Inorganic Chemistry

• Inorganic faculty members
• Inorganic chemistry degree requirements
• Upcoming events

World-class research programs in a variety of subject areas are available to the graduate student in the inorganic chemistry path. Our internationally renowned faculty members are involved in cutting-edge research that involves virtually all areas of inorganic chemistry and many related disciplines.

General research areas include:

• Synthetic inorganic and organometallic chemistry
• Physical inorganic and organometallic chemistry
• Theoretical inorganic and organometallic chemistry
• Bioinorganic chemistry
• Metalloenzyme chemistry
• Solid state chemistry
• Materials science

Research in these areas involves different types of investigations, including metal ring and/or cluster molecules, homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis, photochemistry, inter- and intra-molecular dynamics, computer modeling, and the elucidation of reaction mechanisms.

Inorganic chemistry path faculty members include: John Berry, Thomas Brunold, Judith Burstyn, Charles Casey (Emeritus), Lawrence Dahl (Emeritus), Donald Gaines (Emeritus), Danny Fredrickson, Clark Landis, Mahesh Mahanthappa, Robert McMahon, Bassam Shakhashiri, Shannon Stahl, Paul Treichel (Emeritus), and Robert West (Emeritus).

Many graduate students devise their own research projects, and may be closely associated with several research groups simultaneously. The inorganic research program encourages interdisciplinary research involving other groups within and outside the department.

The major objective of the inorganic faculty is to help every graduate student achieve his or her greatest creative research potential. To this end, students are encouraged to play a very active role in developing their graduate programs. Students select a thesis adviser, research projects, and courses that will address their individual educational needs.

We urge inorganic graduate students to meet with many inorganic faculty members during their first semester and to join a research group as soon as possible. Weekly inorganic chemistry seminars bring together the inorganic students and faculty. Seminar speakers include visiting chemistry faculty from other universities, visiting industrial chemists, and our own advanced graduate students, faculty, and postdoctoral research associates.

Graduate students in inorganic chemistry take a core curriculum that includes several courses in descriptive inorganic chemistry and physical inorganic chemistry. Faculty members constantly evolve the courses to address the growth of the various disciplines within inorganic chemistry. Incoming graduate students take survey courses during the first year in main group chemistry, transition metal chemistry, inorganic structure and bonding, and spectroscopic methods. Students may elect to take a variety of more specialized courses to augment their research programs. Among the offered courses are bioinorganic chemistry, boron chemistry, solid-state chemistry, organometallic chemistry, photochemistry, structural chemistry, and theoretical inorganic chemistry. Many students choose to enroll in additional courses in areas removed from their primary research interests in order to develop a more comprehensive view of the chemical world. In the interests of encouraging a broad perspective, all chemistry graduate students must complete a minor that typically consists of several courses outside the major chemistry field. These may be in a specific chemical area outside inorganic chemistry or in another department, or in a combination of areas or departments.

The major goal of the inorganic division is to help graduate students develop their creative research capabilities. The success of our program is amply illustrated by the placement of our Ph.D. graduates in virtually every type of industrial chemical research as well as in colleges and universities throughout the world. We encourage prospective inorganic chemistry graduate students to contact the department or individual inorganic faculty members for information about any aspect of our inorganic program.

Kristi Heming, Inorganic Divisional Coordinator, 1101 University Ave., Madison, WI 53706 Phone: 608.262.6815, Fax: 608.262.6143, Email: heming@chem.wisc.edu