CRIF:MU Establishment of a Cyber-Enabled Teaching/Research X-ray Diffraction Facility at The University of Texas at Austin

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With this award from the Chemistry Research Instrumentation and Facilities: Multi User program (CRIF:MU), the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Texas-Austin (UTA) will acquire a standard CCD-X-ray diffractometers to be used primarily for education/research and a minidiffractometer primarily for undergraduate education for a consortium of seven institutions distributed over Texas, Ohio and Florida. Cyber enabling will provide access by the diverse institutions as the instruments will be housed at the University of Texas-Austin. The diffractometers will be utilized in various research projects such as 1) physical and bioorganic chemistry of synthetic and natural receptors and catalysts, 2) electronic and ionic properties of oxides, 3) characterization of coordination and organometallic complexes and corresponding ligands, 4) antibody and enzyme engineering with an emphasis on developing better methods for recombinant antibody or enzyme cloning and directed evolution, 5) structure and bonding in the organometallic and coordination chemistry of both d- and f-block and s- and p block elements, 6) elucidation of the mechanisms of novel enzymatic reactions and the design of methods to control and/or regulate their functions, 7) natural products including flavonoids, terpenoids, betalains, alkaloids, phytoalexins, phytoestrogens, neurotoxic nonprotein amino acids, and antiviral proteins, 7) control of air pollution by acid gases, carbon dioxide, and air toxics, carbon dioxide capture, flue gas desulfurization, acid gas treating, carbon dioxide mass transfer with chemical reaction, electrolyte thermodynamics, and reaction kinetics in aqueous solutions, 8) organic multistep synthesis of biologically relevant target molecules, 9) research concentrated on the synthesis of Ruddlesden-Poper phases, 10) polymers, materials, and processes for microelectronics, photoresistors, liquid crystals, computer simulation, mass transport studies, kinetics, graft polymerization, biosensor arrays, novel processes for producing nanometer scale structures.The technique of single-crystal X-ray crystallography allows accurate and precise determination of the full three dimensional structure of a molecule, including bond distances and angles, and it provides accurate information about the spatial arrangement of molecules relative to the neighboring molecules. These studies will have an impact in a number of areas ranging from synthetic chemistry to systems of biological interest and cleaning of the environment.