More Than $1 Million in Grants for Computational Chemistry and Materials Science

Riverside, CA – Bryan Wong, an associate professor of chemical and environmental engineering in UC Riverside’s Marlan and Rosemary Bourns College of Engineering, has received three grants totaling more than $1 million for research to improve understanding of catalysis — the acceleration of a chemical reaction by a catalyst — and develop new photodetection technologies.

Two National Science Foundation grants fund projects to build computational models of photocatalytic reactions and to create open-source software for controlling and assessing the reactions. The research will help develop ways to predict and control oxidation reactions for water reuse applications through mathematical modeling and experimental measurement of chemical reaction rates in water.

A third grant from the Office of Naval Research supports computer simulation of soft electronic devices and flexible materials for use in next-generation technologies such as low-cost photodetectors in detection and surveillance applications. The work will improve the performance of soft electronic devices and flexible materials used in cutting-edge image sensing, optical communications, chemical/biological sensing, and infrared surveillance technologies.

About UC Riverside

The University of California, Riverside (www.ucr.edu) is a doctoral research university, a living laboratory for groundbreaking exploration of issues critical to Inland Southern California, the state and communities around the world. Reflecting California’s diverse culture, UCR’s enrollment is now nearly 23,000 students. The campus opened a medical school in 2013 and has reached the heart of the Coachella Valley by way of the UCR Palm Desert Center. The campus has an annual statewide economic impact of more than $1 billion. To learn more, call (951) UCR-NEWS.