Best Presentation Awards

2025 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical biology: Amy Chabroux (Olson lab), Srindhi Venkatesh (Fisher lab), and Jackson Englade (Toney lab)

• Inorganic/organic chemistry: Alexander Mardar (Osterloh lab), Ansh Patel (Pitts lab), and Trevor Houchins (Berben lab)

• Physical/analytical chemistry: Emma Leff (Wang lab), Isabella Acosta (Britt lab), and Ashely Scott (Louie lab)

2024 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

•  Chemical biology: Amy Chabroux (Olson lab), Ethan Hintz (David lab), Jennifer Lee (Siegel lab)

• Inorganic/organic chemistry: Anthony Witt (Power lab), Tania Shahvali (Shaw lab), Zane Haidar (Pitts lab)

• Physical/analytical chemistry: Bohan Li (Koski lab), Cedric Centers (Crabtree lab), Erin Morissette (Lebrilla lab)

2023 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical biology: Samuel Carter (Olson lab), Wenrui Chen (Chen lab), Olivia Jacobs (Beal lab), Nicholas Robertson (Murray lab), Issac Yu (Ames lab)

• Inorganic/organic chemistry: Sydney Figueroa (Franz lab), Emily Jimenez (Shaw lab), Andrew Li (Osterloh), Bronson Ruiz (Power lab), Yu Cheng Wang (Kauzlarich lab)

• Physical/analytical chemistry: Vicky Huynh (Koski lab), Elika Javaheri (Atsumi lab), Emma Laurence (Liu lab), Rachel Shey (Hammock lab)

2022 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical Biology: Natasha Deo (David lab), Jason Yi (Murray lab), and Vibha Sharma (Heffern lab) 

• Organic/Inorganic Chemistry: Alexandria Adams (Balch lab), Jeffery Toman (Shaw lab) and Arista Wu/Brandon Vernoy (working with Ozcan Gulacar) 

• Physical/Analytical Chemistry:  Jackson Demaray/Stanislav Moroz (Stuchebrukov lab), Nicholas Cheng (Lebrilla lab) and Xian Fong/Archie Mangubat (Wang lab)

2021 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical Biology: Madeline Bright from the David lab, Mateo Cepeda from Atsumi lab, Bryant Luu from Chen lab

• Organic/Inorganic Chemistry: Keyan Li from the Berben lab, Rongqing Shang from the Kauzlarich lab, Banana Isbeih from the Balch lab

• Physical/Analytical Chemistry: Caleb Crowder Walton from the Crabtree lab, Brianca Netto from the Liu lab, Vincent Chang from the Lebrilla lab

2020 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in four research categories.

•  Chemical Biology Session I: Conan Lee from Atsumi lab, Winnie Chen from Lebrilla lab, Serena Kutney from the Franz lab

• Chemical Biology Session II: Shannon Lu from the Beal lab, Hiroaki Yamada from the Ames lab, Seona Patel (seopatel@ucdavis.edu) from the Olson lab

• Organic/Inorganic Chemistry: Christopher Lowe from the Balch lab, Teresa Tang from the Franz lab, 

• Physical/Analytical Chemistry: Hannah Reeves from the Wang lab , Ruimeng Wang from the Wang lab

2019 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical Biology: Henry Agnew (Larsen group), Rebecca Rafique (Murray group) and Jayashri Viswanathan (Olson group).

• Organic/Inorganic: Lauren McNamara (Balch group) and Mira Milic (Franz group).

• Physical/Analytical: Brian Yuen (Wang group), Yiyun Liu (Lebrilla group) and Nathan Soland (Osterloh group).

2018 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical Biology: Arya Azinfar (Olson group) and Devin Minter (Atsumi group).

• Organic/Inorganic: Kelly Gullett (Power group) and Niklas Kraemer (Kurth group).

• Physical/Analytical: Brian Roehrich (Osterloh group) and Gabriella Lahti (Koski group).

2017 Best Presentation Awards: The awards for this year were given in three research categories.

• Chemical Biology: Ardavan Farahvash (Stuchebrukhov group).

• Organic/Inorganic Chemistry: Navtej Singh Grewal and Ming Yin Kwong (Kauzlarich group).

• Physical/Analytical Chemistry: Jessi Hartman (Donadio group) and Alec Tyra (Mukhopadhyay group).

2016 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Colin Unger (Kovnir group): Development of a Solvothermal Reaction Pathway for the Synthesis of Various Transition Metal Chloride Formate Compounds

• 2nd prize: Sahana Rajan (Ames group): Structural Analysis of α-actinin-1, a Cytoskeletal Protein that Controls Neuronal Excitability in Learning and Memory

• 3rd prize (shared): Sydnee Green (David group): High-Throughput Fluorescence Assay for the Study of Click Modified Transition State Inhibitors for Base Excision Repair Glycosylases, and Andrew Teuthorn (Kurth group): An Intramolecular Anionic [3+2] Route to Benzoisoxazoles

2015 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Sokena Zaidi (Berben group): Metal Centered Catalysts Covalently Attached to High Surface Area Carbon Materials

• 2nd prize: Zi Yao (Shaw group):  Discovery of New Small Molecule Inhibitors of the Bacterial Cell Division Protein FtsZ

• 3rd prize: Airi Kawamura (Kauzlarich group): Al Doping of Yb14 MgSb11  for Improved Thermoelectric Performance

2014 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Joshua Queen (Power group): Synthesis and reactivity of bisarylthiolato and bisaryloxo tetrylenes

• 2nd prize: Valerie Huynh (Shaw group): Studying the Structure-Activity Relationship of FtsZ Inhibitors Through Amide Bonds and Diamine Chain Lengths

• 3rd prize: James Lucas (Siegel group): Functional Characterization of Conserved Molecular Interactions in the Active Site of Mannitol 2-Dehydrogenase

2013 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Nicholas K. Brune (Osterloh group), Splitting Water With Rust: Photocatalytic Water Oxidation with Iron Oxide, for Fuel Generation Purposes

• 2nd prize: Molly Fensterwald (Shaw group), Synthesis of Antimicrobial Compounds to Identify DNA Gyrase Inhibitors in Gram-Negative Bacteria 

• 3rd prize:  Mavish Mahomed (Goodin group): Protein Engineering of Cytochrome P450 PikC and Antibiotic Evolution

2012 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Cory Weinstein (Power group), Investigation of Main Group Metal-Transition Metal Carbonyl Complexes

• 2nd prize: Chelsea D. Cates (Berben group), Iminopyridine (IP) Ga(III) Complexes promote exclusively 2-Electron Chemistry and IP2Ga(OH) activates CO2

• 3rd prize: Jackson Zhu (Kurth Group), Expedient Synthesis of a 72 Membered Isoxazolino-beta-ketoamide Library by a 2-3 Component Reaction

2011 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Larissa Miyachi (Guo Group), Functionalized Nanoparticles for Site-Specific Chemotherapy: DNA Linkers and Radiation-Induced Ligand Release

• 2nd prize: Thomas M. Brown (Power group), Sub-90 Deg Interligand Angles in Group 14 ElementDichalcogenolates

• 3rd prize: Alex B. Wood (Kurth group), Synthesis of β-Ketoamide Isoxazolines by a One-Pot, MulticomponentReaction

2010 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Gary E. Arevalo (Dr. Franz group) 'Stereoselective Synthesis of Biologically Relevant Spirocyclic Oxindoles'

• 2nd prize: Florentine U. Rutaganira (Dr. Shaw group) 'Synthesis of Heterocyclic Totarol Analogs for Inhibition of FtsZ'

• 3rd prize: Tony Pan (Dr. Atsumi group) 'Comparison of enzymes for biofuels production in thermophilic cyanobacteria'

2009 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Victor Lui (Tantillo group) 'Progress Towards a Geranyl Pyrophosphate Mimic'

• 2nd prize: Lucy Freer (Larsen group) 'Ultrafast spectroscopy and the blue/green light activated cyanobacteriochrome Tlr0924'

• 3rd prize: Musleh Muthana (Xi group) 'Synthesis of 2-acetamido-2-deoxy-D-galactopyransoly-L- serine/threonine for glycopeptides synthesis'

2008 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize: Nicole Schirle (Beal group) 'Development and Screening of Macrocyclic Helix-Threading Peptides'

• 2nd prize: Alex Sutherland (Guo group) 'Eliminating Greenhouse Gases using a Novel Dry Reforming Catalyst'

• 3rd prize: Sean Beecroft (Lebrilla group) 'A Statistically Based Program to Classify Mass Spectra and Identify Spectral Markers'

• 4th prize: Kostia Malley (Larsen group) 'Chromophore dynamics in retinal Schiff bases and novel rhodopsin mimics characterized by ultrafast time-resolved spectroscopy'

• 5th prize: Simon S.M. Park (Land group) 'An approach to Biosensors using Overlayer Enhanced Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared (OE-ATR-FTIR) Spectroscopy'

2007 Best Presentation Awards

• 1st prize (shared): Evan Horn, Investigation into an Efficient Synthetic Scheme Leads to Two New Sialic Acid Dimers  and Ilya Yakovlev, A New Approach to Peptide Radiolabeling for the Imaging of Cancer by Positron Emission Tomography

• 2nd prize: Jason Holden, Designing a 3-phenyl-4,5-dihydroisoxazole-5-amide Library for Drug Discovery

• 3rd prize: Adrienne Kucma, Investigation of an Easy Synthesis of Yb11A10 (A=Sb, Bi)

• 4th prize: Ryan Henning, Mechanism Studies of a Multifunctional Sialyltransferase from Pasteurella multocida