This award from the Division of Chemistry (CHE) supports the renewal of a Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) site at Columbia University for the summers of 2008-2010. The program will be directed by James Valentini with assistance from Virginia Cornish and Ruben Gonzalez, faculty members in the Department of Chemistry at Columbia. This REU site will bring eight NSF funded students to campus for a ten-week period each summer to conduct cutting edge research in chemistry. An additional eight REU students will be supported with institutional funds. Junior, sophomore, and highly qualified freshman undergraduate students will be recruited from across the nation. One of the special advantages that this program can offer to the REU undergraduate research students is the opportunity to participate in research that extends beyond the faculty and resources of the Chemistry Department. Columbia has a Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center and a Materials Research Science and Engineering Center, each of which brings together faculty from the Chemistry Department and faculty in Physics and in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Many faculty in the Chemistry Department are principal investigators in the Centers and the REU students in this program will have the opportunity to choose projects that are part of the Centers research efforts. Chemistry REU students can also choose to work with non-Chemistry faculty in the Centers or work in the labs of faculty in the Biological Sciences Department who have extensive collaborations with members of the Chemistry Department. These many interdisciplinary efforts span the frontiers of chemistry research and provide Columbia's REU students unique opportunities.
(REU) program in the Chemistry Department has offered undergraduate students the opportunity to take part in all the activities of a practicing research scientist. Our aim was to develop enthusiasm for scientific research and teach the skills necessary to channel the enthusiasm effectively and productively. The twenty-nine students that participated in our program over three years developed original research plans in close collaboration with a Columbia mentor, carried out those plans in the laboratory of our faculty sponsors, and presented the results of their research in a written report and during our summer research symposium. The students were involved with projects throughout the entire department encompassing organic, inorganic, physical and theoretical chemistry. A selection of project titles includes: Derivatized amino acid synthesis for misacylation of tRNA molecules The function of ribosomal protein L11 C-terminal domain in the GTPase center Investigating collagen network structure as a function of temperature and concentration via confocal microscopy Self-assembling phthalimide thiol onto gold surfaces for the production of carbohydrate sensors Synthesis of pyridoxamine PAMAM dendrimers for transamination reactions Temperature dependence of cytochrome P450 BM-3 activity Single-molecule Conductance of Diaminostilbenes Progress Towards the Total Synthesis of Isocyclocitrinol a: Efforts Towards Development of a Diastereoselective Cyclocarbonylation Reaction Synthesis, Characterization, and Nonlinear Optical Studies of Silica-Coated Ag/Au Alloy Nanospheres Novel Zn-Porphyrin Tweezer as a Circular Dichroism Sensitive Reporter of Amino Alcohol Chirality Participants gained experience in collaborative work and cooperative learning in the lab and also in seminars. They attended training sessions on laboratory safety and ethical and responsible conduct of research. They received guidance on making career choices in chemistry and applying to graduate school. They participated in workshops on writing a comprehensive research report, providing careful peer review of research reports, and constructing an effective seminar presentation. The students also had the opportunity to attend weekly seminars given by faculty, and participate in a field trip to Brookhaven National Laboratories and IBM Watson Research Center. Students participating in this program have become co-authors on papers published in professional journals: Yang, Ya-li; Leone, Lindsay M.; Kaufman, Laura J. Elastic moduli of collagen gels can be predicted from two-dimensional confocal microscopy. Biophysical Journal (2009), 97(7), 2051-2060. Wei, Sujun; Wang, Jianing; Venhuizen, Scott; Skouta, Rachid; Breslow, Ronald Dendrimers in solution can have their remote catalytic groups folded back into the core: Enantioselective transaminations by dendritic enzyme mimics-II. Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry Letters (2009), 19(19), 5543-5546. Sundaresan, Arun Kumar; Jockusch, Steffen; Li, Yongjun; Lancaster, Jeffrey R.; Banik, Steven; Zimmerman, Paul; Blackwell, James M.; Bristol, Robert; Turro, Nicholas J. Adiabatic ring opening in tethered naphthalene and anthracene cycloadducts. Photochemical & Photobiological Sciences (2010), 9(8), 1082-1084. Frunzi, Michael; Baldwin, Anne M.; Shibata, Nobuyuki; Iwamatsu, Sho-Ichi; Lawler, Ronald G.; Turro, Nicholas J. Kinetics and Solvent-Dependent Thermodynamics of Water Capture by a Fullerene-Based Hydrophobic Nanocavity. Journal of Physical Chemistry A (2011) 115(5), 735-740. Each year, upon completion of their projects and presentation at the summer research symposium, two students were presented with a Travel Award and given the opportunity to present their findings at a National ACS meeting. Students so supported presented the following papers: Yang, Ya-li; Leone, Lindsay M.; Kaufman, Laura J. Investigating Collagen Network Structure as a Function of Temperature and Concentration via Confocal Microscopy. Abstracts of Papers, 237th ACS National Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT, United States, March 22-26, 2009 Nunez, Claribel; Petrovic, Ana; Berova, Nina; Probing Chirality of Diamines by Novel CDsensitive Dimeric Zn-porphyrin Tweezers. Abstracts of Papers, CD 2009 – 12th International Conference on Circular Dichroism, Brescia, Italy, September, 2009 Carris, Ryan M.; Plummer, Christopher W.; Leighton, James L. Progress toward the total synthesis of Isocyclocitrinol A. Abstracts of Papers, 239th ACS National Meeting, San Francisco, CA, United States, March 21-25, 2010 Messer, Kayla J.; Avins, Joshua; Effraim, Phillip; Cornish, Virginia. Derivatized amino acid synthesis for the misacylation of tRNA molecules. Abstracts of Papers, 239th ACS National Meeting, San Francisco, CA, United States, March 21-25, 2010 Milner, Phillip J.; Treitler, Daniel S.; Snyder, Scott A. Controlling the regioselectivity of the bromonium-induced cyclization of g ,d -unsaturated alcohols. Abstracts of Papers, 239th ACS National Meeting, San Francisco, CA, United States, March 21-25, 2010 Krikorian, Markrete; Meisner, Jeffrey S.; Nuckolls, Colin S. Single-molecule conductance of disubstituted stilbenes. Abstracts of Papers, 241st ACS National Meeting & Exposition, Anaheim, CA, United States, March 27-31, 2011 Baldwin, Anne M.; Frunzi, Michael; Iwamatsu, Sho-ichi; Murata, Shizuaki; Lawler, Ronald G.; Turro, Nicholas J. Kinetics and solvent-dependant thermodynamics of water capture by a hydrophobic bowl. Abstracts of Papers, 241st ACS National Meeting & Exposition, Anaheim, CA, United States, March 27-31, 2011 The majority of the students who participated in our REU program have now graduated and have continued on to advanced degrees at institutions such as Columbia, MIT, UC Berkeley, Texas A&M and Cornell.
