Biochemistry, Chemical Biology, and Organic Chemistry: Design, synthesis, and (bio)chemical characterization of chemical tools as: (1) fluorescent probes for enzymatic activity and (2) moieties to direct small molecules to specific subcellular regions.
Inorganic Chemistry: Organic and inorganic materials for photovoltaics; near-infrared emitting materials for biosensing; ordered inorganic nanostructures; density functional theory calculation; crystallography; photocatalysts for water splitting, porphyrin chemistry.
Physical Chemistry: Computational screening for the discovery of materials exhibiting enhanced catalytic activity and selectivity; Predicting reaction kinetics and thermodynamics of molecular transformations; Modeling adsorption behavior of water containments.
Biochemistry: Bacterial polysaccharide metabolism; Bacterial membrane transport and nanodisc-based membrane biology; Role of Zn-metalloproteases in cancer and stroke.
Inorganic Chemistry: Supramolecular self-assembly: synthesis and characterization of mechanically interlocked molecules; Bioinorganic chemistry: synthesis and characterization of bio-inspired metal complexes as models for the active sites of metalloproteins.
Chemical Education: Synthesis of lignin model compounds; optimizing transition metal catalyzed cleavage reactions of the model compounds. Applying this chemistry to depolymerize lignin into high value aromatic compounds.
Organic Chemistry: Synthesis of simple photochromic organic materials; Design of experiments for undergraduate organic labs; New methodology for organic synthesis via phosphonates; Natural products isolation and chemistry.
Organic Chemistry: Organic synthesis of Basket shaped molecular containers based on Resorcin[4]arene and calix[4]arene; Synthesis of Tweezers shaped organic molecules. Molecular recognition studies upon the synthesized molecular hosts.
Analytical Chemistry: Experimental studies of materials useful for adsorption of various compounds. Experimental and computational modelling of adsorption and surface modification reactions.
Environmental Chemistry: Trace level analysis and the study of reactions and processes relevant to chemical contaminant migration and site remediation.
Physical Chemistry: Use of NMR spectroscopy to study biological systems: protein structure in spider silks and phosphorus metabolites in freeze-tolerant animals.
Inorganic Chemistry: The design and use of biomimetic catalysts (molecules that mimic enzyme behavior) to carry out "green" oxidation reactions using atmospheric oxygen.
600 Lincoln Avenue, Charleston IL 61920 Physical Science, Room 3150
217-581-5906
emtreadwell@eiu.edu