Research Highlight
Research in the AJA Laboratory is strongly interdisciplinary…crossing disciplines and blending conventional organic synthesis techniques and photophysical & photochemical paradigms to devise alternatives approaches for energy applications, organic materials and sustainable chemical synthesis. While the AJA group research themes are inspired by fundamental and established concepts in organic photochemistry and photophysics, the use of cutting edge techniques and instrumentations to rationalize molecular interactions and transformations is paramount; for example, we aim at designing new organic chromophores and probing the mechanism of excitons migration/diffusion and annihilation/quenching upon photo-excitation in various media.
Lab Spotlight
Two new students have joined the AJA Lab. We welcome Jayla (M.Sc.) and Samjhanna (Ph.D.)
August 28, 2020Our fruitful collaborative work with Dr. Onajole at Roosevelt Univ. on the synthesis and anti-tuberculosis activities of imidazo[1,2-a]pyridinecarboxamides is accepted for publication in Chemical Biology & Drugs Design (link)
June 8, 2020Our recent paper in ACS JPC C is now online
Young Ju’s paper on charge & energy transfer in triplet donor-acceptor dyad has been published in J. Phys. Chem. C. Congrats to all!
J. Phys. Chem. C 2020, DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.0c01530. (link)
Young Ju is the recipient of the 2020-2021 Kilpatrick graduate fellowships
PhD candidate Young Ju is the recipient of the 2020-2021 Kilpatrick Graduate Fellowship from the Chemistry Department. Congrats!
May 27, 2020Young Ju is one of the awardees of the 2020-2021 Starr & Fieldhouse fellowship
PhD candidate Young Ju is one the recipients of the 2020-2021 Starr & Fieldhouse award from the Provost Office. Congrats!
May 27, 2020Guang is now officially a PhD candidate
Guang has passed the PhD qualifying exam…he will now continue his work on the synthesis of polyaromatic triplet chromophores. Congrats!
April 21, 2020Young Ju received a Young Investigator Award from Fusion Conference
PhD candidate Young Ju is one the recipients of a Young Investigator Award to attend the 2nd Frontiers of Photochemistry in Nassau, the Bahamas. Her poster also received 3rd place prize. Congrats!
February 24, 2020Jean-Luc has been elected to the vice-chair position of the Users Committee at the Center for Nanoscale Materials at Argonne National Lab.
Jean-Luc will serve as the Vice-Chair for FY 2020-2022; the committee serves as a liaison between the CNM staffs and users.
January 12, 2020Our work on the quinoidization of polyaromatics is published
Postdoc Naresh and PhD student Guang published their work on the quinoidization of polyaromatics to afford novel triplet chromophores.
Eur. J. Org. Chem., 2020, DOI:10.1002/ejoc.201901456. (link) (Cover Page)
AJA was the Brown and Williamson Distinguished Guest Lecturer at the University of Kentucky-Louisville
AJA’s talk was on “Non-classical Aromatic Triplet Chromophores” which can be tailored for solar energy harvesting and modulation and other energy applications.
During the talk, AJA also featured other research projects performed by undergraduate students at IIT.
Funding & Sponsors
