New Faculty

Dr. Zachary Riedel will join the UMass chemistry department in August 2026 as an Assistant Professor. Zach received his BS in materials science and engineering from Clemson University. He then earned his PhD in materials science and engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign under the supervision of Prof. Daniel Shoemaker. His dissertation focused on the prediction, single-crystal growth, and characterization of new materials containing Eu3+ for applications in quantum memory and networking. Concurrently, he probed the crystallographic and magnetic properties of unexplored antiferromagnets. After graduate school, Zach transitioned to a postdoctoral position at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in the strongly correlated electron systems team, working with Dr. Eric Bauer. At LANL, he has discovered and synthesized lanthanide- and actinide-containing intermetallics in search of electronic properties predicted for two-dimensional atomic bonding networks. As an Assistant Professor at UMass, Zach will establish a research program tackling challenges in the data-driven design and synthesis of new inorganic materials, especially those relevant to next-generation energy and computing technology.