With an ever higher demand for cleaner energy, novel electronic devices, and better, safer treatments for human health, materials lie at the heart of meeting tomorrow’s technological demands. At the University of Maryland’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, our faculty, students, and research staff prepare and study advanced materials that will meet society’s energy needs and better foster human welfare. Our faculty’s research in the area between materials science and chemistry known as Materials Chemistry approaches the subject through both theoretical and experimental studies.

While the development and deployment of advanced materials could have a profound impact on society, at the University of Maryland we focus on fundamental research that is at the forefront of chemistry.The diverse array of materials that our department prepares and studies include inorganic solids such as superconductors (Rodriguez), polymers (Sita), functional nanoparticles for drug delivery (DeShong, Wang), and oxides for energy storage and conversion (Eichhorn).We also study the mechanisms by which nanostructures form (Fourkas), crystals grow (Weeks), and surfaces and interfaces control materials properties (Reutt-Robey). Our faculty have won distinguished awards in the area of Materials Chemistry and have led nationally recognized research centers where materials are investigated for their useful optical, electrical, magnetic, catalytic and mechanical properties. For example, the Energy Research Frontier Center at UMD focuses on nanostructures for electrical energy storage, and four of our faculty (Lee, Eichhorn, Reutt-Robey, and Wang) are members of this center.