Research Group

Zephyr-Dillon Stetler

Zephyr-Dillon is from Lake Tahoe, CA and is a 1st year graduate student. They received two bachelor of science degrees in Chemistry and Mathematics from the University of Nevada, Reno. Zephyr-Dillon’s research as an undergraduate student focused on modeling copper exchange zeolites as catalysts for the conversion of methane gas to methanol. Additionally they researched the activation of water and hydrogen via trans-uranium and neptunium complexes. Research interests include machine learning approaches as well as the intersection between chemical systems, theory and computer programming.

Luke Allan

Luke is a 1st year graduate student in Physical Chemistry. Luke received his BS in Chemistry and Minor in Mathematics from Central Washington University. As an undergraduate, he researched novel antibiotic synthesis prior to pursuing Physical Chemistry. In which, he studied nano cluster catalysis as well as quantum and statistical mechanical theory. His current research focuses upon quantum theory.

Dayana Bashirova

Dayana is a 2nd year graduate student in Physical Chemistry. For her undergraduate degree, she attended Kazan Federal University in Russia, where she developed a tool to generate pharmacophore models from MD simulations. She applied this approach to study the protein-protein interactions of the Staphylococcus aureus hibernation factor, which protects Staphylococcus aureus from antibiotics, and to develop potential active candidates against this target.

Jacob Hirschi

Jacob is a 2nd year graduate student in Physical Chemistry. He received his BS and MS in Chemistry from San Diego State University and UC San Diego respectively. His undergraduate research involved the computational modeling of an alkene isomerization mechanism mediated by an organometallic catalyst. His research interests include DFT, spectroscopy, and visualization.

Shawn Opfer

Shawn is a 2nd year graduate student in Physical Chemistry. He is from Sacramento, California and graduated from Pacific University in Northern Oregon in 2019 with a B.S. in Chemistry. His undergraduate research dealt with utilizing classical molecular dynamics to obtain structure-property relationships of surfactant molecules lying at an organic-aqueous interface. His research interests include structure-property relationships, spectroscopy, and theory.

Kye Hunter

Kye is a 3rd year undergraduate student in Chemistry. He is from Corvallis, and while attending OSU has previously done research on the safer and more efficient synthesis of actinide fluorides important to nuclear reactions in projectile-target systems. His research interests include modeling biological systems, quantum theory, and radiochemistry.