The Romero Group
at Baylor University
– Established Fall 2020!
Group News!
Congrats to Sasha! – April ‘24
Sasha was awarded a 2024 CBC Graduate Productivity Award! Congrats to all of this year’s award winners as well!
2024 Academic Young Investigator – March ‘24
Liela was selected as an ACS Division of Organic Chemistry Academic Young Investigator and will speak in the associated symposium at the Fall 2024 ACS Meeting in Denver. Be sure to drop by this talk if you’re at the meeting!
(Pictured: some of the researchers that made this possible!)
Research Highlight in OCP – February ‘24
Check out the highlight on our ZrH chemistry in Organic Chemistry Portal – a redox- and step-economic strategy for the conversion of amides to imines!
Thieme Chemistry Journals Award – January ‘24
Liela was named as a 2024 Thieme Chemistry Journals Awardee (a testament to the creativity and hard work of all members of the research group!)
Welcome New Researchers! – December ‘23
Welcome to the group Dr. Weiheng Huang and first year graduate student Jyotiranjan Mohanta!
Pictured right: the annual group holiday dinner!
All-University Thanksgiving! – November ‘23
The group joined up with members of the Chan, Romo, and Gallagher groups to enjoy dinner on the lawn of Fountain Mall.
Baylor CBC Picnic! October ‘23
The group enjoyed a nice afternoon in the sun for the annual department picnic. Food trucks, snow cones, raffles and the annual volleyball tournament made for a fun event!
Postdoc Appreciation Week– September ‘23
Celebrating the postdocs of the Romero group, Drs. Chabush Haldar and Manjula Rathnayake!
Organic Syntheses Workshop– August ‘23
Liela presented the group’s research findings at the Organic Syntheses Workshop for early career faculty. Thank you to the organizers for the invitation!
Group Party – July ‘23
This summer’s group get together was held at Waco Escape Room where we escaped The Hall of Fame with 5 minutes to spare! Celebratory pizza on the Brazos river and ice cream were well deserved!
Graduate Student Spotlight! – June ‘23
Rebecca (right) presented at the 2023 Janssen Discovery Chemistry Graduate Research Symposium in La Jolla, CA. Congrats to Rebecca and all of the other selected scholars!
Sasha (left) embarks on an AbbVie 2023 Experiential Internship!
Celebrating (Pre)Candidacy Exams! – May ‘23
Congrats to Favour (pre-candidacy) and Sasha (candidacy) for successfully completing their graduate exams! Group tradition of ice cream sandwiches on the BSB patio to celebrate!
Congratulations to Rebecca! – April ‘23
Rebecca was awarded a 2023 CBC Graduate Productivity Award! Congrats to all of this year’s award winners!
ACOC3 – March ‘23
Liela presented the group’s research findings at the 3rd Anatolian Conference on Organic Chemistry. Thank you to the organizers for the invitation!
Hot off the Press! – February ‘23
Check out our latest contribution to the area of ZrH catalysis in JACS! ZrH catalysis showcases the versatility of amides through redox economic transformations.
Congratulations to Jack! – February ‘23
First year graduate student, Jack Russo, has been awarded an ‘Outstanding TA’ award!
Congrats to all of the award winners!
Happy New Year and New Publication! – January ‘23
The group started the new year with a new publication now out in Tetrahedron Letters as part of a special issue in honor of Prof. Wood.
Ryan (pictured center) was clearly stoked for his first coauthored paper and so were we!
Welcome New Researchers! – December ‘22
Welcome to the group Dr. Chabush Haldar and first year graduate students Jack Russo, Abhishek Raj and Ravali Kode!
Pictured left: the annual Romero group holiday dinner (which included a fun gift exchange)!
New Preprint & All-University Thanksgiving! – November ‘22
A pre-print on Rebecca’s most recent work in the area of ZrH catalysis is now available on ChemRxiv!
Also, the Chan and Romero groups combined forces to attend the all-University Thanksgiving dinner on the lawn of Fountain Mall (pictured right).
Happy Halloween! – October ‘22
The Romero group wins the departmental costume contest!
AIW! – September ‘22
Sasha and Rebecca led instrumentation workshop sessions on chiral phase separations during the Baylor 2022 Advanced Instrumentation Workshop. These sessions included hands-on training for undergraduates on how to use HPLC and GC instruments for enantioseparations and ee determination.
This year’s AIW event was the biggest yet with 23 regional schools participating!
Group Party – August ‘22
This summer’s group get together was held at Main Event where we learned who has a talent for bowling (congrats to Josh!), who was stealthiest at laser tag, and who was the all-around best at arcade games.
Hot off the Press! – July ‘22
Halogenation experts Sasha, Manjula and Favour’s work on the highly selective catalytic interhalogenation of alkenes its published in JACS!
This paper made the list of “Top 20 most downloaded articles for the previous 30 days” in JACS. Check it out
Rebecca On JAWSChem – June ‘22
Thanks to the organizers of JAWSChem for giving Rebecca the opportunity to give a seminar during the final JAWSChem seminar of the season!
Keep an eye out for her poster at the upcoming NOS meeting! Congrats to Rebecca and to all of the recipients of this year’s DOC NOS Travel Awards!
Celebrating (Pre)Candidacy Exams – May ‘22
Congrats to Rebecca and Sasha for successfully completing their graduate exams! Celebratory ice cream sandwiches with the group on the BSB patio was definitely in order!
Dia Del Oso – April ‘22
Members of the Romero, Romo, and Wood groups enjoying Baylor’s annual field day, Dia Del Oso. Free carnival games, picnic lunch and goat yoga (yes, you read that right) were part of the offerings.
BU Graduate Recruiting Weekend – March ‘22
Sasha and Rebecca presented some of their research to prospective graduate students. We appreciate their hard work and creativity!
IDWGS – February ‘22
Members of the Romero group celebrating International Day of Women and Girls in Science!
Hot Off the Press! – January ‘22
Rebecca’s first paper (and the Romero group’s first paper) is published in ACS Catalysis! Check it out
January ‘22
Welcome first year graduate student, Favour Eze, to the Romero group!
Happy ‘22 from the Romero Lab!
First annual holiday dinner is in the books! Filled with wood fired pizzas and a very polite white elephant gift exchange.
Bears Go to the Zoo! – October ‘21
Members of the group enjoyed an evening at Waco’s Cameron Park Zoo as part of a special Baylor event.
Welcome to the group Drs. Manjula Rathnayake, Ge Zhang and Matt Hewitt! – August ‘21
From left to right: Ally, Manjula, Sasha, Rebecca, Liela, Ge, Matt, Suresh and Ryan
(Sasha and Suresh are clearly excited to welcome all of the new lab members! )
Welcome to the group! – June ‘21
Ryan Loden (c/o 2023, pictured left) joins the group this summer and Antoinette Bernal-Tent (c/o 2023, pictured right) returns to the lab as a BTRUE Summer Fellow!
Group Par-Tee – June ‘21
The first annual summer party was hosted this year at Top Golf where we learned that some colleagues have a natural talent for this sport!
Congratulations to Katie and Alexandra! – May ‘21
First year graduate students, Katie and Alexandra, have each been awarded ‘Outstanding TA’ awards!
Romero Group January 2021
Welcome to the group (from left to right): Dr. Suresh Narva, Rebecca Kehner, Sasha Lubaev and Katie Bortz