Group News

We want to welcome two new undergraduate group members for summer research. Kallan Blakemore is a rising senior at Auburn and Kennedi Banks is an REU student from Case Western Reserve University. Best of luck in your summer research!

In our latest work by Amanda Chown published in Inorganic Chemistry, we show that Cr³⁺ acts as a reductant in the hydrothermal synthesis of CuCrO₂ from Cu²⁺ precursors. This synthesis is widely used in the literature to generate CuCrO₂ nanocrystals, however, the exact role of Cr³⁺ as a reductant had never been identified. The information leads to a new stoichiometric ratio of 4:3 Cr:Cu needed to produce pure CuCrO₂. Deviations from this can result in side product impurities.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.2c00943

Congratulations to former PhD student Alex Bredar for receiving a prestigious Beckman Postdoctoral Fellowship! She is currently working with Jillian Dempsey at UNC-Chapel Hill.

Congratulations to Brandon Dye who received an year long Undergraduate Research Fellowship from Auburn University as well as acceptance into a summer REU program at Columbia University!

Welcome Smriti Somai as a new graduate student in the group!