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March 02, 2026

OU Graduate Student Rishav Mukherjee Wins First Place at Graduate College Research Showcase

Congratulations to Rishav Mukherjee, a graduate student working under the supervision of Dr. Indrajeet Sharma." Rishav won first place in the Graduate College Research Showcase. The Graduate College Research Showcase allows graduate students to share their research and connect with their peers.


February 26, 2026

OU Chemistry Graduate Student Awarded Prestigious International Ludo Frevel Scholarship

Hamza Shoukat, a graduate student working under the supervision of Dr. Bayram Saparov in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry received the 2026 Ludo Frevel Scholarship. This is an international-level award given to only 6 students worldwide this year. Isaiah Gilley, a former undergrad student who worked under the supervision of Dr. Saparov (now at Northwestern with Prof. Kanatzidis), is also an awardee.


February 18, 2026

OU Researchers Develop Durable Hybrid Materials for Faster Radiation Detection

Researchers at the University of Oklahoma have developed new hybrid materials that challenge conventional thinking about how light-emitting compounds work and could advance the field of fast radiation detection.


February 12, 2026

OU Student Anayat Yusuf Awarded Honors College UROP Scholarship for Panfish Allergen Research

Congratulations to Anayat Yusuf on receiving the Honors College Spring 2026 Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) Scholarship. He is conducting his research under the supervision of Dr. Nagib Ahsan at the OU Proteomics Core Facility, focusing on the characterization of allergenic proteins in North American panfish species.


Campus & Community
December 11, 2025

OU Students Honored for Achieving Perfect Grade-point Average

Thirty-eight students eligible to graduate from the University of Oklahoma in December maintained perfect 4.0 grade-point averages throughout their undergraduate careers at OU. Of the total, more than half are from Oklahoma.


Research
December 08, 2025

OU Researchers Develop Magnetically Doped Quantum Dots, a Breakthrough in Materials Science

A team of University of Oklahoma materials scientists has done what many in the field thought impossible: magnetize quantum dots by “doping” them with manganese. The implications span everything from how we power our homes to how we build computers, scan for diseases, grow crops and illuminate our world.


November 12, 2025

Chemistry Students Win First Place Poster Award at OU’s Advanced Materials Workshop

A research team composed of research assistant and OU alumna Jennifer Ou and undergraduate students Meiling Wade and Maham Saeed earned First Place in the Poster Award, securing the workshop’s top prize of $1,000.


November 12, 2025

Surya Singh Wins the People's Choice Award in 3 Minute Thesis Competition

Congratulations, Surya Singh, for winning the People's Choice Award in the 3 Minute Thesis Competition. Surya is a 4th-year graduate student working in Dr. Indrajeet Sharma's lab. The title of his presentation was: "Sweet Light: Using Sugar and Blue Light to Create Next-Generation Antibiotics".


Research
November 06, 2025

OU Biochemists Lead Global Hunt for New Antibiotics

Helen Zgurskaya and Valentin Rybenkov are leading a five-year, $5.3 million project funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to find new ways to deliver lifesaving drugs directly into resistant pathogens.


October 29, 2025

OU Alumnus Co-Authors Award-Winning Paper on Next-Generation Solid Electrolytes

University of Oklahoma alumna Abby M. Cardoza, now a researcher at the Colorado School of Mines, has co-authored an award-winning paper in the American Chemical Society’s journal Chemistry of Materials.



July 28, 2025

Dr. Indrajeet Sharma Featured in Interview for Chemical and Engineering News

The June 2025 C&EN feature highlights efforts led by University of Oklahoma associate professor Indrajeet Sharma, whose lab has developed a bench-stable sulfenylnitrene reagent that safely and selectively inserts a single nitrogen atom into five-membered N‑heterocycles under metal‑free, ambient conditions—dramatically advancing the precision of late-stage skeletal editing.


Research
June 30, 2025

Training Tomorrow’s Scientists on Today’s Most Powerful Tools

The University of Oklahoma is home to one of the region’s most advanced and well-staffed core research facilities: the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Lab. This facility plays a critical role in cutting-edge research, student training and scientific discovery across several disciplines.


May 20, 2025

Two Students Awarded Prestigious Summer Research Scholarships

Two OU undergraduate students working at the OU Proteomics Core Facility have been awarded two prestigious Summer Research Scholarships from Georgetown University and MD Anderson Cancer Center.


Campus & Community
May 20, 2025

OU Office of the Vice President for Research and Partnerships Recognizes 2025 Research and Creative Activity Awards Winners

The Office of the Vice President for Research and Partnerships recognized faculty recipients of the awards for excellence in campus-wide research and creative activities, as well as eight recipients of active early career awards, 25 project teams that earned $1 million or more in extramural funding and nine recipients of patents at a ceremony on May 16.


Research
May 06, 2025

Accelerating Drug Discovery with a Single Carbon Atom

A research team from the University of Oklahoma has pioneered a groundbreaking method that could accelerate drug discovery and reduce pharmaceutical development costs. Their work, published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, introduces a safe, sustainable way to insert a single carbon atom into drug molecules at room temperature.


Research
April 22, 2025

Using Blue Light to Fight Drug-Resistant Infections

Researchers at the University of Oklahoma have made a breakthrough discovery that could potentially revolutionize treatments for antibiotic-resistant infections, cancer and other challenging gram-negative pathogens without relying on precious metals


April 17, 2025

Chemistry Spring Social

On the evening of Thursday, April 3, Zarrow Hall was filled with enthusiasm as more than 60 students, joined by several faculty members, gathered for the Chemistry Spring Social—a lively kickoff event for the newly forming Chemistry Club. Attendees enjoyed pizza, games, and fun chemistry-themed prizes, creating an engaging and collaborative atmosphere.


Research
February 24, 2025

Scientists Reveal Key to Affordable, Room-Temperature Quantum Light

Newly published research from the University of Oklahoma proves that adding a covering to quantum light sources called a colloidal quantum dot can cause them to shine without faltering, opening the door to new, affordable quantum possibilities.


January 30, 2025

Dr. Helen Zgurskaya Featured in ACS Infectious Diseases

ACS Infectious Diseases has published an editorial featuring interviews with highly cited female scientists who share their experiences. Dr. Helen Zgurskaya from the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry was a featured interviewee.


Research
January 06, 2025

How a Single Nitrogen Atom Could Transform the Future of Drug Discovery

Researchers at the University of Oklahoma, led by associate professor Indrajeet Sharma, have developed a breakthrough method of adding a single nitrogen atom to molecules, unlocking new possibilities in drug research and development. Now published in the journal Science, this research is already gaining international attention from drug manufacturers.


Research
August 19, 2024

Biochemistry Researcher Applying NSF Grant to Improve Gene Editing Technology

Rakhi Rajan, an associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Oklahoma, has received a renewal grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation to improve the accuracy of CRISPR-Cas technologies.


Research
August 01, 2024

OU Research Team Working to Advance Gene Editing and Bioimaging Techniques

Yihan Shao, an associate professor of chemistry at the University of Oklahoma, has received a Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award from the National Institutes of Health to develop computer modeling tools for studying the enzymes critical for CRISPR gene editing and biomedical imaging tools for cancer tumors.


April 29, 2024

Undergraduate Scholarship Winners

The department congratulates Anna Lewis, Amer Abuabed, and Vignesh Anand on receiving the Summer 2024 Provost’s Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity Fellowship.


April 23, 2024

The Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry hosts Chickasha High School Students

OU faculty Rakhi Rajan, Len Thomas and Steven Foster hosted 11 AP Chemistry students and teacher Novah Klein from Chickasha High School. Dr. Rajan organized the all-day event to promote a future in STEM and encourage students to join our department in their future academic endeavors.