug that staves off bacterial infections. CAS students like biochemistry undergrad Favour Foday are working on ways to address big problems like human antibacterial resistance or the looming energy crisis.

The world looks different in the laboratories buried 17 feet beneath campus, where you can pick up an object 1,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair and peer at its individual atoms. In UO’s underground materials characterization labs, researchers are pushing the boundaries of what can be observed through a microscope. Read more in the December sci-fi issue of CAS Connection.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY - Bioengineers and chemists design fluorescent 3D-printed structures with potential medical applications. The discovery emerged from a collaboration between Paul Dalton’s engineering lab in the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact and Ramesh Jasti’s lab in the chemistry and biochemistry department in the UO’s College of Arts and Sciences. The researchers describe their findings in a paper published this summer in the journal Small.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY - Vickie DeRose, professor and head of chemistry and biochemistry, has been awarded a creativity extension by the National Science Foundation (NSF) for research into the structure and function of ribonucleic acid (RNA) through its interactions with metal ions. Fellow chemist Mike Pluth was awarded an NSF creativity extension in 2023 for his work on the role small sulfur-based molecules play in many biological processes. These molecules were likely key species involved in evolution, especially before there was oxygen in Earth’s atmosphere.