University of Richmond Chemistry Professors and Recent Graduates Receive Prestigious Grants
January 23, 2002
Two University of Richmond chemistry professors and two recent graduates of the department have won grant awards considered to be among the field's most prestigious.
John T. Gupton, chemistry department chairman, won a $100,000 Scholar/Fellow Award from the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation. The grant will support Gupton's research into the application of bioactive compounds used in agriculture and medicine. One of only six American chemistry professors selected, Gupton previously received this award in 1991 while teaching at the University of Central Florida.
Michelle Hamm, assistant professor of chemistry, received a $20,000 Faculty Start-Up Grant from the Dreyfus Foundation. The grant provides external research support to new chemistry faculty beginning their first full-time academic appointments. The foundation selected only nine recipients from 92 nominations received nationally.
Two 1997 Richmond chemistry graduates, Elva Angelique Van Devender and Kavitha Vedha-Peters won travel awards from the Women Chemists Committee of the American Chemical Society. The awards help defray the expenses of making presentations at national scientific meetings.
Van Devender is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Virginia, and Vedha-Peters is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Florida, Gainesville. Both recently presented their research at the ACS national meeting.