In a potentially worrisome development for those of us who breathe, chemists from the University of California, Irvine report that they’ve found fragments of fungal cells in the atmosphere. The pieces are extremely small, measuring about 30 namometers in diameter, and much more abundant that previously thought, the researchers said in a study published this week in Science Advances. https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/3/eaax9051.

Dr. Shaul Mukamel was awarded the 2020 Arthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser Science by the On behalf of the American Physical Society, 

"For expanding the boundaries and understanding of nonlinear optical spectroscopy and its application to chemical, biological and material systems."

The prize recognizes outstanding contributions to basic research which uses lasers to advance our knowledge of the fundamental physical properties of materials and their interaction with light.

Students Sean S. Nguyen, Andrew J. Ferreira, Zane G. Long, Tyler K. Heiss, Robert S. Dorn, and R. David Row from the Prescher research group have been published for their findings on a new method for butenolide synthesis from hydroxymethylcyclopropenones. Read the article here.

Congratulations Marc Sprague-Piercy of the Martin Lab on being awarded a Gilliam Fellowship from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The Gilliam Fellowships for Advanced Study support exceptional graduate students who are committed to increasing diversity among scientific leaders, especially those students who will go on to become faculty members at colleges and universities.