Student Hosted Physical Chemistry Seminar

Thursday, January 18th
Professor Keiji Morokuma, Emory University
"Theoretical Studies of Chemical Reactions – From Gas Phase Reactions to Nano Structures, Catalysts, and Enzymatic Reactions"


4:15pm - 5:15pm
Braun Lecture Hall
S.G.Mudd Chemistry Building
Stanford University





This seminar is free and open to the public. All Stanford University Chemistry students are encouraged to attend this special event.

About the seminar
The chemical reaction which creates, destroys, reorganizes chemical bonds to produce new compounds is the most important subject of chemistry. I have been absorbed by this fascinating world of chemistry from the beginning of my career almost fifty years ago, when a hand-powered calculator was used to solve Hückel secular equations for frontier electron densities of simple aromatic hydrocarbons. Theoretical/computational studies have come a long way and is now playing the central role in understanding the mechanism and dynamics of chemical reactions and in helping designing more useful chemical reactions and catalysts. The theory can study not only the reaction of the ground state of molecules in gas phase but also reactions of excited electronic states as well complicated reactions of complex molecular systems. The information theoretical/computational studies can provide is often complementary to the information experimental studies provide, and research on chemical reactions is becoming impossible without strong collaboration between theorists and experimentalists. I will discuss a few recent examples of our own theoretical/computational studies on A. gas phase photochemical and ion-molecule reactions of small molecules and ions; B. self-assembly reactions of small carbon clusters to form fullerenes and carbon nanotubes; C. homogeneous catalytic reactions and reactions of transition metal and organometallic compounds; and D. reactions of metalloenzymes and the effects of protein environment.

About Morokuma:
1963 PhD at Kyoto University under Kenichi Fukui; junior faculty at Kyoto; 1964-67 postdoc at Columbia and Harvard under Martin Karplus; 1967-77 Assistant Prof. to Prof., University of Rochester; 1976-93 Prof, Institute for Molecular Science, Okazaki, Japan; 1993-2006 William Henry Emerson Prof., Emory University; 2006- Prof. Emeritus, Emory University and Research Leader, Fukui Institute for Fundamental Chemistry, Kyoto University

Questions
Please contact Patricia Dwyer at 650-723-4770.