ANNUAL REPORT. Academic Year Department of Chemistry. Jeffrey S. Gaffney, Chair and Professor

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1 ANNUAL REPORT Academic Year Department of Chemistry Jeffrey S. Gaffney, Chair and Professor I. Mission The department is organized with the following objectives in view: 1. to increase the general cultural background of all students; 2. to prepare chemistry majors for graduate study, industrial work, or positions with professional ratings in government service; 3. to provide the basic training for professional students in medicine, dentistry, engineering, pharmacy, and other professional fields; and 4. to prepare high school chemistry teachers. II. Values Chemistry is at the heart of many disciplines and is a core science discipline. The Department offers both undergraduate degrees (BA, BS) and graduate degrees (MA, MS, PH.D.), the Ph.D. is part of the Applied Science Doctoral Program. The Department believes in maintaining high standards and follows the guidance of the American Chemical Society Chemical Education Committee in maintaining course offerings that meet their guidelines for success in chemistry, science, and associated health profession areas. The department s bachelor of science degree is certified by the American Chemical Society (ACS). Students earning this degree will be certified to the ACS for full membership on graduation. The department sponsors a student affiliate chapter of the ACS. Any student enrolled in a program of study leading to a bachelor s degree in chemistry or a related discipline is eligible for membership. The chapter serves as a focal point for those interested in the field of chemistry and offers them opportunities for practical experience and professional contacts. III. Vision UALR Chemistry is focused on giving our students the best chemical education possible and stresses research at both the undergraduate and graduate level as a means of keeping the faculty and students working towards their goals in light of the current state-of-the art. Faculty work to maintain accessibility to our students and also work to collaborate with each other and other departments throughout the university to enhance STEM education opportunities and generate successful graduates. We continue to work towards being the best all-around chemistry department in the State of Arkansas.

2 IV. Highlights A. Teaching The Department's BS degree is certified and is reviewed by the ACS periodically. (see below).

3 This past period we have had two of our Analytical Chemistry faculty retire to Emeritus Professor Status (Dr. Hanson and Dr. Shaikh). Dr. M. Keith Hudson joined the Department after being the Director of the Graduate Institute of Technology (GIT) and continues to direct the NASA EPSCOR program at UALR. Dr. Brian Berry was asked to be the Director of the Applied Science Program that includes the Doctoral Program and a Masters in Applied Science. Dr. Anindya Ghosh was asked to be Interim Associate Dean for the College of Arts, Letters, and Science as this new College was initiated in July of We are currently seeking to hire replacement for Dr. Hanson with an Asst. Professor of Analytical Chemistry and seeking to add an Assistant Professor in the area of Biochemistry to refill Dr. Shaikh's position in the department. Note that these changes have placed a significant burden on the department with release time being given and our department being short-handed. The Department has relied heavily on making use of graduate assistants to teach labs in order to be able to maintain course offerings for our students. We hope to find suitable replacements by January of 2016 for these two positions to be able to offer key high demand courses on a twice a year status in Analytical and Biochemistry areas. We have continued to work with number of high schools with regard to concurrent teaching of CHEM 1402 (ASMSA, Greenbrier, Central). We also have concurrent teaching of CHEM 1403 at ASMSA. All of these programs are assessed by having the students there as well as in our classes at UALR take the ACS standardized tests for the first and second semester general freshmen chemistry classes. Dr. Gaffney visited all of the schools and instructors and submitted evaluation reports to the concurrent program for accreditation purposes during this year. Our graduating seniors are all required to take the Major Fields Test in Chemistry as part of our assessment. Those scores have shown our students to rank at percentile for our average graduate with a number of our recent graduates reaching >90 percentile rankings. To improve our Freshman Chemistry success rates in CHEM 1402 and CHEM1406 (Chemistry for Engineers), the department has implemented a pre-test as a prerequisite for the course with minimum scores for passing and taking the course. This test is currently run through Blackboard and is run through the testing center. CHEM 1300 Preparation for General Chemistry is recommended for students who do not pass the pre-test to better prepare them for these important starting classes. This class has now been put on-line and was offered for the first time during the past year in Fall and Spring semesters as well as in Summer 2. One of our significant challenges has been the overall infrastructure available for chemistry laboratories in our courses. UALR only has two organic laboratory areas, one laboratory area for analytical and four laboratories for teaching freshman level classes. Maintaining equipment and supplies for these labs requires significant amounts of funding from technical fees as the department has a small maintenance budget and budget for chemical supplies. Note that the Department of Chemistry also teaches a number of key courses for the Nursing program - CHEM 1400 Fundamentals of Chemistry I and Dr. Gaffney has developed a one semester course CHEM 1406 General Chemistry for Engineers. Dr. Gaffney is currently working with a colleague on writing a textbook for CHEM 1406 as the only book for this course available

4 needs improvement. CHEM 1400, 1402, 1406 and CHEM 1409 Science and Society were all approved as CORE Science classes and serve not only chemistry but a number of the various departments (Nursing, Engineering, etc.). B. Research The Department of Chemistry continues its publications and efforts in the areas of nanochemistry and materials, environmental and green chemistry, polymer chemistry, small molecule syntheses and characterization (pharmaceuticals and biochemistry applications), and computational chemistry. For the annual period of the Dept. had 24 peer reviewed publications (journal articles and book chapters), 35 presentations at professional meetings (international, national, and local) and 5 patents and 3 invention disclosures along with 3 revised patent applications. Four of the succesful patent have led to small business innovative research grant (Dr. Viswanathan's group) working with the Center for Nanotechnology as part of the UALR cooperative venture with SYNANOMET. The Department of Chemistry was successful in obtaining a research grade NMR from the NSF to pursue research in nanomaterials, environmental chemistry, polymers, catalysis (green chemistry), and small molecule synthesis along with natural product characterization. Dr. Anindya Ghosh led this effort along with Dr. Brian Berry and most of the Department of Chemistry active research faculty as well as other colleagues in COS. This instrument has now been installed and is playing an important role in the Chemistry Department as well as other UALR researcher's investigations. Dr. Belford has continued to develop novel chemical education efforts with support of the NSF and the American Chemical Society's (ACS) Division of Chemical Education. Dr. Berry has also been successful in obtaining funding for collaborative research from NSF. Dr. Jones received a startup grant from Arkansas for his research, and Dr. Hudson continues to run the NASA EPSCOR program at UALR. There continues to be collaborative efforts with the Center for Integrative Nanotechnology as well, so even in very tough funding times, the faculty in the Department of Chemistry have been fairly successful in obtaining and maintaining funding. Undergraduate research efforts continues to be encouraged and a number of our ACS student members attended the ACS National Meeting and presented work on community outreach as well as their undergraduate research. The Department of Chemistry assisted the Applied Science Program in graduating 1 student with Ph.D.s this year in Applied Science (Chemistry). C. Service UALR Chemistry Department faculty supports local high school students improving chemistry skills and science education in a number of ways, including hosting the 2015 Central Arkansas Regional Science Fair, directing the 2014/2015 Central Arkansas Regional Junior Academy of Science, and directing the Central Arkansas Chemistry Olympiad, as well as judging in the Arkansas Science Olympiad. These activities allow these students to showcase their capabilities and in the case of the Chemistry Olympiad, identify students for national and international competitions. These STEM student activities are not targeted specifically to any student

5 demographics, but we have had a number of minority/first generation students who have participated in these programs that have led to increasing their numbers in transitioning successfully from high school to college. Faculty members have visited a number of high schools to give talks to local students about jobs in chemistry areas and research activities including Central and McClellan High Schools. Our American Chemical Society Student Affiliates also again received national recognition by the ACS this year for their community outreach. The student group assists in recruiting events, as well as high school and middle school visits to work to increase the enthusiasm for chemistry in our local community. The department has also reached out to assist the Exxon Mobil Summer education program run by Dr. Vernard Henley from the Engineering College, as well as summer teacher institutes being run at UALR. Chair, faculty members, and the ACS student affiliates have been involved in a number of recruiting activities at UALR and also visiting local schools in the Little Rock area. During the period, the accomplishments of the faculty were recognized by the College of Science in faculty excellence in teaching (Dr. Brian Berry) and research (Dr. Anindya Ghosh). Both won the UALR awards for these areas. In the period the College of Arts, Letters, and Science recognized Dr. Gaffney for his efforts in Public Service and he also won the UALR Faculty Excellence award in this area. Dr. Anindya Ghosh was named the Professor of the Year for 2015 by the Central Arkansas Local Section of the American Chemical Society. D. Student Success Chemistry graduates were awarded the Outstanding graduating senior award for the College of Arts, Letters, and Science - Ms. Jetta Schirmer, BS degree. She is now continuing at UALR to obtain her M.S. degree in chemistry working with Dr. Brian Berry. Mr. Asad Azam was selected as the Whitbeck Outstanding graduating senior for the UALR graduating class of June Asad was a dual Biology BS and Chemistry BA major and is now working at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories in Pasadena, California. Many of our graduates were successful in applying to pharmacy school and medical school as well. Dr. Sunil Kumar Ramasahayam was named the Outstanding graduating Ph.D. student from the College of Arts, Letters, and Science in 2015, so we have had both success with our undergraduates as well as our graduate students. V. Assessment The Department of Chemistry continues to perform assessment by using standardized tests from the American Chemical Society and from the Educational Testing Services, Major Field Tests for our assessing our undergraduate students. In the Freshman Chemistry courses, the final exam is the ACS standardized tests. These tests are also used for Concurrent courses CHEM

6 taught at Central and Greenbrier High Schools, and for both CHEM 1402 and CHEM 1403 at the Arkansas State Math and Science Academy (ASMSA) in Hot Springs. The chair also has visited these concurrent high schools to ensure that the courses are being taught with the necessary equipment and qualified teachers with the required Master's degree (or 18 graduate hours in chemistry) or higher as per ADHE standards. We use the MFTs for Chemistry which allows the department and the graduating seniors to assess their retention of chemistry in analytical, inorganic, organic, and physical chemistry during the capstone CHEM 4199 seminar class. We also have the students take a departmental exam that we have used for many years to be able to have continued assessment of student retention and demonstration of critical thinking skills over a long time period. VI. Priorities for Next Year The Department of Chemistry has continued to publish over 20 papers a year for the past 6 years in the areas of nanochemistry and new materials development and application, green and environmental chemistry, computational chemistry and cheminformatics, polymer synthesis and applications, small molecule synthesis for pharmaceutical applications, and natural product characterization. The Department collaborates with Applied Science, Physics, Earth Science, and the Biology Dept (including bioinformatics) in COS, as well as a number of faculty in EIT, the Center for Nanotechnology, and GIT in these areas. We look to maintain this productivity in research. The Department has strong connections with the Dept. of Public Health (Moran), and the National Center for Toxicological Research, as well as a number of the DOE laboratories (Argonne, Oak Ridge National Labs). We also have developed good connections with the Arkansas Crime Laboratory and are working on developing connections with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality. We will continue to work on enhancing these connections and continue to place graduates at these facilities. Clearly the areas of Materials Science and Environmental Science appear to be areas where UALR can have an impact. We have the new Center for Nanotechnology building, a research grade NMR, visualization and computational centers, and new faculty added in Earth Science along with existing faculty in Applied Science, Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, and Physics in COS and faculty in EIT and the Nanocenter to continue to develop these fields. Recognizing that these areas are ones where we can involve both undergraduate and graduate students in the research activities, it will be important to complete the construction of laboratory areas on the upper floors of the Center for Nanotechnology building in the coming years to be able to maximize productivity and growth in these fields. Dr. Jerry Darsey has implemented a new Center for Molecular Design and Development that makes use of computational and visualization capabilities at UALR. As noted, earlier the main challenges for the Department of Chemistry are in the area of replacing retired faculty and maintaining program with infrastructure needs. We are currently short of research space for active faculty and look towards the completion of the top two floors

7 on the Nanotechnology Center that were originally set aside for chemistry research but not completed. Indeed, for the Dept. of Chemistry in CALS to expand beyond its current capacity will require considerable investment and likely a new Science Building for teaching and research. Under the current budget constraints, we realize this may not be likely, but is something that UALR should remember and consider should funding come available or a benefactor is found with interest in supporting STEM activities at UALR. VII. Appendix: Fast Facts A. Enrollment (fall census, 1 st major headcount and SSCHs) Fall Majors, 97 preadmits, 7 MS/MA, 13 Ph.D (Applied Science). SSCH for fall classes day count number includes concurrent from ASMSA and Greenbrier. It does not count Applied Science Students dissertation research hours or Bioinformatics Ph.D. students taught by Graduate Chemistry faculty. B. Retention (pending available data) Best estimate for retention was to determine SSCH completed at the end of the term. That was Again not counting Applied Science Students dissertation research hours or Bioinformatics Ph.D. students taught by Graduate Chemistry Faculty. That ratio is 83.4%. C. Personnel (number per category, tenure and promotion, etc.) The Department of Chemistry at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock offers two bachelor degrees in chemistry (B.S. and B.A.) and two graduate degrees (M.S. and M.A.). The B.S. in chemistry is American Chemical Society certified and is one of only 6 departments in Arkansas that has that distinction. The Department of Chemistry graduate faculty also hold Adjunct Faculty appointments in the Applied Science Program where an Applied Science (Chemistry) Ph.D. degree is offered. Currently the faculty members include: Dr. Jeffrey S. Gaffney, Chair/Professor, Atmospheric, Environmental, Physical Organic Chemistry. Dr. Robert E. Belford, Associate Professor, Chemical Education Dr. Brian C. Berry, Assistant Professor, Organic/Materials Chemistry; Graduate Student Adviser Dr. Jerry A. Darsey, Professor, Physical Chemistry Ms. Marian S. Douglas, Instructor, Freshman Chemistry Dr. Anindya Ghosh, Associate Professor, Inorganic and Green Chemistry Dr. Mary L. Good, Emeritus Donaghey University Professor Dr. Richard H. Hanson, Emeritus Professor, Analytical Chemistry and Freshman Chemistry Coordinator Dr. M. Keith Hudson, Analytical Chemistry and Instrumentation

8 Dr. Darin E. Jones, Assistant Professor, Organic and Pharmaceutical Chemistry Ms. Ronia Kattoum, Instructor, Nursing Freshman Chemistry and Organic Chemistry Dr. Ali U. Shaikh, Emeritus Professor, Analytical Chemistry Dr. Robert C. Steinmeier, Associate Professor, Biochemistry Dr. Tito Viswanathan, Professor, Organic and Polymer Chemistry Dr. Wei Zhao, Professor, Analytical Chemistry and Laser Spectroscopy Department also has a Research Assistant, Mr. Michael (Mike) McNerlin who is in charge of the Chemistry Stockroom and Teaching Laboratory operations and also serves on the UALR Safety Committee. Ms. M. Estelle Gilbreth is a Research Coordinator in charge of working with the chair to handle budgets, scheduling, student registration, faculty travel, and general operation of the department office located on 4th floor of Science Laboratory Building (SCLB, 451). D. Grants and Contracts Jerry A. Darsey, Department of Chemistry; John R. Talburt MRI: Acquisition of a Petascale Data Storage System for Big Data Exploration, Kenji Yoshi, Computer Science Department; Information Sciences Department October, 2014 $300,000/3 years D.E. Jones (PI Discovery and optimization of dehydroleucodine analogues as anti-leukemic and cytotoxic agents, submitted 06/14/14.) Requested amount: $83199 (ASTA, Funded) Robert Belford."Nanostructure-Assisted Photoelectrochemical Water Splitting for Hydrogen and Oxygen Production, , NASA RID Program, $40,846, Awarded, PI Wei Zhao, co-pis Tar-pin Chen, Grant Wangila. Robert Belford, NSF IIP : I-Corps: WikiHyperGlossary an Information $50,000 Literacy Technology (Awarded: July 1, Dec. 31, 2015) Robert Belford, NSF TUES DUE : Collaborative Research: $154,935 Cheminformatics OLCC (Awarded: Sep. 1, 2012 Sep. 1, 2015) Tito Viswanathan, Novel lignin based magnetic nanocomposites for removal and recovery of phosphorus from contaminated waters, Chief Scientist for Synanomet, LLC (UALR has equity in the company) $300,000 for 2 years. EPA Phase II SBIR program (Funded) July 30, 2013 through July 30, 2015 Anindya Ghosh, Brian Berry, Darin Jones, Jeff Gaffney, Tito Viswanathan Project/Proposal Title: MRI: Acquisition of an NMR Spectrometer for Research and Training Source of Support: NSF, PI (NSF CHE ) Total Award Amount: $273,118 Total Award Period Covered:

9 Anindya Ghosh, Brian Berry, Project/Proposal Title: Part of the VICTER Team (Vertically-Integrated Center for transformative Energy Research) Source of Support: NSF-EPSCoR program, (UALR, co-pi) Total Award Amount: $1.82 M (For 5 years- UALR- co-pi) Total Award Period Covered: Location of Project: University of Arkansas at Little Rock Support: Current Anindya Ghosh, Project/Proposal Title: C-H bond activation Source of Support: ASTA, PI Total Award Amount: $29,200 Total Award Period Covered: Location of Project: University of Arkansas at Little Rock Person-Months per Year Committed to the Project: 0 Brian Berry Cold Zone Annealing $491,093 NSF 2013 Funded until $491,093 for Directed Assembly 2017 of Multicomponent Block Copolymer Thin Films Vertically Integrated $1,820, NSF 2011 Continuing $1,820, Center for until 2015 Transformative Energy Research Collaborative Research: $150,000 NSF 2010 Ended May $150,000 Fundamentals of Block 2014 Copolymer Ordering During Cold Zone Annealing E. Fundraising Chemistry department raises funds for the American Chemical Society Student Association from sales of laboratory notebooks used in freshman classes. Those funds are used to finance travel for the students to go to national meetings.

10 F. Other