Denise Femia, Ph.D.

Denise Femia received her undergraduate degree in chemistry from the State University of New York at Geneseo.  She earned her Ph.D. at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, then moved back to the east coast to work as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Colgate University in upstate NY.  She taught general, organic and organometallic chemistry for two years before joining the Chemistry and Biochemistry department at La Salle University in 2018.

Dr. Femia is interested in solar energy and its potential to replace fossil fuels as a renewable resource to meet global energy demands.  Her research involves designing and synthesizing small molecule chromophores, which are materials that absorb energy from sunlight.  The energy absorbed by these materials can be used in applications such as solar cells or as photocatalysts to power chemical reactions.

Areas of Expertise
Photophysical chemistry
Organic chemistry
Inorganic chemistry
Education
Ph.D., Chemistry, University of Southern California, 2016
B.S., Chemistry, SUNY Geneseo, 2011

Teaching
Organic Chemistry I and II
Organic Chemistry lab
Organic Chemistry for the Life Sciences
Biochemistry for the Life Sciences
Publications

Vyacheslav V. Diev, Denise Femia, Qiwen Zhong, Peter I. Djurovich, Ralf Haiges and Mark E. Thompson, “A quinoidal bis-phenalenyl-fused porphyrin with supramolecular organization and broad near-infrared absorption” Chemical Communications, 2016, 52, 1949-1952