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Dr. Michael Therien, today's guest speaker from Duke University, will be presenting a seminar titled Organized Porphyrin-Carbon Nanotube Superstructures for Energy Conversion Applications.
Course Instructor: Dr. Folami Ladipo
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Catherine Denning will be presenting a seminar titled Novel Ru compounds: A different approach to chemotherapy.
Abstract: Cancer is currently the second largest cause of death in the United States.1 This fact in combination with the prediction that the number of cancer cases will almost double by 20302, means that there needs to be more research in cancer treatment, prevention, and possible cures. Most chemotherapeutic treatments are extremely toxic, leading to damage of malignant cells and healthy cells causing deleterious side effects.3 More research is needed to find treatments that decrease these side effects. One growing area is to use light activated compounds that can be selectively activated in the body and cause much less harm to healthy tissues than traditional chemotherapeutics. Members of my lab focus on using ruthenium (Ru) based, light activated compounds to damage cancerous cells only when irradiated with light. These novel compounds incorporate structural strain so that when irradiated with light, will expel a ligand, creating a chemically active Ru able to “attack” specific moieties within the cell.4 One of our group’s projects is to create compounds which are red-shifted, meaning they are able to be activated at longer wavelengths of light; therefore, penetrate tissue further and are safer to the patient.5 This research adds an exciting dynamic to the cancer research field that may one day lead to better treatments with lower side effects, and more specific targeting.
Course Instructor: Dr. Yinan Wei
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Introduction and discussion: What makes a great seminar?
Course Instructor: Dr. Yinan Wei
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Attend Dr. Therien's talk during the Inorganic Seminar at 2pm. See event page for more details.
Course Instructor: Dr. Mark Watson
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Allen Reed will be presenting a seminar titled Raman Assisted Characterization of Surfactant Molecules at Interfaces.
Course Instructor: Dr. Kenneth Graham
Although the functionally unmarked word order in Hittite is robustly SOV, many other word orders are well attested. In addition to some that are syntactically licensed and bear various discourse structure functions, there are also a number of quite puzzling configurations that involve discontinuous constituents and appear unmotivated in terms of discourse structure. Violations of well-known syntactic constraints suggest that these orders are phonologically motivated. Building on previous evidence that Hittite has “phrasal stress”, I will argue that many if not all such orders reflect: (1) that the primary accent in all Hittite phonological phrases (which mostly match syntactic phrases) falls on the leftmost constituent; (2) that some prosodically weak constituents (e.g., indefinite adjectives) require a phonological word as their immediate leftward host, while others (e.g., relative adjectives) require only a phonological phrase; (3) that the last two rules are violable, resulting in some “exceptions” to the dominant patterns. Further study is needed regarding what determines the “prosodically weak” status of some elements.
