A Message from the Head Department of Chemistry Newsletter
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
June 2018 Issue 4 Department of Chemistry Newsletter A Message from the Head across campus, we have a group of Leah Hildebrandt has decided to chemistry majors of which we are very pursue her bachelor’s degree full time, proud. Watching them learn to carry so she too is leaving us. All of these out experiments in the senior research people will be greatly missed by the Dr. David Palmer labs is one of the most rewarding department. On the other side of the Department Head parts of the job. I had conversations coin, a new faculty member has been with some at convocation this year, in hired, and I’m thrilled to welcome Dr. which I learned about their next steps Tara Kahan to the department; you to medical and dental school, graduate can read more about her and her Hello students, alumni, colleagues, school, and jobs in chemistry. We take research in the following pages. This and friends! It’s my pleasure to greet so much pride in our students and the addition is particularly timely given you all again this year, and introduce success that their hearts and minds the activity of our new Women in this information-packed newsletter. and efforts bring them. Chemistry initiative, also described in I resumed my duties as Head in July this newsletter. 2017 after a 6-month break, and was We have also encountered increasing greeted with a 15% departmental numbers of students who are In closing, remember that the budget cut for the year, followed by an unprepared for university chemistry, Department wants to hear from additional 10% cut for 2018-19. While and we have created a new course you! We work to discover new this is going to make maintaining our (CHEM 100) to try to meet their needs. chemistry and teach our subject to programs much more challenging, we We hope that this, other bridging generations of students, and our have not slowed down in our mission programs, and our outreach activities greatest achievement is your success. to be the best that the U of S has to with high schools and other groups Please be in touch, whether by e-mail, offer. Our department remains a hub of can bring success in chemistry to Facebook, Twitter, or best of all, a visit campus activity and a hive of teaching more students. to campus. and research. We have graded over 4000 exams this year, instructed more Every year brings changes, from new I will take this opportunity to thank than 10,000 hours of laboratories, and graduating students to new and once again all the donors who have and worked with over 100 graduate retiring professors, but this year was helped the department to give students, postdoctoral fellows, a big one for turnover. We saw four the best experience we can to all research associates, technicians, and retirements: Professor Marek Majewski, our students. And to all the U of S undergraduate research students. Dr. Keith Brown, Garth Parry, and our Chemistry community, please accept long-time office stalwart, Ronda Duke. my best wishes for the year ahead. While we teach a lot of students from In addition, our graduate assistant Faculty News 2 Retirements 4 Spinks Lecture 9 University of Saskatchewan | Department of Chemistry 2 Faculty News Chris Phenix is leading a multidisciplinary team to develop imaging probes for gluco- cerebrosidase (GCase), an enzyme which has been indentified as a top priority diagnostic biomarker and therapeutic target of Parkin- son’s disease. The multidisciplinary team in- cludes professors Darrell Mousseau (Patholo- gy, U of S), Rebecca Davis (Chemistry, U of M), David Palmer (Chemistry, U of S) and Justin Hicks (Lawson Research Institute). Early work has led to the development of novel conduri- tol aziridines, which are potent, selective and irreversible inhibitors of GCase discovered by the Phenix group. Photo: Debra Marshall Current work is focused on evaluating a new fluorescent probe for GCase as well as synthesizing radioactive derivatives that are likely to enter the brain. If successful, the team hopes to study disease-pro- moting processes related to GCase as well as to help develop new drugs to treat Parkinson’s in early stages. For this project, Phenix has received funding from GlycoNet and SHRF, along with in-kind sup- port from Lysosomal Therapeutics and the Sylvia Fedoruk Centre (Saskatchewan Centre for Cyclotron Sciences). Andrew Grosvenor was awarded the U of S New Researcher Award at the Fall 2017 Convocation. Research conducted by the Grosve- nor Group is focused on improving the viability of nuclear energy. The Grosvenor Group studies multiple aspects of the fuel cycle, in- cluding: (1) studying U mine/mill wastes in collaboration with Ora- no Canada (formally AREVA Resources Canada); (2) studying inert matrix oxide (nuclear) fuels in collaboration with Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL); and (3) the development of materials for the safe sequestration of nuclear waste. Students and researchers involved in this research program synthesize materials using a variety of solid state methods and investigate natural and synthetic samples using a large number of advanced lab- and synchrotron radiation-based characterization techniques (e.g., X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray pho- toelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray microprobe, X-ray absorption near edge spectroscopy (XANES), and Extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS)). The synchrotron radiation experiments are primarily performed using the Canadian Light Source (CLS). University of Saskatchewan | Department of Chemistry 3 New Faculty Faculty Milestones We are excited to announce that Tara Kahan will be joining our department August 1, 2018, as Associate Professor and nominee for Canada Research Chair in Analytical and Environmental Chemistry. Dr. Kahan obtained her BSc at the University of Regina in 2004 and her PhD at the University of Toronto in 2010. She joined Syracuse University in 2012. As of 2018, Soledade Pedras has been with our de- Dr. Kahan is an emerging expert in the field of atmospheric partment for 25 years. She received a U of S Long-Ser- and environmental chemistry, focusing on chemistry in vice Award on May 29. aqueous environments, chemistry at ice surfaces, and the chemistry of indoor atmosphere. This includes the study of organic pollutants and their reactions in surface waters, Richard Bowles and Jens Mueller have been faculty droplets and aerosols, as well as on ice surfaces. members in our department for 15 years. Her work has been funded by the Sloan Foundation and the National Science Foundation, and she has received the Meredith Teaching Award honouring oustanding teaching by a young faculty member at Syracuse University. Faculty Promotions The University’s Board of Governors approved promotions to Full Professor for Michel Gravel and Andrew Grosvenor, effective July 1, 2018. Faculty News David Palmer was appointed to a three-year term on the NSERC Discovery Grant Evaluation Group for Chemistry. University of Saskatchewan | Department of Chemistry 4 Faculty Retirement Staff Retirements After 33 years with the Ronda Duke began her Department of Chemistry, career at the U of S in the Marek Majewski has retired, Department of Chemistry as of June 30, 2018. in 1979 as a half-time clerk in Stores. Ronda support- Dr. Majewski studied at ed many areas of the de- Warsaw Technical University, partment, from the main and completed a PhD at office, assisting with first University of Waterloo with year labs, to a full-time Victor Snieckus, followed role supporting faculty by postdoctoral work at the and graduate student pro- University of Alberta and the grams. National Research Council. She became the De- He joined our department as an Assistant Professor partment Head’s in 1985, received tenure as an Associate Professor in Secretary in 1999, a 1990, and was promoted to Full Professor in 1995. position she held un- He was Director of the Saskatchewan Structural til her retirement on Sciences Centre from 2004-05, and held the position April 30, 2018. Ron- of Department Head from 2005 to 2011. da’s patience, friend- ly smile, and vast Dr. Majewski taught organic chemistry throughout knowledge of the his career and supervised eleven MSc and seven department will be PhD theses. He co-authored six book chapters and greatly missed. 56 peer-reviewed publications, focusing especially on stereoselective reactions of enolates. He will be Keith Brown retired from the department on fondly remembered for all his contributions to the March 31, 2018. He held the position of Research department! Officer with the Saskatchewan Structural Scienc- es Centre, and was also a Chemistry 112 instruc- tor. Retirement will no doubt provide Keith more Staff Retirement time for jam sessions with his band. Garth Parry retired from his position of Electronics Technician as of January 26, 2018. Prior to joining the Department of Chemistry in 1999, Garth worked in the College of Agriculture. We will miss Garth’s steady presence in the electronics shop and his ability to fix seemingly anything, and we wish him a restful and relaxing retirement. University of Saskatchewan | Department of Chemistry 5 2018 Taube Medalist - Dr. Quang Huy To The 2018 Taube Medal was awarded to Quang Huy To who has recently completed his Ph.D. degree under the supervision of Dr. Soledade Pedras. Huy’s work on the discovery of unique plant defenses (the “nasturlexin family”) and their biosynthetic pathways are landmark achievements. Huy was successful, first, in determining the chemical structures of several new natural products (that are always produced in trace amounts), second, in chemically synthesizing these compounds, and third in demonstrating their antifungal activities against important pathogens of canola and related crops. The discovery of the cruciferous phytoalexins nasturlexins A and B together with cyclonasturlexin and brassinin in watercress plants, revealed the co-occurrence of two parallel defense pathways, the tryptophan pathway and the phenylalanine pathway.