News

Oscar Haoyang Wu has won a MolSSI Fellowship. He will be working on developing open-source, self-improving software that automatically predicts the chemical stability and models the radical oxidative degradation kinetics of active pharmaceutical ingredients in the solution. Congratulations!

Lisa Hsieh’s work on battery price projection is mentioned in a Letter published in The Economist (May 23 edition). The study models the practical lower bounds on battery prices set by materials cost and suggests government interventions (subsidies, gas taxes, and mandates) are needed if electric vehicles are to compete with gas-powered ones in the next decade. The original paper can be found here.

Congratulations to Gwen Wilcox for winning the Department’s Outstanding Employee Award!

Two Green group papers published in Intl. J. Chem. Kinet. are among the journal’s top cited papers over the past two years and are made free to access until March on Intl. J. Chem. Kinet. The perspective “Perspective on Mechanism Development and Structure‐Activity Relationships for Gas‐Phase Atmospheric Chemistry” (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/kin.21172) contributed by Mark J. Goldman and Prof. William H. Green discusses necessary future mechanism development and research efforts for the sustainable development of chemically detailed mechnisms. The article “An Extended Group Additivity Method for Polycyclic Thermochemistry Estimation” (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/kin.21158) contributed by Kehang Han, Adeel Jamal, Colin A. Grambow, Zachary J. Buras and Prof. William H. Green proposes a novel method to estimate polycyclic thermochemistry which significantly improves on group additivity methods. A corresponding web application is available at http://rmg.mit.edu/molecule_search.

A Green group experimental paper, “From benzene to naphthalene: direct measurement of reactions and intermediates of phenyl radicals and acetylene,” (https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2019/cp/c9cp04554f#!divAbstract) has been as a 2019 HOT Article and made free to access now on Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics (PCCP). This work contributed by Te-Chun Chu, Dr. Zachary J. Buras, Dr. Mica C. Smith, Awele B. Uwagwu, and  Prof. William H. Green successfully validates Hydrogen-abstraction–C2H2-addition (HACA) mechanism developed from ab initio calculations. A pressure-dependent model is provided with the paper for future modeling on PAH formation.

Yen-ting wins a scholarship to support students who graduate from the National Taiwan University School of Engineering that have been admitted to an MIT PhD program. The Think Global Education Trust provides the 2 year scholarship to encourage students to develop a global perspective.