Nine Researchers to Collaborate at the Center for Fueling the Future at UMass Amherst

Nov. 27, 2007

Contact:

Ed Blaguszewski 413/545-0444

AMHERST, Mass. – At the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s Center for Fueling the Future, chemist S. Thayumanavan will lead eight UMass Amherst scientists and one scientist from Yale University in the quest to better understand proton transfer, a critical component of fuel cells. The research team at this National Science Foundation (NSF) Chemical Bonding Center comprises a diverse group of chemists, material scientists, physicists and chemical engineers.

Sankaran “Thai” Thayumanavan, Principal Investigator
Center for Fueling the Future, an NSF Chemical Bonding Center
Associate Professor of Chemistry
University of Massachusetts Amherst
413/545-1313, thai@chem.umass.edu

Principal investigator Thayumanavan has been conducting organic and polymer chemistry research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst since 2003. His work focuses on designing and synthesizing new molecules and materials, using a variety of techniques and building blocks. In addition to investigating new molecular architectures for transporting electric charge, Thayumanavan’s lab has also focused on developing materials that can deliver therapeutic drugs or genes to certain cells, work that may lead to new treatments for certain diseases or new tools for biomedical diagnostics.

Thayumanavan came to UMass Amherst from Tulane University, where he was awarded a National Science Foundation CAREER award, the foundation’s most prestigious award in support of the early career development activities of teacher-scholars. He has received several honors including a Cottrell Scholar Award in 2002 from the Research Corporation, and he directed Tulane’s Science Scholars Program for High School Students. Thayumanavan was a post-doctoral fellow at the California Institute of Technology in the lab of Seth Marder, where he focused on synthesizing organic light emitting diodes. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1996 and has bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemistry from the American College in Madurai, India. Thayumanavan has published numerous articles in scholarly journals and organized several scientific symposia.

Other members of the Center for Fueling the Future team include:

• Scott M. Auerbach, professor of chemistry, adjunct professor of chemical engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Michael D. Barnes, associate professor of chemistry, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• E. Bryan Coughlin, associate professor of polymer science and engineering, adjunct professor of chemistry, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Jeanne Hardy, assistant professor of chemistry, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Ryan C. Hayward, assistant professor of polymer science and engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Mark A Johnson, Arthur T. Kemp Professor of Chemistry, Yale University

• Peter A. Monson, professor of chemical engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Mark T. Tuominen, professor of physics, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

• Dhandapani Venkataraman, associate professor of chemistry, University of Massachusetts Amherst.


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