J. Alexandra (Ale) Hakala, graduate student in earth sciences, and Laura Jacobs, graduate student in the Environmental Science Graduate Program both won the Environmental Chemistry Graduate Student Award presented by the American Chemical Society (ACS). Hakala also received a Student Paper Award from ACS. This is the highest award given to students by the Division of Environmental Chemistry.

The College of Mathematical and Physical Sciences has many outstanding students. A new feature on our web site called Student Spotlight is designed to give you a closer look at some of those students. One featured students was Adrianne Lovelace. She is majoring in chemistry and taking pre-pharmacy courses to reach her goal of becoming a clinical pharmacist. You can read her on the Student Spotlight page.

Art Epstein, Distinguished University Professor of Physics and Chemistry, was featured in the January 4 issue of onCampus for winning the prestigious James C. McGroddy Prize for New Materials from the American Physical Society. The complete article is available at oncampus.osu.edu.

The Wonders of Our World (W.O.W.) program and Susan Olesik, program founder and professor of chemistry, were profiled in the January/February issue of Ohio State Alumni Magazine. The complete article is available at ohiostatealumni.org.

Chemists at Ohio State University, led by Bern Kohler, associate professor of chemistry, have probed an unusual high-energy state produced in single nucleotides -- the building blocks of DNA and RNA -- when they absorb ultraviolet (UV) light. This is the first time scientists have been able to probe the "dark" energy state -- so called because it cannot be detected by fluorescence techniques used to study other high-energy states created in DNA by UV light. The complete Ohio State news story is available at researchnews.osu.edu . This research was also covered by United Press International .