The Prokopchuk Group is at #ACSFall2026! If you ❤️ organometallic chem 🧪, C-H activation ⚗️, and/or electrocatalysis ⚡, my students have excellent results to share. As a bonus, also go see @tkschramm.bsky.social from @grimmelab.bsky.social talk about conformational sampling in organometallic chem! 💻

Our dept @colgate.edu is hiring a tenure-stream asst prof in paleoclimate! We are so excited to learn about everyone's work & welcome our new colleague. Review of applications begins September 1. Pls share broadly. For details & to apply: apply.interfolio.com/188708

Avogadro now has over 25 Python plugins for: - input generation for common programs - partial charges and electrostatics - reading and writing file formats through cclib - forcefields and ML potentials - building and analysis commands What are some tools you'd like to see? #compchem

A Recursive Algorithm for Finding Multi-Step Reaction Mechanisms | ChemRxiv chemrxiv.org/doi/abs/10.2... #compchem

I am working on a website to help explain MO. I don't think I there yet... this is really hard. MO is really hard to explain, even with a shitload of javascript... :\ I am accepting notes, if y'all have any. jgassens.github.io/MOexplainer/

A great op-ed by Mark Levin on AI at University of Chicago. Brought to my attention by my colleague @awhspeed.bsky.social Also cites a personal favorite @edzitron.com on the ridiculous costs of AI #chemsky chicagomaroon.com/52978/viewpo...

Welcoming Claude Into the Classroom Risks the Soul of Education

Faculty have a responsibility to protect classrooms as a training ground for thinking, and proliferating LLMs endanger this core mission of the University.

chicagomaroon.com

From our lab— chiral nematic liquid crystal droplets suspended in glycerol. The concentric rings in each droplet arise from the periodic helical ordering within the fluid. #liquidcrystal #chiral #polarizedlight #microscopy #sciart #fluid #crystals

Very happy to share the 1st research paper from our lab! We used high-throughput experimentation, quantum chemistry, AI, and ChatGPT-assisted coding to identify improved boronic acid catalysts for sustainable amidations. Thanks Hanna for your hard work! doi.org/10.26434/che...

The Rosen Group at Princeton University is accepting applications for a postdoctoral researcher interested in developing and applying machine learning interatomic potentials to model the dynamics of inorganic, solid-state materials. Apply at apply.interfolio.com/186022 if interested!

🚀 Our team's latest: "A Dual-Metal Strategy for N-Heterocycle Coordination Using Nickel and Aluminum” Now out in @chemcomm.rsc.org Work done by PhD student, Gabe! 💪 pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a...

Grad students, just an FYI, reputable journals in your discipline don’t need to recruit scholars to submit manuscripts to them. So if you‘re getting email invites to submit your work to [journal you never heard of], it belongs in spam.

Excited to share our new ChemRxiv preprint: “Leveraging Conformational Control of Neratinib’s C–N Axes to Enhance HER4 Selectivity in Ovarian Cancer” Read here: doi.org/10.26434/che...

Very interesting paper recently published in Catalysis Science & Technology doi.org/10.1039/D5CY...

Uncovering the role of boronic acids and boroxines in the catalytic hydroboration of alkenes

The catalytic hydroboration of alkenes with pinacolborane (HBpin) represents a valuable yet challenging transformation in main-group catalysis, furnishing alkyl pinacol boronic esters of broad synthet...

doi.org

Please RT! The Dept of Chemistry at UC Irvine invites applications for a tenured faculty position in Synthetic Organic Chemistry. Deadline: July 1, 2026. More information about the position can be found here: recruit.ap.uci.edu/JPF10109 @uciphyssci.bsky.social

Professor in Synthetic Organic Chemistry

University of California, Irvine is hiring. Apply now!

recruit.ap.uci.edu

Avogadro 2.0 isn't just a viewer and editor — it's an extensible platform for chemistry A plugin system lets you add ML & electrostatic models, new builders and tools. Already over 20 available… Build the tools you need: avogadro.cc/develop/plug... #avogadro #openscience #compchem #opensource

Inorganic and organometallic chemists — Avogadro 2.0 is for you... A new template tool lets you build octahedral, tetrahedral, and other complexes in seconds. Click to add functional groups. Avogadro also detects symmetry and displays symmetry elements #compchem #openscience #opensource

If you've got something really big - 100,000 atoms, a million atoms? I'd really like to try it out.

Avogadro Project@avogadro.cc · 5mo ago

Avogadro 2.0's rendering was rebuilt for modern GPUs. Smooth even with tens of thousands of atoms. Real-time shadows and ambient occlusion give depth and clarity — and a new layer system lets you hide solvent, toggle styles, and focus on what matters. #opensource #openscience #compchem

No fooling, Avogadro 2.0.0 is finally here! Rebuilt from the ground up: fast modern rendering, improved stability, designed for the next generation of molecular, biomolecule, and materials research & education. 🧪 ⚗️ avogadro.cc/install/ discuss.avogadro.cc #opensource #openscience #compchem

How to make your own robot! A review of people making awesome lab robots out of commercial 3D printers. Thank you @vsaggiomo.bsky.social and Sander for inviting me to help write this paper in @digital-discovery.rsc.org. Beep boop! 🤖 #chemsky doi.org/10.1039/D5DD...

Hacking 3D printers as laboratory robots

The emergence of affordable and reliable 3D printers has enabled laboratories to optimize setups, print custom parts, accelerate research, and rapidly prototype. A new movement has emerged in the past...

doi.org

Excited to share that my Faculty Nutshell Talk is now online! In this short piece, I talk about how our lab looks to nature for inspiration in energy storage 🔋🍄⚡️✨

Brewing better batteries: Faculty Nutshell Talks 2026

YouTube video by Center for Communicating Science at Virginia Tech

m.youtube.com

So you think you know KOtBu… Well my colleagues in #PfizerChemistry process chem have done some amazing work to find out a lot more about a very useful base #ChemSky

Potassium tert-Butoxide: Solubility, Solution Structure, and Reactivity

Fundamental properties including solubility and structure–reactivity correlations of potassium tert-butoxide (KOtBu) are described in this manuscript. A combination of donor solvent titration, diffusion NMR, and DFT studies established that KOtBu exists in one of three solution structures: (1) unsolvated cubic tetramer in non-Lewis basic solvents, (2) disolvated cubic tetramer in Lewis basic solvents, and (3) solvated monomer in protic solvents. These studies dispel the notion that strong aprotic donor solvents lead to deaggregation of KOtBu cubic tetramer. In DMSO, a concentration-dependent equilibrium mixture of bis-DMSO-solvated cubic tetramer, dimsylpotassium, and tert-butanol is formed. Donor solvent association with potassium was contextualized in terms of periodic trends within the alkali metal series. The previously reported 1:1 complex of KOtBu and tert-butanol was found to be highly insoluble and affords poor availability of KOtBu when employed in a model dehydrohalogenation reaction. Reactivity can be recovered by the inclusion of strongly Lewis basic donor solvents that disproportionately stabilize the transition state.

pubs.acs.org

#ChemSky I don't promote all our papers on here...like they are ALL AWESOME (of course they are, I wrote them, and you should be honoured to have access to my GREAT THOUGHTS) but this one is a bit special. And has broad implications. doi.org/10.26434/che... ⚗️📜🧵

Okay, as promised, here's a summary of "keeping up with the literature" tools #chemsky What I want is a "sort by best" tool that learns my preferences. I'm not sure there's a perfect solution now, but there are some promising tools...

Hey #ChemSky. I'm wondering what PhD applicants are experiencing this year. I have a student with essentially a 4.0, 3 years of research experience in my group, 1 summer (another pending) interning at Pfizer who currently has no offers. IMO this is complete nonsense. He's getting antsy.

Website updated, so re-posting. #ChemJobs #ChemChat We are searching for a 2-year Visiting Assistant Professor to help teach our 100-level & organic chemistry courses (sabbatical replacement over the next two years). We have a search page with more info. www.skidmore.edu/chemistry-an...

Kelly Sheppard (he/him/his)@kstrna62.bsky.social · 7mo ago

We are searching for a two-year Visiting Assistant Professor to help teach our 100-level and organic chemistry courses. Our search page with info is live. The link for applications will be live soon. It is for sabbatical replacements over the next two years. www.skidmore.edu/chemistry/se...

Obviously a lot is going on (gestures widely) Amid chaos, I cope by doing *something* -- anything. Lately, it's been coding for @avogadro.cc because it feels like some small change I can do myself For *years* I've wanted to show electron density volumes .. little clouds ☁️☁️ #compchem

this is a fascinating article, featuring a ton of analytical chemists arguing with one another #chemchat

Damian Carrington@dpcarrington.bsky.social · 8mo ago

‘A bombshell’: doubt cast on discoveries of #microplastics throughout human body, from brain to blood, arteries to testes Exclusive: Some scientists say many detections are most likely error, with one high-profile study called a ‘joke’ Story by me www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Dilushini’s paper from her masters work comes out with a strong supporting cast! We promised reactive I(V)….Here’s some reactive I(V). pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Flash Communication: Structural Confirmation, Bonding, and Reactivity of an I(V) Analogue of Weiss’s Reagent

Structural confirmation of an iodine(V) analogue of Weiss’s reagent, [ArI-O(Pyr)2]2+, is reported using monodentate pyridine ligands and a nitro-substituted arene to provide protection from electrophi...

pubs.acs.org

Out today on JACS ASAP - Baran/Blackmond collaboration demonstrating the power of temperature scanning reactions in mechanistic studies of multicycle catalytic systems. Fantastic work by @dacagan.bsky.social and Aron Peter and Phil who is still over on the other place. pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10....

Decoding the Nested, Multicycle Mechanism of Ni-Catalyzed Redox-Neutral Cross-Coupling through Temperature Scanning Reaction Calorimetry

Catalytic reactions involving multiple cycles are common in many key organic transformations. We report a detailed mechanistic analysis of one such network of “nested” cycles, the Ni-catalyzed cross-c...

pubs.acs.org

Haven’t posted in a while here but - Thrilled to announce: a research paper with former Fulbright visiting scholar Dr. Kseniia Yutilova has been published in the Journal of Organic Chemistry! doi.org/10.1021/acs.....

Steric and Electronic Control of Regioselectivity in Salophen Metal Complex-Catalyzed Epichlorohydrin Acetolysis

Salophen ligands and their complexes with transition metals Cu(II), Fe(II), Fe(III), and Co(II) were synthesized and characterized by UV–vis, IR, and 1H NMR spectroscopy. The catalytic activity of the...

doi.org