Two students in the Sevy lab work on aligning a Kr⁺ laser used to pump a color center laser. The color center laser, with a frequency resolution of 0.0001 cm-1 and a tunability range of 2-3.5 μm is used either to prepare reactant molecules in single ro-vibrational states or to probe product molecules in single ro-vibrational states. This high resolution laser along with other lasers in the Sevy lab are used to facilitate study of chemical reaction dynamics.

Brigham Young University chemists have developed the synthetic, mirror-image version of a molecule derived from the Stephania japonica, or Japanese tape vine, that has a molecular structure that closely resembles that of the addictive painkiller morphine...

BYU researchers have developed an improved method for making a drug called "cladribine" that has proven effective against certain types of cancer, including hairy cell lukemia, which affects as many as 800 patients a year. Morris J. Robins, the J. Rex Goates Professor of Chemistry, led BYU's efforts.

As part of a multidisciplinary team of scientists from around the world,a Brigham Young University professor and his graduate students have helped to discover a key to how the body regulates its immune response.The finding has important implications in uncovering the roots of baffling autoimmune conditions like multiple sclerosis, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. The work also sheds light on how the body responds to threats such as viruses, bacteria and cancer.

Brigham Young University researchers have developed a method of producing synthetic molecules that would allow pharmaceutical companies to make certain prescription drugs more efficiently, including a forthcoming class of type 2 diabetes medications.

A team of Brigham Young University biochemists has answered a 12-year-old question about the way your body's cells do their jobs. The research relates to heart disease, gastro-intestinal problems, depression, certain forms of cancer, drug addictions and certain forms of blindness.

Research in the Vollmer-Snarr group involves the synthesis and photochemistry of amino-retinoid compounds. This image shows the irradiation of an amino-retinoid compound with blue light (~450 nm) to produce cytotoxic photo-oxidation products.

Research into fundamental reaction mechanisms involves the use of short pulses of laser light to start and probe chemical reactions. Undergraduate student Aaron Johnson aligns a nanosecond YAG laser in preparation for a nanosecond step-scan FTIR measurement of the reaction of an organometallic reaction. Data from these experiments will aid in the design of catalysts.

In the Farnsworth research group we are studying the passage of ions from an atmospheric-pressure source, an inductively coupled plasma, to the mass spectrometer where they are sorted and counted. An understanding of ion behavior will help us design improved instruments. This picture shows in blue the path of a laser that is used to excite ions entering the mass spectrometer and in red the path of the fluorescence from those ions into our detection system.