PhD in Synthetic Organic and PhysOrg Chemistry; USA

[Tarquinn]

PhD studentships in synthetic organic and physical organic chemistry are available in the laboratory of Prof. Rajendra Rathore at the Department of Chemistry, Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA. The main research focus of the Rathore lab is in synthesis and physico-chemical investigation of novel aromatic molecules and materials for applications in cutting-edge technologies, such as solar cells, photovoltaic devices, organic light-emitting diodes, etc. Successful candidates will gain an excellent experience in organic synthesis, organic electrochemistry and photochemistry, and X-ray crystallography; they will have opportunities to participate in multi-disciplinary collaborative research and publish their research in leading high-impact journals. In addition, there are opportunities in combined experimental and computational chemistry research. During the course of their PhD studies graduate students will gain good teaching experience working as teaching assistants (TAs) with undergraduate students.

Rathore lab has on-going funding from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, and actively publishes in high-impact journals, including the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Angewandte Chimie, and Science. The department is equipped with state-of-the-art NMR (600 and 400 MHz), mass-spectrometry, X-ray, and laser spectroscopic facilities, and has access to a high-performance computer cluster for computational chemistry calculations. Marquette University provides graduate students with adequate financial support, tuition fee waiver, and health insurance.

Interested individuals are encouraged to contact Prof. Rathore directly at raj.rathore@marquette.edu (English only, please) or Dr. Marat Talipov at marat.talipov@marquette.edu (Russian or English).

Selected recent articles from the Rathore group:
"Charge delocalization in self-assembled mixed-valence aromatic cation radicals", Navale, T. S.; Thakur, K.; Vyas, V. S.; Wadumethrige, S. H.; Shukla, R.; Lindeman, S. V.; Rathore, R. Langmuir 2012, 28, 71–83. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/la202611w
"Probing the arenium-ion (proton transfer) versus the cation-radical (electron transfer) mechanism of scholl reaction using DDQ as oxidant", Zhai, L.; Shukla, R.; Wadumethrige, S. H.; Rathore, R. J. Org. Chem. 2010, 75, 4748–4760. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/jo100611k
"Crossover from single-step tunneling to multistep hopping for molecular triplet energy transfer", Vura-Weis, J.; Abdelwahed, S. H.; Shukla, R.; Rathore, R.; Ratner, M. A.; Wasielewski, M. R. Science 2010, 328, 1547–1550. http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1189354
"Preparation of a tetraphenylethylene-based emitter: Synthesis, structure and optoelectronic properties of tetrakis(pentaphenylphenyl)ethylene", Vyas, V. S.; Rathore, R. Chem. Commun. 2010, 46, 1065–1067. http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/b923915d
"Synthesis, optical, and electronic properties of soluble poly-p-phenylene oligomers as models for molecular wires", Banerjee, M.; Shukla, R.; Rathore, R. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2009, 131, 1780–1786. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/ja805102d