Sharon Hammes-Schiffer
Sharon received her B.A. in 1988 from Princeton University and her Ph.D. in Chemistry from Stanford University in 1993, followed by two years at AT&T Bell Laboratories as a postdoctoral research scientist. She was the Clare Boothe Luce Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Notre Dame from 1995-2000 and spent the next twelve years at The Pennsylvania State University, initially as the Shaffer Associate Professor of Chemistry and later as the Eberly Professor of Biotechnology. She became the Swanlund Chair and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2012 and the John Gamble Kirkwood Professor of Chemistry at Yale University in 2018. She became a Professor of Chemistry at Princeton University in 2024.
Dr. Hammes-Schiffer’s research centers on the investigation of charge transfer reactions, dynamics, and quantum mechanical effects in chemical, biological, and interfacial processes. Her work encompasses the development of analytical theories and computational methods, as well as applications to a wide range of experimentally relevant systems. She has developed quantum mechanical and hybrid quantum-classical theories and simulation methods for proton-coupled electron transfer reactions and hydrogen tunneling in solution and enzymes. She has also developed theoretical approaches and algorithms for including fundamental electron-proton interactions and non-Born-Oppenheimer effects in molecular electronic structure calculations.
Furthermore, in conjunction with experimental collaborators, her calculations of proton-coupled electron transfer in molecular electrocatalysts and photoinduced dynamical processes are guiding the design of more effective catalysts for energy conversion processes essential to solar energy devices.
