The UCLA Student Members of the American Chemical Society has been awarded a Green Chemistry Student Chapter Award for activities in the 2014-15 academic year.  SMACS was one of only 43 chapters nationwide to receive the award, given to student groups which promote green chemistry on campus, by the American Chemistry Society’s Green Chemistry Institute. […]

We are sad to report that Professor emeritus Howard Reiss passed away on December 21, 2015 at the age of 93. Elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1977, Prof. Reiss was an accomplished physical chemist and theorist who worked in a variety of fields, including solid state, statistical mechanics, nucleation and colloid phenomena, […]

View lectures by 2015 Seaborg Medalist Stefan Hell and symposium speakers Carlos Bustamante, Scott Fraser and Shimon Weiss. To view the videos of the lectures visit the video recordings website.  A photo gallery is also available online. To learn more about the 2015 Seaborg Symposium please visit the event website.

Recent graduates Nooriel Banayan (’15) and Kyle Travaglini (’15) received the Dean’s Prize Medal of Excellence at the 2015 UCLA Science Poster Day. The students were presented their awards by the Dean and Vice Provost of Undergraduate Education at the May 12th event. Winners were chosen by the faculty judges as students who exemplify excellence […]

Graduate students competed in the Research Pitch Competition by giving five minute “pitches” about their research to a panel of faculty judges.  The event was hosted by the Chemistry and Biochemistry Graduate Student Association (CBGSA). 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place prizes were awarded for $500, $300, and $200 respectively in the form of a travel grant […]

On November 13, 2015, the Graduate Student Affairs Office held its second annual Outreach and Diversity Day, co-sponsored by the American Chemical Society (ACS). The event was created as a recruiting mechanism to invite prospective students from diversity-sponsored programs to visit the UCLA campus and learn more about graduate life in our department. Students from […]

Professor Richard Kaner was awarded the Materials Research Society (MRS) Medal at the 2015 MRS Fall meeting in Boston. Prof. Kaner delivered his award talk “Synthesis and Applications of Conducting Polymer Nanofibers” at the meeting on December 1, 2015. He was presented the MRS Medal at the MRS Awards Ceremony the next day. Prof.  Kaner […]

The UCLA groups of Houk and Tang have combined with the Codexis company, a biotech firm, to develop methods to understand the origins of enzyme selectivity. How do these enzymes achieve their remarkable selectivity? Where other catalysts fail, these green biocatalysts can often deliver pharmaceuticals in high yield and purity. The research was published this […]