To Our Alumni:
We have designed this web page to facilitate our interactions with you. Within this web
page, you find the latest information about the department, and will also provide you an opportunity to share information
Here is a current profile of the department. We teach approximately 70,000 credit hours per year and our teaching mission is accomplished with the able help of 130 graduate teaching assistants, 8 lecturers and 10 support staff. Our external research budget last year was of the order of $9 million and it supported the training of 80 graduate research assistants, 60 postdocs, with the help of 24 research support staff members. There are now 35 faculty members in the department. Last year we graduated about 45 students with BA/BS degrees and ~23 students with Ph.D.'s. All these big numbers probably remind you that we run a very large operation, but at the same time, you will also remember that it is our personal attention that is really the "Buckeye" mark.
The research of our faculty led to more than 250
publications, books and participation in meeting and symposia throughout the world. In this letter, I want to focus
briefly on the young faculty members that are the future of the department.
Heather Allen studies chemistry associated with environmental processes and recently won a Beckman Award.
Pat
Woodward, a Sloan awardee, is a solid state chemistry
who is designing the next generation of optical and
electronic materials. Mike
Freitas, in collaboration with the OSU Medical School,
has made some major strides in studying mass spectrometry of
histones to help understand the gene transcription
replication process. Sean
Taylor, a biochemist, is working on biosynthetic
pathways for synthesis of natural products as well as
developing novel antifugal and antiyeast compounds.
Our newest faculty members are Jovica
Badjic, who is synthesizing nano-scale organic materials
and Dennis
Bong, who specializes in biomimetic chemistry. We
are particularly excited about the contributions of these
young people, and I encourage you to visit their research
websites on the departmental website
platform.
Besides teaching and research, our faculty continue to
have a major impact on the community of scientists and the
community in general. Terry
Miller continues to head up the Molecular spectroscopy
Symposium, which will be celebrating its 60th
year next year. Matt
Platz headed up a university-wide committee on Academic
Integrity in Athletics and did an excellent job in what was
a very contentious issue. Susan
Olesik is continuing her Wonders of our World (WOW)
program which focuses on scientific literacy of elementary
school students. The WOW program is beginning to show
improvement in the scientific test scores of elementary
students in both suburban and inter city schools.
Faculty continue the entrepreneurial spirit, notably, Rick
McCreery in the area of molecular electronics, Art
Epstein in the area of functional polymers, and Sheldon
Shore in catalysis.
Our undergraduates continue to make a mark-a recent
accomplishment was the Goldwater Fellowship awarded to Mike
Gribble, a senior working in Jon
Parquette's research lab. It also gives me special
pleasure in welcoming back Ray Goodrich, BS 1985, to campus
as an Adjunct Professor of Chemistry. Ray is working
on technology to clean up the blood supply and the impact of
his work will be felt world-wide.
There were several celebrations over the past year.
Notable among these was celebrationg of Leo
Paquette's 70th birthday where over 200
students and postdocs from all around the world converged on
campus for a day long symposium. An endowed fund has
been set up to bring distinguished organic chemists from
around the world to campus, and the first such seminar
series will take place in the spring. Also, last fall
we honored the memory of Roy Plunkett, Ph.D. 1936, who
discovered Teflon while employed by DuPont Company.
Major infrastructural changes are continuing on
campus. Evans Lab 1008 is finally gutted, and soon
with a new auditorium, we no longer have to put up with the
dusty boards and the clocks that never quite worked. A
departmental center titled the Center for Chemical and
Biological Dynamics whose centerpiece is a million dollar
femtosecond laser, has been set up and is being directed by Terry
Gustafson.
As far as 2005, we are in the process of hiring up to
five faculty members. Some of you have participated in
the Carnegie Initiative for the Doctorate survey that is
being led by Claudia
Turro. We plan to implement some of the
recommendations of that committee during this year.
The Carnegie Initiative essentially is poised to redefine
graduate education for the next 15-20 years and is one of
the more ambitious programs that we have undertaken.
Let me conclude by saying that I would very much like to
hear from you, and welcome you to visit the
Department. Recently Dr. Russell Walker, Ph.D. 1952,
visited with us and it was a delight to talk with him about
the Chemistry Department 50 years ago and how we are
today. I look forward to hearing from many of you and
may you have a great 2005.
Prabir Dutta
Fox Professor
and Department Chair
