Liudmyla Prozorovska graduated with a Ph.D. in the Interdisciplinary Materials Science Program at Vanderbilt University in May 2021. Liuda is a native of Ukraine and, prior to Vanderbilt, an honor graduate of the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI), BE and MS in Metallurgy.
Liuda’s doctoral research in Prof. Kane Jennings’s lab focused on the development of polymer films for sensing of metal ions. For one of her projects, Liuda grew polymers directly from the surface of silicon substrates and modified them with dopamine molecules (i.e. the neurotransmitter that spikes in your brain when you get likes on your social media posts) to detect aluminum ions – a byproduct from mining and other human activities that pollutes the Earth’s environment.