Ohio University’s Chemistry & Biochemistry Colloquium Series presents Dr. Miaochan Zhi on Monday, Feb. 8, at 4:35 p.m. in Clippinger 194.
Miaochan Zhi
Zhi is a Research Physicist, Biomaterials Group, Biosystems and Biomaterials Division with the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Abstract: As stated in a New York Times article, “The Nature of Glass Remains Anything but Clear.” This is particularly true for the connection between short-time (picosecond) and long-time (seconds and longer) dynamics. Previous experiments using incoherent quasielastic neutron scattering have shown picosecond dynamic heterogeneity, hopping and “Johari-Goldstein” beta relaxation in glass-forming liquids, and have proposed a relationship between short- and long-time dynamics. I will discuss femtosecond heterodyne-detected optical Kerr effect (HD-OKE) spectroscopy studies on propylene carbonate, a glass forming liquid. In addition to exploring the fundamental science of glass physics, our study will be of interest to biopharmaceutical companies for protein stabilization and preservation, as has been shown by Cicerone et al. that there is a correlation between picosecond dynamics and degradation of proteins in sugar-based glass. We are developing a laser technique that can shed light on why there is such a correlation by studying the dynamic heterogeneity of molecules at short timescales.
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