Remarks from the Division Chair

Fall, 2006
Barbara J. Garrison

Greetings to all members of the PHYS division! As the outgoing chair for 2006, it has been extremely gratifying to see PHYS continue to grow in size, stature and richness of intellectual impact on the chemistry community. This is evidenced in many ways, by the historically large number of contributing abstracts in the biannual ACS meetings, the numerous ACS awards received by our fellow physical chemistry colleagues (and celebrated in the Tuesday award symposia each Spring), as well as the growing number of requests for interdisciplinary topic symposia in collaboration with other divisions. We can all be duly proud of the pivotal role PHYS plays in generating the fundamental ideas and technologies that so often prove crucial for enabling major advances not only in our own area, but also in a remarkably wide variety of other disciplines.

The national ACS meetings this year in Atlanta and San Francisco were a huge success and the credit goes to Bruce Kay, Program Chair for 2006 and now Division Chair. Our division is committed to a having a broad diversity in the programs at national meetings thus helping to display the pervasiveness of physical chemistry in many areas of scientific endeavors. Thanks, Bruce, for putting together two terrific programs!

The programs for the two 2007 meetings to be held in Chicago and Boston, organized by incoming Program Chair Greg Voth, promise to be equally exciting.   The program for Chicago is on-line (http://oasys.acs.org/acs/233nm/phys/papers/index.cgi) with abstracts due November 10.  Please contribute an abstract and plan on attending the meeting. We look forward to another banner year of PHYS division effort and activity under Greg’s guidance.

Programming ideas for the 2008 and 2009 national meetings should be directed to the future Program Chairs Laurie Butler (l-butler@uchicago.edu) and Martin Head-Gordon (mhg@bastille.cchem.berkeley.edu), respectively. From the input I have received on upcoming programs from these folks, it is clear we will be in excellent hands for years to come! Program Chairs are always looking for good ideas for symposia and good people to organize the symposia. Feel free to volunteer yourself or a colleague to the Program Chairs.

I would like to invite all PHYS division members to become more active in the Division, as officers or executive committee members. If you are interested in participating in this manner, please let me or any of the other Division officers know, as we are always looking for candidates. In an organization such as the ACS, where the lion’s share of the work is carried out by volunteers, it is critically important to have diverse and active participation by the Division members.

The position of Secretary-Treasurer of the PHYS Division is a five year term. A huge, special thank you goes to Ken Jordan and his assistant, Elaine Springel, for five fantastic years of service to the PHYS Division. Their superb dedication has helped make the division and the national meetings run more smoothly.  Anne McCoy is the Division’s nominee to be Ken’s successor as Secretary-Treasurer. A final thanks goes to David Nesbitt, the Past Chair for 2006, who can now attend ACS meetings with no divisional responsibilities.

In closing, I just want to say that it has been an honor to serve as the Chair of the PHYS division. I leave feeling more excited than ever about the future of physical chemistry and confident and enthusiastic about the Division’s leadership. It is truly an exciting time to be a physical chemist!

Barbara Garrison, PHYS Division Chair, 2006

Election Information and Ballot

Dear PHYS Division Member:

The Bylaws of the Division of Physical Chemistry, approved in 2006, call for the Division Chair to appoint a three-person, Nominating Committee before the spring meeting. A complete slate of candidates prepared by this committee will consist of one candidate for Vice-Chair-Elect, one candidate for each vacancy on the Executive Committee, and one candidate for each vacancy that may have developed in the ranks of the division Councilors, Alternate Councilors, and Secretary/Treasurer position. The Vice-Chair-Elect automatically becomes the Vice-Chair, Chair-Elect, Chair, and Immediate past-Chair in each succeeding year. Thus, this person makes a commitment to serve five years on the Executive Committee. In the year this person serves as Chair-Elect, the duties of Program Chair are also his or hers. The term of office for other Executive Committee members, Councilors, and Alternate Councilors is three years. The Secretary/Treasurer serves five years.

The Secretary/Treasurer is required to announce the slate of candidates in the fall newsletter.

To increase the input of the members in this nominating process and to broaden the pool of candidates, the Executive Committee seeks input directly from members for use by the Nominating Committee. Any member may suggest nominees to any of the officers of the PHYS division in writing. The nominee must agree to serve.

Additional nominations can come from the membership in the following fashion: A petition candidate must be supported by the signatures of not fewer than 4% of the members of the PHYS division in good standing (presently approximately 4,000). No signature shall be valid if it appears on more than one nominating petition for the same vacancy during the same calendar year.

A letter shall be submitted from each petition nominee stating willingness to be a candidate for election and to serve the Division for a full term if elected. No nominee may be a candidate for more than one vacancy. If nominated for more than one vacancy, the nominee must choose which nomination to accept.

Four weeks from the date of the mailing of the fall newsletter shall be allowed for additional nominations to be received by the Secretary/Treasurer. All valid nominations received within that period shall be accepted and no others.

If no valid nominations are forthcoming from the membership, the nominees submitted by the Nominating Committee for Vice-Chair-Elect, Secretary/Treasurer, and membership on the Executive Committee are declared elected.

Regardless of whether petition nominees are validated or not, the Bylaws require the Secretary/Treasurer to distribute to every PHYS division member a ballot that bears at a minimum the names and biographical sketches of the single candidates for each Councilor and Alternate Councilor vacancy submitted by the Nominating Committee.

Biographical sketches of all the nominees are found below. This year, the Nominating Committee consisted of David Nesbitt, Barbara Garrison, and Fleming Crim. They have chosen the following candidates for election:

Martin Head-Gordon, Completed B.Sc. (Hons) (1983) and M. Sc. (thesis) (1985) degrees at Monash University in Melbourne Australia, before coming to America to obtain his Ph.D. (1989) in theoretical chemistry at Carnegie-Mellon University, working with the late John Pople on molecular orbital theory and algorithms. From 1989-1992 Head-Gordon was a postdoctoral fellow at AT&T Bell Laboratories, working with John Tully. He explored gas-surface energy exchange, and developed new models for non-adiabatic energy flow. Since 1992 Head-Gordon has been on the faculty of the Chemistry Department at the University of California Berkeley, with an additional appointment as a Faculty Scientist in the Chemical Sciences Division of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He is known for development of linear scaling methods for performing density functional theory calculations, for new methods for calculating electronic excited states, and for advances in electron correlation methods. He is one of the driving forces behind the Q-Chem quantum chemistry program. Head-Gordon has received awards that include Packard (1995) and Sloan (1995) Fellowships, a Miller Research Professorship (2001-2), and the medal of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Sciences (1998). He was elected to the IAQMS in 2006, and was a Visiting Fellow of Clare Hall (2006). He is an Associate Editor of Molecular Physics and serves on the Editorial Advisory Board of Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics and several other journals. He has served as Chair of the ACS Theoretical Chemistry Subdivision (2003). Head-Gordon has over 200 scientific publications and over 150 invited talks.

Jingsong Zhang,Received his B.S. degree in Chemical Physics from the University of Science and Technology of China (1987) and a Ph.D. degree in Physical Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley (1993). At UC Berkeley, he studied reaction dynamics of atmospheric and combustion reactions using crossed molecular beams technique. From 1993-1996 Dr. Zhang was a postdoctoral fellow at University of Southern California and worked on photodissociation dynamics of small molecules and clusters. From 1996-2002, Dr. Zhang was an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and an assistant research chemist at the Air Pollution Research Center (APRC) at University of California, Riverside, and from 2002-2006, he was an associate professor of chemistry and associate research chemist at UC Riverside. Since 2006, he is a professor of chemistry and research chemist at UC Riverside. At UC Riverside, his research focuses on photodissociation and reaction dynamics of small molecules and free radicals important in combustion and atmospheric chemistry, as well as atmospheric chemistry and air pollution measurements. He has investigated state-resolved and state-to-state photodissociation dynamics of small free radicals in gas phase, high-temperature decomposition mechanisms of hydrocarbons and CVD precursors, and atmospheric reaction mechanisms and ambient air pollutant measurements. Dr. Zhang received the 1996 Camille and Henry Dreyfus New Faculty Award and was an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow from 2001-2003. During 1996-2000, he received three UC Regents' Faculty Fellowships and Faculty Development Awards. He received the Chinese American Faculty Association of Southern California Faculty Award in 2000. He served as session chair for several ACS symposiums and co-chaired the 20^th Symposium on Atmospheric Kinetic and Photochemical Processes in 2003. He is on the editorial advisory board of Chinese Journal of Chemical Physics since 2002. Dr. Zhang has supervised 15 graduate students, 2 postdoctoral fellows, and two visiting scholars. Dr. Zhang is a member of the American Chemical Society and the American Physical Society.

James M. Lisy, , Received B.S. degrees in Chemistry and Mathematics from Iowa State University (1974), a M.A. degree in Physics (1977) and a Ph.D. degree in Chemical Physics (1979) from Harvard University. At Harvard, he characterized the electrical dipole moments of small molecules in excited, metastable electronic states, via high resolution laser spectrometry in an electric resonance molecular beam apparatus. From 1979-81, Dr. Lisy was a NSF Postdoctoral Fellow at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he developed methods for the infrared laser spectroscopy of neutral molecular clusters using molecular beam mass spectrometric detection. In 1981, he assumed a faculty position at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as an assistant professor. He has remained there, being promoted through the ranks to full professor. He has served in administrative roles as Chair of the School of Chemical Sciences Service Facilities Committee, where he supervised the most significant renovation and upgrade of these facilities in the history of the School. From 2002-5, he served as Associate Head of the Department of Chemistry, with responsibility for the education mission of the Department at the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as renovation and remodeling of all space within the Department. From 1981-87, his research focused on the vibrational spectroscopy and structural characterization of neutral molecular clusters using infrared laser spectroscopy and molecular beam techniques, and popularized the use of optical parametric oscillators (using LiNbO₃ as the active gain medium) as a tunable infrared source. In 1987, he shifted his attention to the infrared spectroscopy of cluster ions, where the focus of his research has been on the competition between various non-covalent interactions. The balance between these competing interactions as a function of size, composition and temperature, has been a recurring theme in his research, which has applications, to atmospheric, solution and biomolecular chemistry. Prof. Lisy has received recognition for his research with a Dreyfus Award for Young Faculty in 1981, a Sloan Fellowship in 1987-9, a JSPS Fellow in 1996, a Visiting Professor of Chemistry at the Institute of Molecular Science in Okazaki, Japan in 1987, a chercheur associé of CNRS in 2004, a Wilsmore Fellow at the University of Melbourne in 2004-5.  He was most recently award the Journal of Molecular Spectroscopy Review Lecture Award in 2006 at the International Symposium on Molecular Spectroscopy. Prof. Lisy has authored over 80 papers, delivered over 140 invited talks on four continents, chaired the Gordon Research Conference on Molecular and Ionic Clusters in 1998 and 2002, and is currently a senior editor of the Journal of Physical Chemistry. He is a member of the American Chemical Society and a Fellow (2001) of the American Physical Society. He has served on a number of advisory committees for the National Science Foundation, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the ACS-PRF, the Beckman Foundation, and the Editorial Board of the Journal of Chemical Physics. During his 25 years at the University of Illinois, he has supervised the research of 12 Ph.D. awardees, 6 M.S. students and 18 senior theses. In addition, he has been recognized for his teaching excellence four times by the School of Chemical Sciences.

Anne McCoy, Received her B.S. degree in Chemistry from Haverford College (1987) and Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry with Ned Sibert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1992). She was a Golda Mier Postdoctoral fellow with R. Benny Gerber at the University of California, Irvine and Hebrew University from 1992-1994 and joined the faculty in the Chemistry Department at The Ohio State University in October 1994. Since that time, Dr. McCoy has risen through the ranks and is currently a Professor. Dr. McCoy’s research is in the areas of theoretical treatments of the spectroscopy and dynamics of systems that undergo large amplitude motions. Much of her work has focused on van der Waals clusters. More recent work has also included studies of the spectroscopy of hydrogen bonded systems and molecular ions, in particular CH₅⁺. Dr. McCoy received the Bergmann Award (1998), Camille Dreyfus Teacher/Scholar (1999) and AWISCO Award for Outstanding Woman in Science (2005). She has authored 87 technical papers and delivered more than 100 invited talks. Dr. McCoy previously served as a member of the executive committee of the Physical Division of the ACS (2003-2005). She has also been active in Telluride Summer Research Center, co-organizing four workshops in the past five years, serving on the board from 2001-2004, and as an officer since 2005. She is on the Executive Committee of the International Symposium for Molecular Spectroscopy, co-chaired the 2005 Gordon Research Conference on Molecular Energy Transfer and chaired the 2006 Midwest Theoretical Chemistry Conference. Since 2005, she has been a Senior Editor of the Journal of Physical Chemistry. Dr. McCoy is a member of the American Chemical Society (1992), American Physical Society (1995), and Sigma Xi (1987).

Ellen B. Stechel, Division of Physical Chemistry, Sandia National Laboratories, P.O. Box 5800, MS0734, Albuquerque, NM 87185-0734. (505) 845-1277 Email: ebstech@sandia.gov; Oberlin College, A.B., 1974; University of Chicago, M.S. 1976, Ph.D., 1978; Sandia National Laboratories, Manager Fuels and Energy Transitions, August 2006 to present; Department of Homeland Security, Science & Technology, Office of Research & Development, Office of National Laboratories, Office of Technology Transition on contract from Energy, Infrastructure, and Knowledge Systems, Sandia National Laboratories, July 2005 to August 2006; Ford Motor Company, North America Engineering, Core and Powertrain Engineering, Emissions Compliance Engineering, Mgr, Nov 2002 to June 2005; Ford Motor Company, North America Engineering, Core and Powertrain Engineering, Low Emissions Technology, Technical and Project Manager, May 2001 to Nov 2002; Ford Motor Company, Ford Research Laboratories, Chemistry and Environmental Science, Mgr., Nov 1999 to May 2001; Ford Motor Company, Ford Research Laboratories, Physics, Nov 1998 to Nov 1999; Sandia National Laboratories, Physical and Chemical Sciences, Advanced Materials and Device Sciences, Mgr., Oct 1994-Oct 1998; Member ACS since 1994. Division of Physical Chemistry: Councilor 2001-2006; Past Chair 1999; Chair 1998; Chair Elect and Program Chair 1997; Vice Chair 1996; Vice Chair Elect 1995; Committee on Nominations and Elections 2007-2009 and 2005; Committee on Science, Division Rep 2000-2008, Committee Associate, 1998-1999; Committee on CAS, 2003-2004, Committee Associate, 2002; Senior Editor, J. of Phys Chem., 1998-2000; Member APS, AVS, AAAS

Notes from the Secretary/Treasurer

Kenneth D. Jordan

This newsletter contains information about the ACS national meetings and any other items of interest to significant numbers of PHYS Division members. All members of the PHYS Division are welcome to submit items to the Secretary for inclusion in this newsletter. The deadlines are generally around December 1 and May 1 for the newsletters appearing before the Spring and Fall ACS meetings, respectively. Submissions may be made via mail, FAX, or e-mail.

The current ACS Bylaws & Regulations may be viewed at:

http://www.chemistry.org/portal/Chemistry?PID=acsdisplay.html&DOC=committees%5Ccnb%5Cindex.html.

Click on the link to Documents of the Committee and then on the link to Charter, Constitution, Bylaws, and Regulations of the American Chemical Society (Bulletin 5).

A copy of the bylaws and regulations is also included on the Division’s web page (http://hackberry.chem.trinity.edu/PHYS).

I also wish to use this as an opportunity to say that I have really enjoyed serving as Secretary/Treasurer for these past five years. I look forward to attending the superb symposia that the Division has slated for the upcoming meetings.

Councilor’s Report

John E. Adams

I use this opportunity to report on several items of possible interest to members of the Physical Chemistry Division that were announced in San Francisco at the national meeting either during the meeting of the ACS Council or during other governance meetings.

I am particularly pleased to report that fellow PHYS councilor Ellen Stechel was elected to serve on the Committee on Nominations and Elections for a three-year term starting in January. This is the committee that proposes slates of nominees for President-Elect, the Board of Directors, and certain other elected committees of the Council. Congratulations, Ellen!

There were three petitions for changes to the Bylaws on the Council agenda for consideration, i.e. to let us know formally that they will be on the agenda for a vote at the meeting next spring in Chicago. The three petitions include one that will permit a single payment of dues at the current annual rate for two- or three-year periods, one that will prohibit the Committee on Nominations and Elections from nominating someone for national office who is on that committee currently or who was on that committee last year, and one that will make changes in certain election procedures (numbers of signatures needed on petition nominations and the conduct of certain Director-at-Large elections). An ensuing short but intense (and largely out of order) discussion of the second of these petitions threw little light on the subject. But, I editorialize.

We received a report on progress made by the Governance Review Task Force, a group charged with looking at various aspects of how ACS operates.  To date, the suggestions first vetted at the previous Atlanta meeting have been divided into the categories of (1) good idea, let’s go forward; (2) basically good idea but it is still a little rough around the edges; (3) might still be a good idea, but the details need to be rethought; and (4) bad idea, dump it and don’t waste any more time on it. (These are not the “official” categories, but you get the point.) The “good idea” category includes a broadening of the eligibility for full membership in ACS. The Committee on Membership Affairs is currently working on a petition to change the Bylaws in order to implement just such a broadening.

The inclusion of a general discussion item has been a fixture of Council meetings for a few years. This time the subject was strategies for involving younger members in Society leadership positions. The results of a survey of the Council were presented prior to the open discussion.

ACS continues to be in good shape financially—current projections suggest that we will end 2006 about $8 million in the black, which is $3.5 million better than the net called for in the approved budget. We have been able to realize savings in IT expenses and healthcare costs (particularly in Columbus, OH, at Chemical Abstracts) while selling more electronic services than expected. Our investments also have done better than expected, in part because the good financial performance of 2005 translated into higher investment balances in 2006. The Committee on Budget and Finance received several proposals for funding new programs, but the committee chose to recommend funding only a few of them. The programs for which funding was recommended are (1) the Green Chemistry Institute (2007 and 2008 proposed budgets) and (2) workshops planned by the Committee on Professional Training involving institutions that serve large numbers of Hispanic and Native American students. There also is some good financial news on another front. The Committee on Meetings and Expositions recommended that given the success of the national meeting funding scheme approved several years ago by the Council, national meeting registration fees for 2007 should be the same as those for 2006. The Council quickly and gratefully voted to ratify that recommendation.

If any PHYS members have questions about actions taken by the Council, I would be happy to answer them if I can. You can contact me at AdamsJE@missouri.edu.

Biophysical Subdivision

Jay R. Winkler

Beginning in September, 2006, Jeffery G. Saven (University of Pennsylvania) will assume the position of Chair of the Biophysical Subdivision, replacing Jay R. Winker (Caltech) who will end his service.  Cecilia Clementi (>Rice University) will serve as Chair-Elect.

A new website that will provide information of interest to members of the Biophysical Subdivision is being developed (http://ACS-Biophysics.rice.edu/).

Future symposia of interest to subdivision members include:  Multiscaling Methods in Biophysics (Spring 2008, New Orleans); Folding: Conformations and Dynamics of Biopolymers (Fall 2008)

You are encouraged to contact Jeff Saven or Cecilia Clementi with ideas for symposia at future ACS National Meetings.

Subdivision membership is free to dues-paying members or affiliates of the Division of Physical Chemistry.  To join the Biophysical Subdivision, notify the Chair, Jeffery G. Saven, at the address in the table of officers. Indicate that you wish to join and mention that you belong to the PHYS Division.  If you do not belong to the Division, you may join both the Division and the Biophysical Subdivision by completing the application form at the end of this newsletter.

Theoretical Subdivision

Krishnan Raghavachari

Beginning September, 2006, Angel Garcia (RPI) will assume the position of Chair of the Theoretical subdivision, replacing myself. Todd Martinez will serve as Chair-Elect and Berny Schlegel will serve as Vice-Chair-Elect.

Subdivision membership is free to dues-paying members or affiliates of the Division of Physical Chemistry. To join the Theoretical Subdivision, notify the Chair, angel Garcia, at the address in the table of officers. Indicate that you wish to join and mention that you belong to the PHYS Division. If you do not belong to the Division, you may join both the Division and the Theoretical Subdivision by completing the application form at the end of this newsletter.

Student Poster Awards

Bruce D. Kay

The winners of the Physical Chemistry Student Poster Award Competition at the Fall 2006 ACS meeting in San Francisco, CA, were:

• Allison G. Caster, Department of Chemistry, University of California at Berkeley “Chemically selective imaging with single pulse CARS microscopy”
• Adam Cohen, Department of Chemistry, Stanford University “Suppressing Brownian motion of individual molecules in solution”
• Luis Velarde, Department of Chemistry, University of Arizona “Intracluster ion-molecule reactions within [(CO₂)_n(H2O)_m] ^- anionic clusters"
• Jill Zwickl, Department of Chemistry, “Simulation of proton transfer reactions in solution”
• Doran I. G. Bennett, Department of Chemistry, University of Chicago “Ground state dynamics of vinoxy: Computational and experimental study”
• Margaret E. Johnson, Department of Bioengineering, University of California at Berkeley “Limitations of representing liquid water properties with pair potentials”

Name                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Address                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

City, State, Zip                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Country, Postal Code                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Telephone                                                                                      (h)                                                                                                                

ACS Member?     NO    r              YES     r        ®     ACS member #                                                                                                                       

Membership Categories (qualification)                                                         (CIRCLE ONE)

r             Member (current ACS member)                                                               $15.00

r             Student (current Student ACS member)                                                 $ 5.00

r             Division Affiliate (Non-ACS member)                                                      $15.00

r             National Affiliate (current National Affiliate ACS member)                   $15.00

Subdivision Membership

r             Theoretical Chemistry (no additional fee at this time)

r             Biophysical Chemistry (no additional fee at this time)

                                            Total $                          

Payment: (please check one)

r
r             VISA/MasterCard              r    American Express
Card Number:                                                                                                                                 
Expiration Date:                                                                                                                              
Signature:                                                                                                                                        
(Signature is required, regardless of method of payment)
 
 
 
Please mail this application (and check, if applicable) to:
ACS Member & Subscriber Services
P. O. Box 82229
Columbus, OH  43202
1-800-333-9511