Women Named Dreyfus Teacher-Scholars for Research & Teaching in Chemistry

The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation recently announced the selection of 14 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholars for 2020. These faculty are within the first five years of their academic careers, have each created an outstanding independent body of scholarship in the chemical sciences, and are deeply committed to education. Each Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar receives an unrestricted research grant of $100,000. Six of this year’s 14 winners are women. Their short biographies and Dreyfus Foundation research projects are listed below.

Emily Derbyshire, Ellen Matson and Katherine Mirica

Emily Derbyshire is an assistant professor in the department of chemistry at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. She holds a secondary appointment in the department of molecular genetics and microbiology. Dr. Derbyshire is a graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. She earned a Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research project: Chemical Approaches to Understand Infectious Agents.

Ellen Matson is the Wilmont Assistant Professor of Chenmity at the University of Rochester in New York. A native of Washington, D.C., Dr. Matson is a graduate of Boston University, where she double-majored in chemistry and science education. She earned her Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Dr. Matson joined the faculty at the University of Rochester in 2015. Her research project:  Multimetallic Metal Oxide Clusters for Electrochemical Energy Storage and the Production of Chemical Fuels.

Katherine Mirica is an assistant professor of chemistry at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire. She joined the faculty there in 2015. Dr. Miraca was born and raised in Eastern Ukraine and moved with her family to the state of Rhode Island during her freshman year in high school. She earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry at Boston College and a Ph.D. in chemistry at Harvard University. Her research project: Molecular Engineering of Multifunctional Materials for Chemical Sensing and Microelectronics.

Alison Narayan, Gabriela Schlau-Cohen and Christina Woo

Alison Narayan is an assistant professor of chemistry in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts at the University of Michigan. She is also affiliated with the university’s Life Science Institute. Dr. Narayan is a graduate of the University of Michigan. She holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley. She joined the faculty at the University of Michigan in 2015. Her research project:  Biocatalytic Reactions for Selective, Sustainable Synthesis.

Gabriela Schlau-Cohen is an assistant professor of chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She joined the faculty at MIT in 2015. Dr. Schlau-Cohen is a magna cum laude graduate of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, where she majored in chemical physics. She holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley and was a postdoctoral fellow in chemistry at Stanford University.  Her research project: Elucidating Structural and Energetic Dynamics of Membrane Proteins.

Christina Woo is an assistant professor in the department of chemistry and chemical biology at Harvard University, and an affiliate member of the Broad Institute. She has served on the Harvard faculty since 2016. Dr. Woo is a 2008 graduate of Wellesley College in Massachusetts, where she majored in chemistry. She earned a Ph.D. at Yale University and did postdoctoral research at the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University. Her research project: Chemical Control of Cellular Signaling.