The Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Awards Program, which supports the research and teaching careers of talented young faculty in the chemical sciences, recently selected Professor Zach Wickens as an award winner for 2025. The national award recognizes research achievements, a demonstrated commitment to education, and the promise of continuing outstanding contributions to both research and teaching.
Professor Wickens has been recognized by students as an outstanding classroom instructor. One student remarked, “Honestly one of the best professors I have had so far. He is super caring and understanding of all of his students.” Students also mention his commitment to student success, flexibility, and accessibility outside of scheduled lab and class hours.
Research in the Wickens group focuses on leveraging electronically destabilized intermediates to unlock challenging reactions while maintaining control over selectivity. Photoredox catalysis has proven a powerful technique to achieve functional group tolerance as well as exquisite selectivity for radical chemistry. However, substrate classes that demand extreme potentials for activation remain outside the scope of photoredox catalysis due to the finite energy available from visible light. The group’s research focuses on leveraging a new family of photocatalysts–organic radical ions–that are mildly reactive in the ground state but become potent redox agents upon excitation. This supplements the energy of visible light and unlocks previously inert substrate classes to radical chemistry while maintaining the selectivity profile characteristic of traditional photoredox catalysis.
The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation announced
the selection of 19 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholars for 2025. These faculty are within the first five years of their academic careers, have each created an outstanding independent body of scholarship, and are deeply committed to education. Each Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar receives an unrestricted research grant of $100,000. More about the award and other recipients is available here.