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Chemistry & Biochemistry

Gain research experience with faculty committed to your success

About Chemistry & Biochemistry at UCCS

The UCCS Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry offers vibrant and transformative teaching, abundant opportunities for laboratory research at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and networking resources to help students succeed in their career endeavors. 

Advancing Green Chemistry Education

Did you know that UCCS Chemistry & Biochemistry is the only higher-education department in Colorado that has signed a commitment with Beyond Benign to integrate green chemistry—environmentally sound chemistry—into all its first-year labs?

Not only do UCCS Chemistry students have opportunities to work with groundbreaking researchers in multiple subfields of chemistry, but they also enter their major and their careers with the ability to develop chemical processes and ask chemistry-related questions that recognize the human and environmental impact of their work.

Instructors Tisha Mendiola Jessop and Niki Juhl are working hard to make green chemistry accessible to everyone.

Alumni Stories

Madison Fox
Award-winning researcher

Biochemistry graduate and competitive figure skater Madison Fox (’22) has been taking part in a 2-year post-baccalaureate fellowship at the National Institutes of Health's NIAID Vaccine Research Center, where she was honored to have won the Post-Baccalaureate Poster of the Year award and gave her first main session plenary talk at the International Keystone Symposia: HIV Vaccines, Immunoprophylaxis and Drugs meeting. Following on Dr. James Kovacs' mentorship during her undergraduate research training, she was offered the remarkable opportunity to actually lead two large-scale NHP studies investigating the use of broadly neutralizing antibodies as a therapeutic strategy against chronic HIV-1 infection, and is planning to submit her first, first-author manuscript based on her work in prolonged viral suppression of HIV. She will shortly be starting in an Immunology PhD program at the Yale School of Medicine with an emphasis on Medical Research.