Chemistry | CAS in the Media | Washington State University

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Showcase faculty, staff award winners announced

March 13, 2020 mikayla.makle

Eight members of CAS faculty were among faculty and staff selected for University-wide, Showcase 2020 awards, which recognize their scholarly achievements and professional acumen. They are:

Association for Faculty Women Samuel H. Smith Leadership Award
Catherine “Katie” Marguerite Cooper
School of the Environment

Donald Matteson. Emeritus Society Legacy of Excellence Award
Don Matteson
Professor Emeritus of Chemistry

Kimberly Christen. Innovation and Entrepreneurship Award
Kim Christen
Digital Technology and Culture Program/Center for Digital Scholarship and Curation

President’s Distinguished Teaching Award for Instructors and Clinical Faculty
Janet M. Peters
Department of Psychology
Chris Dickey
School of Music

Sahlin Faculty Excellence Award – Leadership
Stephen Bollens
School of Biological Sciences and School of the Environment/Meyer’s Point Environmental Field Station

Sahlin Faculty Excellence Award – Outreach & Engagement
Cheryl B. Schultz
School of Biological Sciences

Sahlin Faculty Excellence Award – Research, Scholarship & Arts
Gregory W. Yasinitsky
School of Music

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Chemist among four WSU faculty named AAAS Fellows

December 10, 2019 adriana

Four WSU faculty members, including professor of chemistry Aurora Clark, were recently elected as Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), a high honor recognizing their contributions to science and technology.

This year a total of 443 scholars from a range of disciplines were chosen by their peers on the Council of AAAS to become new Fellows. They will receive official certificates and rosette pins in a ceremony on Feb. 15, 2020, during the AAAS Annual Meeting in Seattle.

Clark is director of the Center for Institutional Research Computing and deputy director of the IDREAM Energy Frontier Research Center. Her research includes modeling of complex, multicomponent solutions, providing the basic science needed to help solve many industrial problems. Her work has helped in development of remediation strategies for the nuclear waste site in Hanford, Washington. To understand such complex problems, Clark has developed methods that integrate applied mathematics and chemistry to extract new information from modeling data – this includes the study of networks of interactions between molecules using similar approaches to internet search engines.

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WSU students dedicate innovative artwork to Kamiak Elementary School, community

October 18, 2019 adriana

Imagine a large, outdoor painting that changes colors when warmed by the sun or by the touch of a child’s hand and shifts hues again in cool rain and winter’s chill.

Two such temperature-sensitive paintings are among four vibrant murals created this fall through a unique collaboration between Washington State University artists and chemists for public display at Kamiak Elementary School in Pullman. The innovative paintings will be dedicated to the new elementary school and surrounding community on Monday, Oct. 21, at 4 p.m.

The free, public event will be held on the school playground at 1400 NW Terre View Dr. or, in case of rain, in the school library.

“Our goal was to create an outdoor mural, inspired and informed by chemical science, that is both educational and interactive,” said Amy Nielsen, clinical assistant professor of chemistry, who co‑led the project with Joe Hedges, assistant professor of fine arts.

The professors worked with master of fine arts student Kelsey Baker, chemistry graduate student Aaron Hendrickson, and about 25 students in Hedges’s advanced and intermediate painting class to create the murals designed by Baker and Jiemei Lin, a graphic artist at WSU.

The incoming student class at Kamiak Elementary and members of the community voted for their favorite of three designs presented by the mural team in early August.

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Northwest Public Broadcasting (NWPB)

WSU undergraduate education benefits from eight Smith Teaching and Learning grants

August 13, 2019 adriana

Amy Nielsen, clinical assistant professor of chemistry, and Joe Hedges, assistant professor and coordinator in the Dept. of Fine Arts, are developing a new course in which students will learn the chemical origins of color perception and create painting projects from pigments they have synthesized themselves in the laboratory.

Their project, “Chemistry and Art: Exploring the Painted Surface,” uses lecture, lab, and studio venues to foster students’ formation of a tactile link between chemistry and painting. It also looks at the evolution of colored pigments from natural ones used in cave paintings to the development and industrial synthesis of modern chemical pigments in the 20^thcentury and beyond.

Nielsen and Hedges are among 15 WSU faculty members on three campuses pursuing eight projects to improve undergraduate education, thanks to funding from the Samuel H. and Patricia W. Smith Teaching and Learning Endowment.

Since 2000, the endowment has provided support for dozens of faculty-initiated ventures that focus on enhancing the education of students. Thousands of learners at WSU have benefitted directly or indirectly from scores of innovative ideas to transform pedagogy and curricular issues.

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3 CAS faculty awarded WSU seed grants

May 8, 2019 adriana

Washington State University has awarded 10 New Faculty Seed Grants (NFSG) to encourage the development of research, scholarly, or creative programs. The program supports projects that will significantly contribute to the researchers’ long range goals by kick-starting a more complex project or idea. The seed funding to junior faculty helps build the foundation for their research programs, allowing recipients to gather preliminary data, build collaborations, or establish creative programs. The funding also effectively provides a basis for faculty to seek extramural funding as well as opportunities for professional growth.

The Office of Research, the Office of the President, and the Office of the Provost fund the NFSG program. The 10 proposals selected this year represent the range of scholarly activity taking place at WSU. The total amount of grant funding is $212,524.

Awarded faculty and their projects include:

Deepti Singh, School of the Environment, will analyze the influence of multiple climate factors that govern the extent, severity, and duration of the impacts wildfires have on air quality and water resources.
Joe Hedges, Department of Fine Arts, will create and exhibit a new body of innovative intermedia art works that combine oil painting and new media objects, such as flatscreen televisions and tablets.
Rock Mancini, Department of Chemistry, will develop a new type of reaction to generate synthetic-biologic hybrids, enabling the synthesis of many new biomolecule therapeutics.

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