![\"Graduation](\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Graduation-Cap_blue-500x500-e1586882554282.png\")
<\/a>CELEBRATING SUCCESS:<\/strong> UToledo recognizes the Class of 2021 with a series of stories featuring students receiving their degrees at\u00a0fall commencement<\/a>.<\/p><\/div>\n Shyam Sunder fell in love with the potential research opportunities his friends at UToledo shared with him and which he read about.<\/p>\n \u201cI became more and more fascinated with the real-world applicational research at The University of Toledo,\u201d he said. \u201cI came for an open-house meeting at UToledo and met all the professors and had one-to-one and group meetings with them. I really liked the passion they had toward science and the new approaches.\u201d<\/p>\n A month later, on New Year\u2019s Eve of 2015, Shyam Sunder had extra cause for celebration: earlier that day he learned that he had been selected to join the chemistry Ph.D. program for fall.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the reason I remember the date,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n And he\u2019ll have another reason to celebrate this New Year\u2019s as well. He will have his Doctorate in Chemistry; Shyam Sunder, 34, defended his Ph.D. in July and finished the program in August. He has been working at Waters Corp. in Milford, Mass., as a Systems Qualifications Scientist since October.<\/p>\n Shyam Sunder is co-author of five journal articles and has a patent.<\/p>\n Shyam Sunder<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cSharma joined the doctoral program in chemistry at UToledo five years ago eager to expand his knowledge of analytical chemistry,\u201d said Dr. Jon Kirchhoff, Distinguished University Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics.<\/p>\n \u201cHis desire and commitment to learn new methods, explore novel chemistry and gain experience with the excellent instrumentation available in the department set him apart.\u00a0 The knowledge he gained and his growth as a scientist led to his co-authorship on five journal articles to date from his dissertation \u2014 three as first author \u2014 and ultimately was key to him obtaining the position at Waters Corporation, which is one of the leading scientific instrument companies in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n Shyam Sunder said while he was working through his undergrad and master\u2019s degrees in India, he wanted to become an analytical scientist. The Flint water crisis in 2014, however, caused him to rethink this future career, with the motivation to help in the removal of heavy metals and other toxic chemicals from drinking water sources.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I came to UToledo in 2016, I began to explore labs and choose an advisor. I was excited to talk with Dr. Kirchhoff, who became my advisor and helped me join his lab,\u201d Shyam Sunder said. \u201cI\u2019m so glad that I did and that I made the right decision because the growth in my learning curve was steep.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I was new to the University of Toledo, I was good at theoretical knowledge of instrumentations and techniques. Then I got real-world experience. Dr. Kirchhoff was so encouraging and kept motivating me to learn new things.\u201d<\/p>\n Kirchhoff said that Shyam Sunder\u2019s discovery and development of a new air-stable polymer for the extraction of rare earth elements, which was published this year, was a major contribution to the scientific literature.<\/p>\n \u201cI am very proud of his accomplishments and know he will be an excellent representative for UToledo alumni.\u00a0 He is an even better person and made a very positive impact on the undergraduate students he taught as a teaching assistant and his fellow graduate students.\u00a0 He will do great things in his career.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Govind Sharma Shyam Sunder is co-author of five journal articles, has a patent, a job at Waters Corp. in Milford, Mass., and on Friday will receive his Doctorate in Chemistry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":878,"featured_media":70721,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,69,39,1,71,7],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70716"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/878"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70716"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70761,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70716\/revisions\/70761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/a>