Patrick Hanley was born in St. Albans, West Virginia, on July 4, 1985. As an undergraduate at West Virginia University, Patrick worked under the supervision of Dr. Jeffrey Petersen exploring the synthesis and reactivity of Group IV transition metal complexes. He joined the Hartwig Group in the fall of 2008 to pursue his interest in organometallic chemistry, and is currently working on olefin insertion into palladium-nitrogen bonds. Outside of the lab, Patrick enjoys spending time with his fiancé, home brewing, and watching WVU sports.

Jessica Klickenberg was born in Cleveland, OH and grew up in a boring suburb just to the south of the city. She completed her undergraduate studies in chemistry at the University of Virginia and worked with Professor Cassandra Fraser on the synthesis and application of polymeric metal complexes. In 2007, she made the decision to move to Illinois, because she really likes a challenge, the -22 0F temperatures have made her appreciate the warmth of the lab ovens even more, and downhill skiing is too expensive anyway. She joined the Hartwig Group after becoming enamored with alkane borylation in March of her junior year in college (the only inorganic lecture she didn't doodle during!). She's currently working on C­–N cross coupling and not trying to flood the lab with CO. In her spare time, she exhausts herself with marathon and cycling century training, cooking, and having Martha Stewart moments.

Carl Liskey was born in 1985 and grew up in North Judson, Indiana. He then attended Purdue University, where he worked in Tong Ren’s lab investigating diruthenium paddlewheel complexes and their charge transfer properties. Carl spent the summer of 2007 in the Hartwig Group, which greatly influenced his decision to come to the University of Illinois and join the Hartwig Group in Fall 2008. Carl is currently working on C-H Activation. Outside of the lab, he enjoys watching and playing a variety of sports.

Sherzod Madrahimov

Sherzod Madrahimov was born in 1981 in Namangan, Uzbekistan. He graduated from the Tashkent Institute of Chemical Technology in 2003 with a BS in Food Engineering. In 2007, he earned a Master’s degree in Chemistry from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, working with Dr. Brian Ward on materials based on tetrathiafulvalene with conducting and magnetic properties. In the fall of 2007, he started his PhD work at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and joined the Hartwig group the same year. He is studying the mechanisms of iridium-catalyzed asymmetric allylic substitution. Sherzod is married has a daughter. Outside of lab, he enjoys spending time with his family, playing/watching soccer and practicing judo.

Cass Richers grew up in Bryan, Texas, and attended Texas A&M University. He graduated in 2006 with a B. S. in chemistry and joined the Hartwig Lab the following spring. He is currently studying the effects of phosphines on olefin insertions into metal-alkoxo and -amido bonds. He chose the University of Illinois because of the people who do research there and the friendly environment. In his spare time, Cass follows Texas A&M athletics and occasionally plays sports.

Dan Robbins was born in 1984 in Milwaukee, WI, and spent his formative years in Milwaukee, Philadelphia, and Indianapolis. Dan obtained his bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering and Chemistry in 2007 from Purdue University, where he conducted undergraduate research under the direction of Professor Philip Fuchs on the total synthesis of apoptolidin. During his undergraduate years, Dan also completed two summer internships at Merck Research Laboratories in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, where he completed a process improvement project and developed a real-time reaction monitoring system using IR spectroscopy. Dan had another summer internship at Lilly Research Laboratories in Indianapolis. In 2007, Dan moved to Urbana-Champaign to begin graduate studies and joined the Hartwig Group after becoming enthralled with catalysis and reaction kinetics during one of his summers at Merck. Dan is currently working on the development of a reaction discovery system using high-throughput screening and Ir-catalyzed C-H borylation. In his spare time, Dan enjoys music and is an avid soccer fan.

Christo Sevov was born in 1986 in Sofia, Bulgaria. In 1990, he and his family immigrated to the United States where they finally settled in South Bend, Indiana. There, he received his undergraduate degree in chemistry from the University of Notre Dame. Working in physical organic chemist Olaf Wiest’s lab, he performed mechanistic studies on electron transfer catalyzed Diels-Alder reactions. Inspired by the idea of catalysis, he joined the Hartwig group at UIUC in 2009 to study and further develop catalytic intermolecular hydroamination reactions. Outside of the lab, Christo enjoys playing a variety of sports, relaxing with friends, and of course, going back to his alma mater for Notre Dame football games.

Allie Strom was born in 1987 in New Jersey and grew up in upstate NY. She was awarded a Bachelor’s degree from Harvard University in 2010, where she worked in Prof. Tobias Ritter’s group on the silver-mediated fluorination of aryl stannanes and mechanistic studies on C-F reductive elimination from high-valent palladium fluoride complexes. In the fall of 2010, inspired to pursue her passion for organometallic chemistry, she joined the Hartwig group and is working on hydroamination using Rh complexes. Outside of the lab, Allie enjoys running, cooking and baking, and watching NY Giants football.

Yichen Tan was born in 1985 and grew up in the southeast of China. He obtained his bachelor degree from Peking University, where he did his research on the synthesis and self-assembling of disk-shaped supramolecules via hydrogen bonding. In 2007, Yichen came to UIUC and joined the Hartwig Group because of the interesting projects and awesome lab mates in this group. Now, he is working on aryl C-H amination. Outside of lab, Yichen enjoys watching movies and playing tennis.

Philip Vogel was born in Cincinnati, OH, where he lived until venturing off to Boston to study at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Not content to study at just one university, Philip performed research on corannulene-based OLEDs and on applications of mechanochemistry to substitution reactions with Prof. James Mack of University of Cincinnati and completed his bachelor's degree requirements with a summer French course and research with Prof. John Arnold at University of California, Berkeley. Knowing he'd found something good at Berkeley, he decided to stay for a PhD and joined the Hartwig group in 2011 to work on C-H activation.