UO Chemistry and Biochemistry’s Julie Haack, a faculty member specializing in green chemistry, helped them refine their plastic recipe!

Chemistry and Biochemistry Senior Instructor Emeritus Ralph Barnhard passed away on February 23, 2019.

A UO alum, Ralph earned his Master of Science degree in Chemistry at the University of Oregon in 1965 and joined the department’s teaching faculty in 1966. Over the following 34 years, he taught thousands of chemistry students and served as assistant department head.  Ralph retired in 2000.

Ralph is remembered as an outstanding educator with a wholehearted commitment to his students,  This  sentiment was underscored in April 2011 when the department dedicated the Chemistry Resource Center in his honor – a new classroom and adjoining suite of rooms for peer tutoring and teaching assistant office hours.

Ralph’s obituary can be found in the Register Guard.

David Johnson, Rosaria P. Haugland Foundation Chair in Pure and Applied Chemistry at the University of Oregon, has been named as a recipient of the prestigious Humboldt Research Award.

The award is granted in recognition of a researcher’s overall achievements and whose fundamental discoveries, new theories, or insights have had and will continue to have a significant impact on their discipline.

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation promotes academic cooperation between German scientists and scholars with their counterparts from around the world. Award recipients are encouraged to collaborate on research projects with colleagues in Germany. Professor Johnson will be working with Prof. Dr. med. Wolfgang Bensch of Christian-Albrechts-University Kiel in Germany on projects involving solid state and surface chemistry, and material synthesis.