2024 has been an epic publication year for the Holland Group, topped off by two JACS papers. The first was initiated by Cory MacLeod and Sean McWilliams, who discovered a series of carbonyl and carbyne complexes, and then brought through the fire by Allie Nagelski, who changed around substituents to enable purification and did a ton of analysis. She was assisted by Sam MacMillan and Kyle Lancaster at Cornell, who made essential XAS and DFT contributions that enabled us to show that carbon bridges in diiron complexes can effectively “buffer” changes in charge, a role that may be important in the FeMoco of nitrogenase. The second was initiated by Jeremy Weber and then finished by Alec Hegg; they worked with the groups of Alex Miller and Hannah Shafaat to show a series of rhenium complexes that split N2 to nitrides, and then the nitrides can give ammonia electrochemically. Both studies involved careful mechanistic study, analysis of ligand covalency and redox activity, and careful computations that make me proud. Great work!!!

Double congratulations to Linda Zuckerman, who has received two awards based on her accomplishments. First, she was awarded a Dean’s Emerging Scholars Research Award, which provides travel support to students who have contributed to diversity in the department. Then, most recently she received an ACS Leadership in Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Respect Recognition Award. Both of these have as a major component the fact that she has been an inspiring leader of the Chemistry DEI Advocates, who initiate and support inclusiveness initiatives in our department and help to guide community members toward university resources when they are having trouble. Congratulations Linda, and thanks for this amazing service to inclusiveness!

One of our newest areas of research is on iron-sulfur clusters that incorporate nickel. These are relevant to understanding of the active site of CO dehydrogenase, an enzyme that reduces CO₂ and oxidizes CO at an iron-nickel-sulfur cluster. We now have some flags placed in the ground: Sam and Teddy wrote a review for Chem that highlights some of the challenges in the field, and Dan and Majed worked together with Zachary Mathe and Serena DeBeer (MPI for Chemical Energy Conversion) to make novel iron-nickel-tungsten-sulfur clusters in a paper that just came out in JACS. Congratulations to them on their outstanding papers, and looking forward to more cool science on this front!

Congratulations to Sam Newman-Stonebreaker, who was chosen to receive a postdoctoral fellowship from the National Institutes of Health. Chosen on the basis of his proposal and his promise for continued great research, this fellowship is an important recognition of his outstanding scientific abilities. Great job, Sam!