Todd Hudnall.

STAFF REPORT

The Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Texas State is in the thick right now, publishing two papers that are featured on the covers of international chemistry journals.

In each case, Assistant Professor Todd Hudnall directed the research.

“Having our publications featured on the covers of these prestigious scientific journals offers increased visibility of not only our work, but also of Texas State University as a whole,” said William Brittain, chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. “For the students and postdocs that have worked on these projects, having their work published on the cover of an internationally-recognized journal is extremely gratifying.”

An article titled, “Isolation of a Neutral P8 Cluster by [2+2] Cycloaddition of a Diphosphene Facilitated by Carbene Activation of White Phosphorus,” by Hudnall, along with Texas State researchers Christopher L. Dorsey and Brian M. Squires, is featured on the inside cover of the Angewandte Chemie International Edition, volume 52, issue 16, published by the Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker.

An article titled, “Phosphaalkene vs. phosphinidene: the nature of the P–C bond in carbonyl-decorated carbene – PPh adducts,” by Hudnall, along with Texas State researchers Dorsey, Roberta R. Rodrigues and Chelsee A. Arceneaux, is featured on the back cover of Chemical Communications, volume 50, issue 2, published by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Hudnall’s research group is concerned with the chemistry of reactive main group allotropes, alloys and radicals, with a special focus on the discovery of new structures, bonding modes and reactivities. The group is studying the ability of electron-deficient carbenes to serve as stabilizing ligands to reactive phosphorus, arsenic, antimony, silicon and boron-containing species.