Roberto A. Garza-López

Roberto A. Garza-López is a theoretical/computational physical chemist who has published over 30 peer-reviewed journal articles in areas of statistical thermodynamics, stochastic processes, molecular mechanics, random walks and diffusion-controlled reactions on fractal and Euclidean surfaces.  He is presently working, in collaboration with Harry Gray and John Kozak, on protein folding/visualization of azurin and cytochrome c’ proteins as well as the energy transfer in dendrimers and their implication in biology, catalysis and nanotechnology.

He was the first Cambridge-Pomona exchange professor, an experience that resulted in publication in the Journal of Physical Chemistry.  He did a sabbatical in the lab of Richard Zare at Stanford University that resulted in two publications, one in Science and another one in Analytical Chemistry.   He translated into Spanish the autobiography of Nobel Laureate Ahemd Zewail (“Viaje a Través del Tiempo: senderos hacia el Premio Nobel” published by the Fondo de Cultura Económica) while doing a sabbatical in Zewail’s lab, working on molecular dynamics of small molecules. 

As a participant in the PAYS program at Pomona College since its creation, he works with senior high-school students performing random walks on catalytic surfaces and exploring chemical systems using molecular packages such as NWChem, Mopac, QChem and Gaussian.