Rebecca Rapf
Rebecca Rapf
About Me
I am a physical chemist interested in using fundamental laboratory studies to inform and contribute to a wide range of applied fields, including atmospheric chemistry, planetary science, biophysics, and astrobiology. I completed my PhD in 2017 at the University of Colorado Boulder under the supervision of Prof. Veronica Vaida. My thesis work focused primarily on detailed mechanistic studies of the photochemistry of organic species in the aqueous phase under conditions relevant to both the modern and early Earth using mass spectrometry. I also characterized the surface activity and aggregation behavior of simple lipids and their photochemical products using a number of analytical techniques, including Langmuir troughs, dynamic light scattering, and optical microscopy. As a post-doc in the Wilson group, I am moving from the bulk phase to droplets. I explore the kinetics of condensed-phase reactions using both single-particle and colliding-droplet microreactors.