The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation

Today is #NationalSTEMDay! 🎉 🧪

This year, we're celebrating all the incredible educators and researchers that we are proud to call grantees.

Researchers discover spontaneous chirality in conjugated polymers Chirality, a property where structures have a distinct left- or right-handedness, allows natural semiconductors to move charge and convert energy with high efficiency by controlling electron spin and the angular momentum of light. A new study has revealed that many conjugated polymers, long considered structurally neutral, can spontaneously twist into chiral shapes. This surprising behavior, overlooked for decades, could pave the way for development of a new class of energy-efficient electronics inspired by nature.

Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Nicholas Jackson of
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign used machine learning to find "that polymers with longer molecular chains were more likely to form chiral assemblies."

https://phys.org/news/2025-10-spontaneous-chirality-conjugated-polymers.html

Héctor Abruña, the Émile M. Chamot Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Cornell University, is the recipient of the 2025 Dreyfus ... Héctor Abruña, Cornell University, 2025 Dreyfus Prize Recipient

"As with all prizes, it's really a reflection of the people who've done the work in my laboratories over decades."
- Héctor Abruña (Cornell University) on winning the Dreyfus Prize

https://youtu.be/mGO6KOygzQI

TBT: Two weeks ago was a wonderful celebration of the 2025 Dreyfus Prize winner Héctor Abruña of Cornell University

📸: Chris Kitchen Photography

Congratulations to Dr. Kathryn Riley at @swarthmorecollege.bsky.social for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Julie Pollock (@julieapollock.bsky.social) at University of Richmond for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Andrew Petit at California State University, Fullerton for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Ryan Limbocker at United States Military Academy at West Point for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Geneva Laurita at @batescollege.bsky.social for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Melissa Gordon at Lafayette College for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Shuming Chen at Oberlin College for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Dr. Jeanine Amacher at Western Washington University for being named a 2025 Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar! #DreyfusAwards

The Dreyfus Foundation is pleased to announce the selection of 8 new Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholars!

The award honors young faculty in the chemical sciences who have created an outstanding independent body of scholarship & are deeply committed to education with undergraduates.

CATNIP for chemists: New data-driven tool broadens access to greener chemistry University of Michigan and Carnegie Mellon University researchers have developed a new tool that makes greener chemistry more accessible.

Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Alison Narayan (Alison Narayan, Narayan Lab @ UMich, University of Michigan) and colleagues have developed "a new tool that makes greener chemistry more accessible."

https://news.umich.edu/catnip-for-chemists-new-data-driven-tool-broadens-access-to-greener-chemistry/

Peptide study paves path toward new weapon against antibiotic-resistant bacteria | Newsroom CORVALLIS, Ore. – New research into antimicrobial peptides, small chains of amino acids able to damage bacterial cells, shows why some peptides are more effective at doing that and also why some cells are more vulnerable. The findings open the door to designing novel compounds for killing disease-causing organisms that have become resistant to antibiotics. These compounds would represent a major breakthrough against a pervasive global problem, said study co-leader Myriam Cotten of Oregon State University.

A new peptide study from Henry Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Myriam Cotton (Oregon State University) and colleagues "paves [the] path toward [a] new weapon against antibiotic-resistant bacteria."

https://ow.ly/avIN50Xl1LL

Three Stanford Medicine professors elected to National Academy of Medicine Euan Ashley, Thomas Montine and Alice Ting join the distinguished society of physicians.

Congratulations to Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Alice Ting (Alice Ting) of Stanford University on being elected to National Academy of Medicine!

https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2025/10/national-academy-medicine.html

Congratulations to University of San Diego on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to San José State University on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to San Francisco State University on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to High Point University on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to Hamilton College on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to College of Charleston on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to @carleton.edu on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

Congratulations to California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo on being awarded a grant from the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program! #DreyfusAwards

The Jean Dreyfus Lectureship awards provide a $25,000 grant to bring a leading researcher to a primarily undergraduate institution to give at least two lectures in the chemical sciences. A portion of the award also supports two undergraduates in summer research.

The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation is pleased to announce 8 new grants in the Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions program!

Q&A: UW chemistry professors explain MOFs, the materials behind the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Oct. 8 awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi

Want to learn more about MOFs, the materials behind the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry?

Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Dianne Xiao (UW Chemistry) explains: https://www.washington.edu/news/2025/10/10/uw-chemistry-professors-explain-mofs-the-materials-behind-the-2025-nobel-prize-in-chemistry/

TODAY at 5 p.m. PT: Occidental College hosts Emily Balksus of Harvard for a public talk as part of their Jean Dreyfus Lectureship. Details below:

TODAY at James Madison University as part of their Jean Dreyfus Lectureship, JMU Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry will host Polly Arnold of UC Berkeley and Berkeley Lab for a discussion following a free film screening

Scalable AI tracks motion from single molecules to wildebeests University of Michigan researchers have developed a tool powered by artificial intelligence that can help them examine the behavior of a single molecule out of a sea of information in the blink of an eye—or at least overnight.

Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Nils Walter (Nils Walter & Lab @ the U. of Michigan) and colleagues have developed "a tool powered by artificial intelligence that can help them examine the behavior of a single molecule out of a sea of information in the blink of an eye."

https://ow.ly/8C0650XkXkA