Team

Rachel Hems (she/her)

Rachel grew up in Ontario, Canada and obtained her BSc in Chemistry from the University of Guelph. Her interest in environmental and analytical chemistry first began througundergraduate research experiences working in Dr. Jennifer Murphy’s (U of Toronto), Dr. Nigel Bunce’s (U of Guelph), Dr. Paul Rowntree’s (U of Guelph) and Dr. Cora Young’s (Memorial University of Newfoundland, now at York University) labs. 

Rachel then pursued her PhD in environmental chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Toronto working with Dr. Jon Abbatt. Her PhD research investigated aqueous oxidation reactions and photochemistry of organic compounds in the atmosphere using chromatography and high-resolution mass spectrometry. 

Rachel received an NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship to work in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Michigan, where she measured the composition of aerosol particles using a single-particle mass spectrometer.
Outside of teaching and research, she enjoys spending time outside hiking, cloud gazing, and star gazing.

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