Trainee Spotlight: Tiara Torres-Flores
Tiara Torres-Flores is a 3rd year PhD student in the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department. She is currently a part of the MMLI Thrust 4 working on automated synthesis of oligothiophenes for rapid discovery of organic photovoltaic (OPV) materials and is particularly interested in understanding the factors controlling protodeboronation rates for Suzuki-Miyaura cross-coupling reactions applied to sequence-defined oligomers of different chain lengths. [Click above to read more!]
Faculty Spotlight: Ganesh Sivaraman
Ganesh Sivaraman recently joined MMLI as a Research Assistant Professor after working at Argonne National Laboratory as part of the Argonne Leadership Computing Data Science Program. His focus at MMLI is bringing together the best of AI and the chemical sciences. [Click above to read more!]
MMLI Trainee Spotlight: Tiara Torres-Flores!
Tiara is a 3rd year PhD student in the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department. She is currently a part of the MMLI Thrust 4 working on automated synthesis of oligothiophenes for rapid discovery of organic photovoltaic (OPV) materials and is particularly interested in understanding the factors controlling protodeboronation rates for Suzuki-Miyaura cross-coupling reactions applied to sequence-defined oligomers of different chain lengths.
What is your background? I did my B.S. in Chemical Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez with a curricular sequence in Visual Arts. During that time, I started my research journey with OPVs, hydrogel synthesis for biomedical applications, and worked at Eli Lilly as a process engineer.
What drew you to MMLI? Although my background was in chemical engineering, I was always drawn to synthetic organic chemistry and the MMLI offered the opportunity for me to seamlessly combine both. I was excited to be at the center of cutting-edge chemistry, automation, and AI.
What has been your favorite part of being a part of MMLI? My favorite part of the MMLI is all the connections I have made and forming part of a comprehensive scientific community. If I need help with chemistry, simulations, automation, characterization techniques, or outreach opportunities, there is someone within the MMLI that can do it and is happy to collaborate.
How do you like to spend your free time? (or what would you do for fun if you had more free time!) For fun, I recently have gotten into weightlifting, and have seen drastic changes in my overall physical and mental health. I also enjoy playing the ukulele.
Fun fact (or extremely average fact) about yourself you would like to share. All the women in my family have an iteration of the same name. My mom’s name is Tara and my sister’s name is Tayra. Put them all together and you have a tongue twister: Tara, Tayra, Tiara. Of course, people had a hard time with it and I grew up being called all three.
MMLI Faculty Spotlight: Let’s meet Ganesh Sivaraman!
Ganesh Sivaraman recently joined MMLI as a Research Assistant Professor after working at Argonne National Laboratory as part of the Argonne Leadership Computing Data Science Program. His focus at MMLI is bringing together the best of AI and the chemical sciences.
What is your background and describe your current work/role/any exciting projects you want to share.
I specialize in computational science, bridging applied machine learning with chemical physics. At MMLI, my focus is on the MMLI-Corpus, a comprehensive literature corpus concentrating on Suzuki-Coupling whilst also facilitating cross-disciplinary research.
What drew you to MMLI?
I was drawn to MMLI by its commitment to pioneering research.
What has been your favorite part of being a part of MMLI? The prospect of interdisciplinary collaboration is what excites me most about being part of MMLI.