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David Clevette

David Clevette

Professor

Phone Number: 402.826.8244
Department: Chemistry
Office: LI201
Email: [email protected]
Primary Campus: Crete
Credentials: BA, PHD

About

Education:

Post-Doctoral Fellowship, University of British Columbia, Vancouver , 1987-1989.

Ph.D., Inorganic Chemistry, University of Missouri-Columbia, 1987.

Research Interests:

I. Physical Properties of Potential Pharmaceuticals

We are working with a pharmaceutical research company to determine physical properties of some of their new drug substances - synthetic antibiotics of a novel cephalosporin class of beta-lactams. All of the compounds studied have various acidic functional groups, and the acidity constants (pKa values) are determined through potentiometric titrations.  Another study includes using proton nmr to measure the proton shifts as a function of pD.  That enables an assignment of pKa values to the specific functional groups on the molecule.  Degradation kinetic studies of these compounds may also be studied using UV-VIS spectroscopy and HPLC.

II.  Metal Ion - Ligand Complex Formation

Potentiometry may be used to study the competition between protons and metal ions for a ligand in  aqueous solution.  This leads to a measurement of formation constants of metal-ligand complexes.  Amino acids and EDTA are a couple of examples of ligands that can complex a metal ion.  The use of ion chromatography is also planned to help study these systems.