Julia Ann Kalow is an assistant professor of chemistry at Northwestern University. She is primarily a synthetic chemist, who works on polymers, photochemistry and tissue engineering. She is interested in synthetic strategies that can turn molecular structure and chemical reactivity into macroscopic properties. She has been awarded the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, Thieme Award and was selected by the University of Chicago as a Rising Star in Chemistry.
Early life and education
Kalow is from Newton, Massachusetts. She studied chemistry and creative writing at Columbia University. She played the flute for the Columbia University Wind Ensemble. She worked with James L. Leighton on the synthesis of isocyclocitrinol and on an enantioselective imino-Nazarov reaction. During this placement she became more interested in a research career. She was awarded the Chemistry Undergraduate Award and Brownstein Writing Prize. She was also the salutatorian of her graduating class at Columbia. She worked as an intern at Merck Research Laboratories, where she investigated trifluoromethylation using metal catalysts. In 2008 Kalow joined Princeton University as a graduate student with Abigail Doyle. Together they worked on asymmetric nucleophilic fluorination. She used cooperative catalysis in fluorination reactions, which allowed for selective radiofluorination. Her work was awarded an American Chemical Society Division of Organic Chemistry Graduate Fellowship.
Research and career
In 2013 Kalow joined Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a postdoctoral fellow with Timothy M. Swager. She worked on telechelic P3HT synthesis, as well as miktoarm polymers using ring-opening metathesis polymerisation. Kalow became interested in the use of complex emulsions in enzyme sensing, as well as self-assembly of block copolymers.
She joined Northwestern University in 2016. She is a member of the National Science Foundation Center for Sustainable Polymers. Her work considers organic synthesis and polymer chemistry, and is interested in photoresponsive materials. This includes creating polymers with controlled chain lengths using selective photoexcitation. To achieve this, Kalow is developing photochemically gated junctions, which allow spatiotemporal control of junction dynamics. These junctions permit for transient regions of fast and slow exchange dynamics, which operate over long length scales. Her group are also developing hydrogels that can be controlled using light. In 2017 Kalow was named a Searle Fellow at Northwestern University.
Selected publications
Her publications include;
- Kalow, Julia (2010). "Enantioselective ring opening of epoxides by fluoride anion promoted by a cooperative dual-catalyst system". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 132 (10): 3268–3269. doi:10.1021/ja100161d. PMID 20163118. S2CID 35560131.
- Kalow, Julia (2015). "Dynamically reconfigurable complex emulsions via tunable interfacial tensions". Nature. 518 (7540): 520–524. Bibcode:2015Natur.518..520Z. doi:10.1038/nature14168. PMC 4504698. PMID 25719669.
- Julia A., Kalow (2011). "Mechanistic Investigations of Cooperative Catalysis in the Enantioselective Fluorination of Epoxides". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 133 (40): 16001–16012. doi:10.1021/ja207256s. PMID 21863842. S2CID 207072935.
Awards and honours
Her awards and honours include;
- 2021 Sloan Research Fellowship
- 2021 Camille Dreyfus Teacher Scholar Award
- 2019 National Science Foundation CAREER Award
- 2019 American Chemical Society PMSE Young Investigator
- 2018 3M Non-tenured Faculty Award
- 2018 Thieme Chemistry Journal Award
- 2017 Air Force Research Laboratory Award
- 2015 University of Chicago Rising Star in Chemistry
She is a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
References
- "Leighton Group Members". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- ^ "Reactions: Julia Kalow : The Sceptical Chymist". blogs.nature.com. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Newsletter". www.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Klein Addresses Newest Alumni | Columbia College Today". www.college.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2022-01-29.
- "A Day in the Life: Julia Kalow". Princeton University Media Central. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Video | Princeton University Department of Chemistry". chemistry.princeton.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Graduate Research Fellowships". ACS Division of Organic Chemistry. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Dr. Julia Kalow, MIT | Department of Chemistry". chemistry.stanford.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "A year in the life of a new professor". cen.acs.org. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "CSP Team". UMN. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "How biodegradable plastic bags don't live up to their name". PBS NewsHour. 2019-05-02. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "The MONET Team – MONET". Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- Kalow, Julia A.; Accardo, Joseph V. (2018-07-11). "Reversibly tuning hydrogel stiffness through photocontrolled dynamic covalent crosslinks". Chemical Science. 9 (27): 5987–5993. doi:10.1039/C8SC02093K. ISSN 2041-6539. PMC 6050525. PMID 30079213.
- "Searle Fellows Program: Office of the Provost - Northwestern University". www.northwestern.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Three Northwestern professors named Sloan Research Fellows". news.northwestern.edu. Retrieved 2022-06-05.
- "2021 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Awards". Dreyfus Foundation. 2021-04-30. Retrieved 2021-06-10.
- "Two young faculty members receive prestigious NSF CAREER awards". news.northwestern.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "NSF Award Search: Award#1847948 - CAREER: Photocontrolled Dynamic Covalent Crosslinkers for Light-Responsive Polymer Networks". nsf.gov. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- Kalow, Julia (2019-07-12). "Julia Kalow Recognized as PMSE Young Investigator". UMN. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Kalow Receives 3M Non-Tenured Faculty Award: Department of Chemistry - Northwestern University". www.chemistry.northwestern.edu. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "Previous Winners - Thieme Chemistry - Georg Thieme Verlag". Thieme. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
- "AFOSR Awards Grants to 45 Scientists and Engineers through its Young I". Wright-Patterson AFB. 11 October 2017. Retrieved 2019-08-24.