Month: April 2021

Victoria Iannelli, a chemistry major at Clemson University and winner of the 2021 Warwick Chemical Foundation Award in Chemistry, has earned a summer internship with Elemental Scientific, Inc. (ESI) that will begin in May. Elemental Scientific is a market leader in mass spectrometry automation and sample introduction. Elemental Scientific is headquartered in Omaha, NE and recognized internationally for its innovative products. Victoria will join the team in Omaha where she will be working with state-of-the-art instrumentation to solve customer-related problems. These projects will include creating new analytical instruments related to the detection of nanoparticles and process monitoring in the production of solar energy materials.

“Being a former graduate student of Prof. Ken Marcus, I am extremely honored to be able to give back to the current students at Clemson University. We are very excited about this opportunity and hope this is just the start of a long-standing relationship between Clemson and ESI”, says Dr. Derrick Quarles, a Product Manager Elemental Scientific, Inc.

Please join us in congratulating the 2021 Chemistry Department Student Awardees. Since we are unable to hold our annual honors and awards ceremony this year, I hope you will take the time to congratulate any of the honorees that you might know, so that they will understand that their accomplishments are still being celebrated within the department.   We would also like to thank the work of the selection committee (Drs. Stephen Schvaneveldt, Vivian Ezeh, Byoungmoo Kim, James Plampin, Rhett Smith, Thao Tran, and Modi Wetzler).

1. Outstanding Student in General Chemistry Award 

• Olivia Ambre
• Daniel Labrador

2. Outstanding Student in Introductory Chemistry Award 

• Adele Veldekens

3. Chemical Rubber Company Award 

• Annie Buck

4. Outstanding Student in Organic Chemistry Award 

• Jamie Schweitzer

5. Houghton Mifflin/ICUC First Year Chemistry Award 

• Lauren Ulisse
• Cassidy Walsh

6. Outstanding Sophomore Chemistry Major Award 

• Kayla Lea

7. Undergraduate Award in Analytical Chemistry 

• Pavel Herman

8. Undergraduate Award in Inorganic Chemistry 

• Eric Guo

9. Undergraduate Award in Organic Chemistry 

• Grace Anderson

10. Undergraduate Award in Physical Chemistry 

• Sydney Satchell

11. American Institute of Chemists Award 

• Matthew Cullen

12. Merck Index Award 

• Nia Grant

13. Senior Researcher Award 

• Blake Parker

14. Chemistry Faculty Award 

• Morgan Merriman
• Johnathan Phillips

15. American Chemical Society Award 

• Arielle Relich

16. Chemistry Outreach Award 

• Tatiana Estrada-Mendoza

17. Graduate Faculty Award 

• Katja Hall
• Austin Seilkop

18. Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award in Chemistry 

• Kyle Beard
• Lacey Billotto
• Paul Priego

19. Outstanding Graduate Researcher Award in Chemistry 

• Hiu Xu

20. Warwick Chemical Foundation Award in Chemistry 

• Victoria Iannelli

21. Mark Bernhard Hardin Award in Chemistry 

Harrison Howell

Learn about the impressive work done by Paula Cable-Dunlap and her team in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Division. Dr. Cable-Dunlap graduated in 1995 after defending her thesis “Development of Radio Frequency Powered Glow Discharge Devices for Applications in Mass Spectrometry”, performed under the supervision of Dr. Marcus.

Read more at https://www.ornl.gov/news/paula-cable-dunlap-assembling-nuclear-mosaic

Congratulations to Dr. Katja Hall, who defended her thesis “Optimization of the Liquid Sampling-Atmospheric Pressure Glow Discharge for Varied Spectrochemical Applications”. The work was supervised by Prof. Ken Marcus.

You can read more about her contributions here: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=j0dRE-kAAAAJ&hl=en 

Congratulations to Dr. Kerrick Rees, who defended his PhD thesis “PROGRESS TOWARD THE DEVELOPMENT OF INHIBITORY SMALL MOLECULES FOR THE BACTEROIDES AND TOXOPLASMA MICROORGANISMS”. The work was co-directed by Dr. Dan Whitehead and Dr. Kristi Whitehead.

Kerrick is now heading to postdoctoral in the Townsend lab at Vanderbilt University soon….. and will be greatly missed in Hunter!

Congratulations to Dr. Tyler Williams, who recently defended his PhD Thesis “DIVERSE MASS SPECTROMETRIC COUPLINGS AND APPLICATIONS OF THE LIQUID SAMPLING – ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE GLOW DISCHARGE AS A COMBINED ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR IONIZATION SOURCE”. The work was supervised by Prof. Ken Marcus.

Tyler, who has been incredibly productive as a graduate student, will soon join the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration, which enhances national security through the military application of nuclear science. He will work in the administration’s enriched uranium modernization group, which focuses on modernizing the nation’s enriched uranium capabilities and infrastructure to support NNSA’s defense, nonproliferation, and naval reactor missions.

Good luck!

In 1993, three students, Tony Rosati (Georgetown University), Gina Pearson (American University) & Anne Holt (Florida State University), all activists within NAGPS, wanted to find a way to physically manifest support and appreciation of the contributions, impact and value of graduate students. Their effort led to a cooperative initiative called National Graduate & Professional Student Appreciation Week. Tony & Anne also realized that bringing in the endorsement of each state’s government (via a Proclamation from the Governor) would assist in building greater media attention to GPSA Week.

Graduate-Professional Student Appreciation Week

Graduate students are behind every successful project and are a critical component of our department. As Dean Lopez said, Clemson would not be the R-1 research university it is without our graduate students and their research. Our highly valued undergraduate education benefits from the interactions with and mentorship of graduate students. You put in a collective 35,000 hours a WEEK as teachers of record, teaching assistants, research assistants and program assistants. Hundreds of undergraduates work on Creative Inquiry teams led by graduate students. Depending on the year, between 20% and 60% of named inventors on Clemson patents are graduate students. Your geographic and cultural diversity makes Clemson a more vibrant community. And you’re a primary reason Clemson has the statewide presence it does: hundreds of Clemson graduate students study primarily at a campus or facility other than the main campus.

Thanks!