School of Chemistry

One of the key roadblocks in the management of the COVID-19 pandemic has been the availability of reliable RNA test kits to identify people carrying the virus. Testing is essential for rapid identification and tracing of infection. While antibody tests can show which people have already been exposed at some point in the past and have developed an immune response, the RNA tests can determine whether the person is currently infected and, depending on the load of virus, how long it is since they acquired it. Australia has only a few groups currently able to manufacture these tests. A common method involves taking the fluid from a swab, lysing cells, and separating the RNA with magnetic beads. A shortage of these beads has held up the development of locally made COVID-19 tests and led to dependence on over-priced and often low-quality tests from overseas. Because of the heavy demand for these tests, supply is not assured.

Dr Lars Goerigk has joined the inaugural Early Career Advisory Board of Chemical Reviews as one of ten international early and mid-career researchers.

Congratulations to Boskovic Group members Gemma Gransbury, Jett Janetzki and Moya Hay on the publication of their paper “Understanding the Origin of One- or Two-Step Valence Tautomeric Transitions in Bis(dioxolene)-Bridged Dinuclear Cobalt Complexes” in  J. Am. Chem. Soc.

Congratulations to Simone Calvello and A/Prof Alessandro Soncini, for having their paper “Effect of Magnetic Anisotropy on Direct Chiral Discrimination in Paramagnetic NMR spectroscopy " selected as a 2020 PCCP Hot Article.

Congratulations to Dr Lars Goerigk who published an article together with PhD student Dale Lonsdale which will appear in print in the upcoming inaugural “PCCP Emerging Investigators” themed collection in which Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics recognises select early career researchers in physical chemistry, chemical physics and biophysical chemistry.

PhD student Nisha Mehta was born with albinism. With support from her parents and educators she has overcome many challenges to pursue an award-winning career in chemistry

School of Chemistry academic Professor Emeritus Frances Separovic is the cover star of the latest volume of the Australian Journal of Chemistry.

Which factors control transmetalation? To answer this question at the strictly molecular level, the transfer of a phenyl ring from boron to silver or to lithium in isolated ionic tetraphenylborate complexes was examined by multistage mass spectrometry and quantum chemical calculations in a joint collaboration between Richard O'Hair and Thomas Auth and Konrad Koszinowski from the University of Göttingen.

While getting close to the awesome power of nature is a big draw for tourism, the eruption on White Island reminds us of the very real risks.

Congratulations to Ben Spyrou (Donnelly group) and Martin van Koeverden (Abrahams group) who were both shortlisted for the prestigious Don Stranks Award.

The paper reports the first direct observation of unpaired 4f electrons in synchrotron X-ray diffraction experiments, detected in two Dy(III) complexes.

Nisha Mehta, PhD student in the Goerigk group, is a 2019 recipient of the Indian National Award for the Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities in the category “Role Model”, one of India’s Presidential honours.

Congratulations to Natalie Uhlikova and Charles Croft, PhD students in the Kolev group, for the prizes they were awarded at the 27th Annual RACI R&D Topics Conference in Adelaide!

Congratulations to Dr Chris Hall, who has been awarded the Asian Photochemical Association Prize for Young Scientist 2019, as a recognition of his work in photochemistry.

The Australian Research Council awards the Future Fellowships for excellent mid-career researchers to undertake high-quality research in areas of national and international benefit.

The Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) scheme provides focused research support for early career researchers in both teaching and research, and research-only positions. It supports research in areas of critical national importance by enabling outstanding Australian and international early career researchers to conduct their research in Australia.

For the last 12 months, participants hailing from all corners of the globe have undergone an intensive leadership training program for women with a background in STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine), as they prepare for the fourth iteration of the Homeward Bound voyage.

Are you ready for a career in research? Our Graduate Research Pathway guarantees you a place with us from masters through to your PhD.

In the 90s, Professor Richard Robson created a new class of coordination polymers, and his models inspired an entirely new field of chemistry.

Exciton Science is continuously offering opportunities to work and study within the Centre. click through for open Postdoctoral Research Fellow and PhD scholarship positions.

Amy Hancock, Masters student in the Goerigk research group, won a poster prize for her poster “Assessing Noncovalent Interactions in Electronic Excited States” at this year’s conference of the Asian Pacific Association for Theoretical and Computational Chemistry (APATCC) in Sydney.

Five women at different career stages gave valuable insights into studying and working in the School of Chemistry.

Congratulations to Boskovic Group PhD student Gemma Gransbury on the publication of her paper “Single-ion anisotropy and exchange coupling in cobalt(II)-radical complexes: insights from magnetic and ab initio studies” in Chemical Science.

Congratulations to PhD student Dale Lonsdale from the Goerigk Group for winning one of the poster awards at DFT2019 in Alicante, Spain.

The School of Chemistry and the Chemistry Institute at Humboldt University of Berlin are offering third year students the opportunity to complete the research component of the Chemical Research Project CHEM30013 in Germany over 8 weeks between December 2019 and February 2020 whilst experiencing the German culture and a Winter lifestyle.

PhD student Saghar Massomi-Godarzi (Jones Group) has described new intra-molecular singlet fission materials in Advanced Energy Materials.

A Global Grand Challenges grant has been awarded to the University of Melbourne and the City University of Hong Kong to develop a new, low-cost bioreactor system.

Bosirul Hoque from the Kolev Group has won the best oral presentation award at the 14th International Conference on Membrane Science and Technology (MST2019, June 13-14) in Singapore.

Like most things in life, careers don’t always have a clear and straightforward path. Hear the career stories of the Faculty of Science's Frances Separovic and Theresa Jones. You just never really know what you are capable of, and sometimes you have to follow your nose and just take the opportunities as they happen.

Two Faculty of Science academics received AOs in the 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours list for distinguished service.

In a long running collaboration with Prof. Vlasta Bonačić-Koutecký (University of Split), Richard O’Hair has published a new study which made the cover of ChemCatChem.

The BioInspiration Seed Funding Competition is designed to have teams develop creative, nature-inspired solutions to global/ practical/ human technological and design challenges.

Professor Paul Mulvaney will lead a project to develop flexible graphene electronics after successfully receiving funding from the Australia-China Science Research Fund (ACSRF).

Gemma Gransbury has won 1st place in the poster prize at the Chemical Communications "Chemistry for Global Challenges" Symposium at RMIT.

The School of Chemistry celebrated International Women's Day with a lunch time forum.

Nisha Mehta from the Goerigk group has been awarded two prizes at the 2019 RSC Twitter Poster Conference.

Calvin Lee has had his latest paper published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry A and featured as a Hot Paper.

Dr Goerigk was awarded for his work in Density Functional Theory and his guidelines in computational strategies.

A new drug delays motor neurone disease progression and improves cognitive and clinical symptoms according to trial results announced by a spin-out company from the Florey and University of Melbourne.

Congratulations to Lenka O'Connor Sraj from Kolev Research Group for being awarded the fist prize for oral presentation at the annual R & D Topics Conference in Canberra organized by the Analytical and Environmental Chemistry Division of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute.

Congratulations to Dr Lars Goerigk for having been awarded the 2018 Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research (ECR) for his recent contributions to the field of Density Functional Theory.

The School of Chemistry would like to express a hearty thanks to Wilsmore Fellow Dr Nick Chilton from the University of Manchester, for the brilliant EPR workshop that he ran this week.

Congratulations to Associate Professor Colette Boskovic, Associate Professor Craig Hutton, and Professor Gavin Reid for each successfully obtaining an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project grant. Together they have received over $1.25 million, contributing to the Faculty of Science’s total of nearly $9.75 million.

In a long running collaboration with Prof. David Goldberg (Johns Hopkins University), the Jameson lab, including PhD candidates Josh Prendergast and Zahra Shirani-Sarmazeh, have published a new study in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Based on a big-data analysis of publications and citations by League of Scholars, the most recent edition of The Australian’s Research Magazine named the following researchers of The School of Chemistry as young up-and-coming Australian leaders in their respective fields:- Dr Lars Goerigk in “Molecular Modeling”- Dr Marc-Antoine Sani (Separovic group at Bio21) in “Biophysics”

Congratulations to the Goerigk group who published a front-cover article in Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics (PCCP), which also got selected for PCCP’s themed collection of “2018 hot articles” [1]. The paper addresses the every-growing and confusing “zoo" of double-hybrid density functional theory (DFT) methods.

In a paper published today in Advanced Energy Materials PhD student Saghar Masoomi‐Godarzi (Jones Group) describes a new class of materials that promote intra-molecular Singlet Fission. This process, which takes high energy photons and creates two low energy photons, has been demonstrated in new advanced organic semiconductor materials where the two excitons are hosted on the same molecule. Theory suggests that the maximum efficiency of solar cells can be increased from 32% to around 45% by incorporating SF materials.

University of Melbourne coordination chemists Paul Donnelly and Colette Boskovic were recently invited to contribute articles to a special issue of Coordination Chemistry Reviews celebrating Coordination Chemistry in Australia.

Alice O’Rourke (University of Birmingham), the 2018 International Museums & Collections Award winner, has just completed a new themed exhibition on the ground floor of the Chemistry Building.

Congratulations to PhD student Gemma Gransbury on winning a poster prize at the International Conference on Molecule-based Magnets (ICMM2018) in Rio de Janeiro.

This week, the School of Chemistry welcomed three students from Humboldt University (HU), Berlin, as part of the exchange program recently established by Associate Professor Uta Wille.

The School of Chemistry celebrated its annual Student Awards evening on 15th August to celebrate the achievements of our outstanding students of 2017.

Congratulations to Boskovic Group PhD student Maja Dunstan, who has received an Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering (AINSE) Postgraduate Research Award.

Academic staff and graduate researchers from the School of Chemistry engaged in spirited discussions at the Women in Chemistry panel discussion as part of the Science Festival.

Kolev Group PhD student Lenka O'Connor Sraj has received a travel award of US$400 from the SETAC (Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry) North America Awards and Fellowship Committee.

Dr Czyz has joined the School of Chemistry as part of the ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre (Chemical Industries) within the Polyzos Group. She is a synthetic organic chemist and will lead industry engagement in photoredox catalysis and flow chemistry.

Dr Chris Ritchie and colleagues have published a paper on a new class of self-assembled molecules for advanced materials.

Crystallographers at the University of Melbourne received a boost following the installation of a state-of-the-art small molecule X-ray diffraction (XRD) machine.

Congratulations to Boskovic Group PhD student Gemma Gransbury, who has just received an Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI) Postgraduate Travel Bursary.

A recent article featuring Professor Richard O'Hair has been published in ChemComm (Chemical Communications).

Congratulations to Lenka O’Connor Šraj, Dr Inês Almeida, Chelsea Bassett, Associate Professor Ian McKelvie, and Professor Spas Kolev for the publication of a news story on the their research on the Elsevier Chemistry page.

Congratulations to Boskovic Group MSc student Aiden Atkin on the award of an Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering (AINSE) Honours Scholarship for his project “Inelastic Neutron Scattering of Lanthanoid Complexes”.

The School of Chemistry and the Chemistry Institute at Humboldt University of Berlin are offering third year students the opportunity to complete the research component of the Chemical Research Project CHEM30013 in Germany over 8 weeks between December 2018 and February 2019 whilst experiencing the German culture and a Winter lifestyle.

Congratulations to Dr Tessa Young, a recent PhD graduate from Tony Wedd’s lab, who has been awarded a Durham International Junior Research Fellowship (Durham University, UK).

In a long running collaboration with Prof. David Goldberg (Johns Hopkins University), the Jameson group, including PhD candidate Josh Prendergast, have published a new study in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. This investigation is part of a joint NIH grant.

Former University of Melbourne student, Professor Christine McKenzie (University of Southern Denmark), inspired women early career researchers at the School of Chemistry’s Inaugural International Women’s Day networking lunch.

A recent article published by Dr Chris Ritchie and PhD student Hedi Karoui detailing the microwave-assisted synthesis, characterization and post-synthetic modification of a series of polyoxometalates has been featured on the front cover of RSC journal New Journal of Chemistry.