天美传媒

 is a  and an associate professor in the  at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Her research seeks to understand and control multiscale molecular assembly processes to achieve sustainable manufacturing of materials and devices for environment, energy, and healthcare applications, including therapeutic products. Molecular assembly, where a set of inanimate molecules can form structures with ever-evolving complexity and emergent properties, is inextricably linked to the origin of life. With the advent of modern drug development, the rise of nanotechnology, and most recently the renaissance in energy research, the field has resurged into prominence.
The , started in 2015 at UIUC, aims to understand the assembly of organic functional materials and innovate printing approaches that enable structural control down to the molecular and nanoscales. 
Education

Postdoctoral scholar, Stanford University & SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, 2011-2014
Ph.D., chemical engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2011
M.S., chemical engineering practice, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2008
B.S.E., chemical engineering, Tsinghua University, 2006

Honors

2023 University Scholar, University of Illinois
2023 New Horizons Solvay Lectures in Chemistry, International Solvay Institutes
2023 List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent, Fa’16, Sp’18, Sp’20, Fa’20, Fa’21, Fa’22
2022 Van Ness Award Lecture, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
2022 Thiele Award Lecture, University of Notre Dame
2022 “Rising Star” series of Advanced Materials
2022 Soft Matter Emerging Investigator
2021 Campus Distinguished Promotion Award
2021 I. C. Gunsalus Scholar, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences
2020: NASA Early Career Faculty Award 
2020: Rising Star in Materials Chemistry, Chemistry of Materials “Up-and-Coming Series” 
2020: List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent (Fall and Spring)
2020: Emerging Investigator, Chemical Society Reviews, the Royal Society of Chemistry
2019: Lincoln Excellence for Assistant Professor Scholar, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences 
2019: Beckman Fellow, Center for Advanced Study, UIUC 
2019: Early Career Award, AVS Prairie Chapter 
2019: Emerging Investigator in Crystal Growth & Design, ACS Publications 
2019: Emerging Investigator, Molecular Systems Design & Engineering, the Royal Society of Chemistry 
2019: Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 
2018: List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent (Spring)
2018: NSF CAREER Award 
2018: 3M Non-Tenured Faculty Award 
2018: Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in Chemistry 
2018: Chemistry of Materials Reviewer Excellence Award, ACS Publications 
2017: School of Chemical Sciences Teaching Award, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
2017: US Frontiers of Engineering Symposium, National Academy of Engineering 

Charles M. Schroeder is the James Economy Professor of  and a professor of  at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He is Co-Chair of the Molecular Science and Engineering Theme and Leader of the AI for Materials Group in the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. Professor Schroeder is a faculty member in the Center for Biophysics and Quantitative Biology and holds affiliate status in the Department of Chemistry, the Department of Bioengineering, the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, and the Materials Research Lab. He previously served as Associate Head in the Department of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at Illinois.
Professor Schroeder received his B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in 1999, followed by an M.S. in 2001 and Ph.D. in 2005 in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University. Before joining the University of Illinois in 2008, he was a Jane Coffin Childs Postdoctoral Fellow and a K99/R00 NIH postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University (2004-2007). 
Professor Schroeder is the recipient of several awards, including a Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, a Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, an NSF CAREER Award, the Arthur B. Metzner Award from the Society of Rheology, an NIH Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00), the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research at Illinois, and the Vision and Spirit Award from the Beckman Institute. Professor Schroeder is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS Fellow, 2022) and a Fellow of the Society of Rheology (2023).
Research Statement 
The cutting edge of chemical science research lies in the ability to manipulate and control single molecules. The Schroeder group has pioneered a unique and powerful brand of molecular engineering that allows for the precise design and characterization of single molecules, in problems ranging from polymer physics to molecular electronics. Imagine the ability to design and engineer new soft materials with any desired functional properties (e.g., electrical, optical, mechanical) by controlling chemical structure and composition at the molecular level. The Schroeder group aims to achieve this vision by understanding how form and function arise in soft materials given precise control over molecular synthesis, structure, and processing. Current work is defined by four focus areas:
Single polymer dynamics. A major unsolved problem in soft materials and rheology lies in understanding how the collective behavior of individual molecules gives rise to bulk properties in polymeric materials. To address this challenge, the Schroeder group has extended the field of single polymer dynamics to new materials including architecturally complex polymers such as rings and branched polymers. His work provides a molecular-level understanding of non-equilibrium polymer dynamics, bridging the gap between molecular behavior and bulk properties in polymeric liquids and solids. Recent work has focused on fully recyclable synthetic polymers using metastable chemistries.
Vesicle dynamics, biological membranes, microhydrodynamics & Stokes trap. Schroeder's group studies the non-equilibrium conformational dynamics of lipid vesicles and colloidal clusters using a Stokes trap, which is a new method developed by his group that allows for the precise trapping and manipulation of single molecules or particles using automated flow control. Understanding the dynamics of membrane-bound vesicles is critical for developing new and efficient drug delivery vehicles. His recent work has focused on understanding the non-linear deformation of lipid membranes in flow, including phase separation and dynamics of multi-component lipid membranes under tension. 
Automated synthesis for materials discovery. The Schroeder group uses automated synthesis to drive the discovery of new materials for applications including organic electronics and energy storage. A “Lego-like” building block approach is used to synthesize large libraries of chemically diverse, sequence-defined molecules via automated iterative Suzuki coupling (C-C coupling). Automated synthesis is also used in combination with AI-guided, closed-loop discovery methods for new materials, e.g., organic photovoltaics (OPVs) with improved photostability or new electrochromic molecules.
Molecular electronics & bioelectronics. Electron transport in proteins is essential for fundamental life processes in living cells. Understanding these mechanisms at the molecular level remains an open challenge in the field. Recently, the Schroeder group has studied charge transport mechanisms in sequence-defined polymers, redox-active molecules, and supramolecular assemblies using single molecule techniques. His work is focused on bioelectronics by developing new sustainable materials for next-generation electronic devices, including self-assembled protein circuitry and conductive peptide nanowires.