The program of study for the master’s degree will normally include up to 15 hours in the student’s major area of study, 6 to 12 hours in related areas, and one hour of graduate seminar. At least two semester hours of credit must be earned at the 700 level or higher in each of three of the following groups: analytical, inorganic, organic, physical, materials, and biological. A master’s thesis that is based on 6 to 8 semester hours of original research must also be defended before one’s supervisory committee.

As a medium-sized department, K-State Chemistry is large enough to ensure that our students are provided access to a variety of first-rate equipment, yet small enough to assure our students of a close personal interaction with faculty. We recognize that our students are individuals, and our programs are structured so as to allow each student to reach his or her potential at an appropriate pace. The Department of Chemistry occupies two adjoining buildings – CBC and King Hall – that provide over 81,000 square feet of research, teaching and office space for the activities of our 21 faculty, 11 staff and 90 graduate students and research associates.

The Chemistry Department is well equipped with instrumentation to support modern chemical research. Major instrumentation includes a Varian Inova 400-MHz and Mercury 400-MHz multinuclear NMR spectrometers, a liquid chromatogrpahy-mass spectrometry Waters Acquity UPLC-TQD system, two single crystal X-ray diffractometers (Siemens SMART 1000 and Bruker Kappa Apex II), and a low temperature-equipped Bruker powder X-ray diffractometer. Both the NMR and X-ray facilities are managed by full-time Ph.D. scientists.

The department houses extensive computational resources including two Beowulf clusters, and numerous and broad electrochemical research capabilities. Chemistry researchers have access to broad array of microscopy techniques, including AFM, STM, TEM, near-field scanning optical microscopy, multiphoton-excited fluorescence microscopy (with demonstrated single molecule capability), and ultrafast video microscopy.

The Chemistry Department possesses substantial instrumentation for the synthesis of nanoscale materials: chemical vapor deposition, plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition, electrochemical deposition and metal-vapor deposition methods are all available in faculty research groups. An extensive set of materials characterization methods are available within the department including surface plasmon resonance, ellipsometry, chemisorption and temperature-programmed desorption techniques, thermogravimetric analysis, differential scanning calorimetry and FT-IR/Raman/DRIFT spectra of gases, liquids and solids.