Department of Chemistry Seminar – Dr. Walensky
About the event
Speaker: Dr. Justin R. Walensky, Department of Chemistry, University of Missouri, Columbia
Host: Dr. Ivan Popov
Title: Cooperative Chemistry in Small Molecule Activation with Actinide Complexes
Abstract: Actinides are large, radioactive, electropositive metals that need and want electron density. Hence, they prefer hard Lewis bases such as oxygen and nitrogen. Our group has been developing the chemistry of the actinides with soft Lewis bases, such as phosphorus and arsenic, thus depriving the metal center of electron density. This dramatically increases the reactivity of these complexes leading to unusual reactivity. In addition, uranium can exist in multiple oxidation states and low-valent uranium is well-known to be a powerful reducing agent. In each case, our group utilizes the unique properties of the actinides to investigate reaction modes and potential intermediates to convert small molecules such as CO into more desirable chemicals. Our recent results will be discussed in this seminar.
Bio: Justin Walensky was born in Albany, New York and he moved with his family to Florida in high school. He received his B.A. Chemistry from New College of Florida. His undergraduate research was primarily done at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under the direction of Dr. Annie Kersting. He obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Irvine with Dr. William Evans and was a Glenn T. Seaborg Fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory (with Dr. Richard Martin). He was a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Michael Hall at Texas A&M University before moving to the University of Missouri in 2011. He has served as Associate Chair for Undergraduate Studies (2015-2021) and is currently Chair of the Chemistry department. Justin’s primary research interests are the coordination chemistry, bonding, and reactivity of actinide complexes, particularly thorium, uranium, and neptunium. He has been awarded a Nuclear Forensics Junior Faculty Award from the Department of Homeland Security, an Early Career Award from the Department of Energy, and an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellowship for Experienced Researchers.