Gregory Vansuch joined NREL as a postdoc in Paul King’s group in December 2021, where he contributed to the group’s effort of studying nitrogenase MoFe protein using a biohybrid approach until March 2022. In March 2022 he began a Postdoctoral Director’s Fellowship and works under the mentorship of Paul King and Carolyn Lubner. Vansuch uses spectroscopy and electrochemistry for understanding the properties of electron transfer cofactors in a multi-subunit enzyme that has a non-trivial electron transfer pathway, with the results having broad applicability to (bio)inorganic chemistry and biological energy transduction. Prior to joining NREL he was a doctoral student at Emory University under the mentorship of R. Brian Dyer. His dissertation focused on probing roles of second coordination sphere residues near the active site of a [NiFe]-hydrogenase. This primarily involved the use of equilibrium and transient absorption infrared spectroscopy. Aspects of the project also let him become familiar with the synthesis of dot-in-rod CdS/CdSe nanoparticles and in their use in nanoparticle-redox mediator-redox enzyme biohybrid systems.

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Research Interests

Physical-(bio)inorganic chemistry

Infrared spectroscopy

Photochemistry

EPR spectroscopy

Core/shell nanoparticles

Electrochemistry

Electron transfer

Proton transfer

Electron bifurcation

Education

Ph.D., Chemistry, Emory University

B.A., Chemistry and Mathematics, University of Colorado Boulder

Featured Work

Publications

Metal-Ligand Cooperativity in the Soluble Hydrogenase-1 From Pyrococcus Furiosus, Chemical Science (2020)

Surface-Ligand “Liquid” to “Crystalline” Phase Transition Modulates the Solar H2 Production Quantum Efficiency of CdS Nanorod/Mediator/Hydrogenase Assemblies, ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces (2020)

Applications of Photogating and Time Resolved Spectroscopy to Mechanistic Studies of Hydrogenases, Accounts of Chemical Research (2017)

Glutamate Gated Proton-Coupled Electron Transfer Activity of a [NiFe]-Hydrogenase, Journal of the American Chemical Society (2016)

Presentations

Non-Canonical Iron-Sulfur Clusters in an Electron Bifurcating Hydrogenase, Bioinorganic Chemistry Gordon Research Seminar (2023)

Proton Migration in a [NiFe]-Hydrogenase: The Roles of the First and Second Coordination Spheres, Inorganic Reaction Mechanisms Gordon Research Seminar (2019)

Awards and Honors

NREL Director’s Postdoctoral Fellowship (2022)