Chemistry

Chemistry Graduate Program Overview

Graduate Program Overview

The Chemistry Master's program provides knowledge, skills and discovery within the chemical sciences. The program prepares candidates for professional employment in chemistry, for teaching at the community college or secondary level, and for graduate studies beyond the M.S. level in chemistry and related fields. Primary focus is on a research project that culminates in a written thesis or project report and an oral defense, supplemented with advanced course work in chemistry or related disciplines. Research is offered in a variety of fields including interdisciplinary work in organic, inorganic, physical, computational, analytical, environmental, biochemistry, and chemistry education.

Thesis Proposal/Defense

Chem 589 Proposal
Chem589 Defense

Facilities
The Department of Chemistry is housed in a $60 million state-of-the-art science building that is fully equipped with an array of modern instrumentation (NMR, FTIR, HPLC, GC-MS, UV-Vis, IC, fluorescence spectroscopy, etc.) as well as computational facilities. Additional instrumentation is available for shared use in other departments on the CWU campus as well as in regional facilities.

Curriculum
The graduate program curriculum includes advanced course work as well as laboratory research culminating in a written thesis or project report and an oral defense.

Descriptions of the MS Chemistry program with thesis and non-thesis option requirements are in the online CWU graduate catalog.

Click on the links below for:

Chemistry, MS, (Thesis Option) 
Chemistry, MS, (Non-Thesis Option)

Course offerings can be found in a separate handout or on the chemistry web site: Chemistry Quarter Schedules

Admission
All applicants are encouraged to apply for teaching/research/staff assistantships, decisions on the assistantships will be made based on the applicant's GPA, recommendation letters, teaching/research experience, and various other factors.

Incoming students are expected to have earned an undergraduate degree in chemistry or a related field (equivalent to those offered at CWU; see requirements for the B.S. and B.A. degrees in chemistry) and demonstrate potential for superior scholarship. International students for whom English is a second language must provide TOEFL or IELTS scores to demonstrate their English proficiency. Application materials may be obtained through the School of Graduate Studies and Research Website listed above.

Research Programs
A completed research project is the cornerstone of the graduate program in chemistry. Following is a list of graduate faculty mentors and their respective areas of interest from which a student can choose:

Gil Belofsky(belofskyg@cwu.edu) 
Isolation and structural characterization of organic compounds from plants. Medicinal and pharmacological applications of natural products.

Timothy Beng (timothyb@cwu.edu)
 Development of synthetic methodology for efficient and expedient construction and functionalization of nitrogen and oxygen-containing heterocycles, for eventual application in natural and unnatural product synthesis.

Anthony Diaz (diaza@cwu.edu)
Luminescence, energy transfer and degradation processes in solid state luminescent systems.

Levente Fabry-Asztalos (fabryl@cwu.edu)
 Design and synthesis of inhibitors against therapeutically important enzymes.

Yingbin Ge (yingbin@cwu.edu)
Theoretical chemistry and computational studies of the properties of nanoclusters, nanocatalysis, astrochemical species and reactions.

Anne Johansen(johansea@cwu.edu)
Chemical composition of ambient aerosol particles and surface waters in the context of global climate and public health. Analysis of wines.

Todd Kroll (kroll@cwu.edu)
Identification and characterization of protein-protein interactions regulating the size, position and lamination of functional areas of mammalian neocortex.

Sam Lohse (lohses@cwu.edu) 
Investigations of Environmental and Biological Interactions of Functionalized Nanoparticles.

Dion Rivera (riverad@cwu.edu)Spectroscopic investigations of macromolecular complexes of polyelectrolytes and surfactants in solution and at nanoparticle interfaces.

Tim Sorey  (soreyt@cwu.edu)
Development and integration of instrumental measurement technology in educational laboratories and the synthesis of educational strategies that support their use.