Welcome to the Chemistry Department

As the Chair of the Chemistry Department in the College of Arts and Sciences at University of North Florida, I would like to welcome you to our site. I am delighted that you are browsing our web pages and exploring UNF's Chemistry Department, a thriving academic department with ambitious plans for growth. In the past five years we have added eight tenure-track assistant professors to the faculty pool (presently 19) and this has dramatically changed the dynamics of the department.

We offer a Bachelor of Science (BS) in Chemistry, a four-year program of study, which is fully accredited through the American Chemical Society (ACS). In Fall 2010 we added new undergraduate tracks in Pre-Med Professions and Materials Chemistry, and since then we have experienced a dramatic upsurge in the number of our chemistry majors. In the 2011-2012 academic year, we graduated 20 BS chemistry majors and we expect this number to increase in coming years. About half of our graduates go on to graduate programs, medical or veterinary schools, and others find employment in industry. We have developed close ties with local industry and with the Mayo Clinic, and through these interactions our junior and seniors have been able to find internship opportunities.

Our program is designed to give students a diverse, yet deep, understanding of chemical phenomena and provide an opportunity to learn the experimental skills used by practicing chemists. Most courses include substantial laboratory work in order to give students that first-hand experience. Students interpret and explain experimental data from a broad array of instrumentation, including high-field NMR (500 MHz), GC-MS, GC, FT-IR, UV/Vis, HPLC, X-ray powder diffraction, and a Perkin Elmer AAnalyst 800 Flame/Graphite Furnace, plus a variety of other research-caliber instruments. Numerous undergraduate research opportunities with the faculty are available; juniors and seniors are strongly encouraged to gain undergraduate research experience with a faculty mentor before graduation.

I know you will find the information that you are looking for by browsing through our website. Should you require additional information on the chemistry program at UNF, please feel free to contact me (radha.pyati@unf.edu) or the Chemistry main office at (904) 620-3503.

Dr. Radha Pyati

Associate Professor & Chair, Department of Chemistry