Bradley Chmelka

Professor

Chemical Engineering

Bradley Chmelka

Contacts

Department of Chemical Engineering
University of California, Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, CA 93106-5080

tel: (805) 893-3673
fax: (805) 893-4731
bradc@engineering.ucsb.edu

Personal web site

Research Description

Our research is motivated by the need to understand at a molecular level the fabrication and functions of new catalysts, adsorbents, optoelectronic materials, porous ceramics, heterogeneous polymers, and biominerals. These categories of technologically important materials are linked by their crucial dependencies on local order/disorder, which often governs macroscopic process or device performance. We are broadly interested in heterogeneous solids, whose sizable variations in local ordering and dynamics have pronounced influences on the adsorption, reaction, optical, or mechanical properties of these materials. Through development and application of state-of-the-art techniques of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, we observe many common molecular features among these diverse systems, which provide new insights and design intuition for our materials chemistry and engineering objectives. We benefit from close collaborative research relationships with a number of industrial partners and foreign laboratories.

Biography

Professor Chmelka graduated summa cum laude from Arizona State University in 1982 with a B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering. From 1982 to 1984 he worked as a startup engineer with Unocal Corporation at the Parachute Creek Shale Oil Project. He received his Ph.D. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1990. Postdoctoral fellowship awards from the Division of Chemistry of NSF and from the NSF-NATO Program supported his postdoctoral research work in applications of NMR spectroscopy to inorganic and polymeric solids at Berkeley (1990) and at the Max-Plank-Institüt fur Polymerforschung in Mainz, Germany (1991). Dr. Chmelka joined the faculty at UCSB in 1992.


Awards/Honors

  • Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Award, 1996
  • Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation Teacher-Scholar Award, 1993
  • David and Lucile Packard Foundation Award, 1993
  • New Young Investigator Award, NSF Division of Materials Research, 1992
  • NSF Division of Chemistry Postdoctoral Fellowship Award, 1989
  • NSF-NATO Postdoctoral Fellowship Award, 1989

Selected Publications

  • Sensitivity Considerations in Polarization Transfer and Filtering Using Dipole-Dipole Couplings: Implications for Biomineral Systems, Solid-State NMR, 29,, 2006, 170-82, S.C. Christiansen, N. Hedin, M.T. Janicke, J.D. Epping, Y. del Amo, M. Demarest, M. Brzezinski, B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Cross-Linked Poly(styrene)-block-Poly(2-vinylpyridine) Thin Films as Swellable Templates for Mesostructured Silica and Titania, Adv. Mater., 17,, 2005, 2591-2595, R.C. Hayward, B.F. Chmelka, and E.J. Kramer, web link
  • Rapid 1H{13C}-Resolved Diffusion and Spin-Relaxation Measurements by NMR Spectroscopy, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 127,, 2005, 11624-11635, C.A. Steinbeck and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Template Cross-Linking Effects on Morphologies of Swellable Block Copolymer and Mesostructured Silica Thin Films, Macromolecules, 38, 2005, 7768-7783, R.C. Hayward, B.F. Chmelka, and E.J. Kramer, web link
  • Friedel-Crafts Alkylation Properties of Aluminosilica SBA-15 Meso/Macroporous Monoliths and Mesoporous Powders, J. Catal, 221, 2004, 400-412, J. Chiu, S. Bishop, D.J. Pine, and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Interactions of Charged Porphyrins with Nonionic Triblock Copolymer Hosts in Aqueous Solutions, Langmuir, 20,, 2004, 10399-10412, C.A. Steinbeck, N. Hedin, and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Mesostructured Silica/Block Copolymer Composites as Hosts for Optically Limiting Dye Molecules, J. Phys. Chem. B, 108,, 2004, 11909-11914, N.A. Melosh, B.J. Scott, C. Steinbeck, R.C. Hayward, P. Davidson, G.D. Stucky, and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Structure of a Surfactant-Templated Silicate Framework in the Absence of 3D Crystallinity, J. Am. Chem. Soc, 126, 2004, 9425-9432, N. Hedin, R. Graf, S.C. Christiansen, C. Gervais, R.C. Hayward, J. Eckert, and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Thin Films of Bicontinuous Cubic Mesostructured Silica Templated by a Nonionic Surfactant, Langmuir, 20,, 2004, 5998-6004, R.C. Hayward, P.C.A. Alberius, E.J. Kramer, and B.F. Chmelka, web link
  • Nucleation and Growth of Zeolites and Inorganic Mesoporous Solids: Molecular Insights from Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy, Current Opinions in Colloid and Interface Science, In Press, J.D. Epping, B.F. Chmelka