Shweta Prakash Gaikwad

B.S. in Chemistry: Mumbai University, 2019

M.S. in Chemistry: IIT Bombay, 2021

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Shweta hails from the state of Maharashtra in India and graduated from the B. K. Birla College at Mumbai University. Shweta was aawrded the INSPIRE Scholarship for her academic excellence, which was endorsed by the Department of Science and Technology. Shweta then pursued her MS degree in Chemistry at IIT Bombay where she worked under the guidance of Professor Irishi Namboothiri. Here, Shweta's research focused on the Hauser and Kraus annulations toward complex molecule synthesis, as well as on syntehtic applications of Morita-Baylis-Hillman adducts of nitroalkenes. Upon receiving her MS degree, Shweta continued to pursue education here at Penn State, where she enrolled in our PhD program in 2021. She chose to join our group as an opportunity too learn new areas of research while still pursuuing synthetic chemistry as part of our catalysis subgroup. Shweta likes trying out new things (such as new polymers, new flavors of ice cream at the creamery and everything in between). In her spare time, she enjoys cooking, swimming, and playing bandminton.

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Honors

 

• Penn State Chemistry, First Year Graduate Student Award (2021-2022)

• Penn State Chemistry, Continuing Teaching Award (2022-2023)

• Department of Chemistry, Second Year Graduate Student Award (2022-2023)

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Publications

 

M. Spicuzza, S. P. Gaikwad, S. Huss, A. A. Lee, C. V. Craescu, A. Griggs, J. Joseph, M. Puthenpurayil, W. Lin, C. Matarazzo, S. Baldwin, V. Perez, D. A. Rodriguez-Acevedo, J. R. Swierk, and E. Elacqua. Visible-Light-Mediated Diels-Alder Reactions Under Single-Chain Polymer Confinement: Investigating the Role of the Crosslinking Moiety on Catalyst Activity, Polym. Chem., 2024, 15, 1833-1838.

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