Dr. Jelena Samonina joined the faculty of the UVA Chemistry Department in 2019, where her teaching interests include Organic Chemistry and Chemistry for the Health Sciences. She earned her M.S. and her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry at Warsaw University. After two postdoctoral trainings at the University of Virginia and at Stanford University she joined the faculty of Washington and Lee University.
Chemical Education Research: Enhancing Students’ Outcomes by Unpacking Postsecondary Instructors’ Practices
Design and Application of Chemical Biology Tools for Studying Cellular Communication
Alicia Frantz is an instructor for Organic Chemistry lecture. She earned a B.S. in Forensic Chemistry and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Ohio University, Athens, Ohio. She is currently focusing on implementation of guided inquiry based learning in courses with large enrollment. Attending a large school herself, Alicia understands the importance for dedicating more of class time to group work and evidence-based techniques than the traditional lecturing.
The Zhang group focuses on the development of inorganic nanoscale and sub-nanoscale materials with atomically precise surfaces, interfaces and ordered architectures that enables notable physicochemical properties and emerging applications. Combining the efforts in materials synthesis, advanced characterization, and functional device engineering and simulation, we aim to derive new design principle and new synthetic methodology for critical materials in catalysis, magnetism, plasmonics and biosensing.
Professor Kevin Welch is interested in developing curricula for undergraduate instruction in general chemistry and organic chemistry. In particular, his focus is on updating these courses to accommodate the diverse educational background in chemistry of the students enrolling in chemistry at the University of Virginia, as well as providing a strong chemical foundation for the students as they continue on in their educational and post-educational careers in a variety of fields. In the past, he has taught undergraduate courses in general chemistry, organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, en
Professor Serbulea is teaching organic chemistry courses, including the accelerated organic chemistry lectures and laboratories. She is actively involved in the development of the organic chemistry curriculum, focusing on improving the coordination between the topics in the lecture course and the experiments that are carried out in the laboratory. In the accelerated organic chemistry laboratories, students gain hands-on experience in the synthesis, purification, and characterization of organic compounds using modern analytical instruments and laboratory equipment.
