College of Arts & Sciences Chemistry

Research

The USD Chemistry Department has a strong research program involving undergraduate, M.S., and Ph.D. students working closely with faculty members.

Descriptions of individual research projects of chemistry faculty members can be found on our People page.

Grant-Funded Research Areas
  • NPURC  
  • NSF-IGERT
  • SD-EPSCoR
  • DOD-EPSCOR  
Facilities

Research facilities are located in the Churchill-Haines and Pardee Laboratories on campus. Both of these laboratories are currently undergoing complete infrastructure renovations. Equipment is accessible to all students engaged in research projects with faculty.

Numerous microcomputers, scattered throughout the department, are connected to the local network. We maintain many instruments for student use, including several gas chromatographs, a high-performance liquid chromatograph, an atomic absorption spectrometer, inert atmosphere glove boxes and a variety of electrochemical instruments, as well as:

  • 200 MHz Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectrometer
  • Chemical Microscopy Facility
  • Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometers (one with microscope and gas chromatograph interface) (3)
  • Fluorescence Imaging System
  • Nitrogen/Dye Laser System
  • Nd:YAG Lasers and OPOs (3)
  • PTI fast-lifetime instrument
  • UV-Vis Spectrophotometers (diode array and monochromator-based)
  • Spectrofluorimeters (3)
  • Quartz Crystal Microbalance
  • Atomic Force Microscope
  • Shimadzu GC-Mass Spectrometer (direct insertion probe)        
  • Varian 500 LC-MS (with ESI and APCI ionization modes and ion-trap detector)       
  • Finnegan GCQ Ion Trap Mass Spectrometer
  • Bruker SMART APEXII CCD Single-Crystal X-ray Diffractometer       
  • Rigaku Ultima IV X-ray diffractometer (with X-ray reflectivity, grazing incidence angle studies for thin films)
  • FEI Spirit G2 Twin 120kV Transmission Electron Microscope (Installation 2010)
  • Horiba LabRAM Aramis confocal Raman instrument

A full complement of online chemistry journals is available through the library, including electronic access to databases such as Chemical Abstracts (SciFinder Scholar) and the Cambridge Structural Database.