Eugenia Kumacheva

Biography and Career

Eugenia Kumacheva was born in Odessa, Soviet Union. After earning her undergraduate degree (cum laude) from the Technical University in St. Petersburg, She worked in industry for several years before beginning her Ph.D. research. In 1986, she obtained her Ph.D. degree in physical chemistry of polymers in the Russian Academy of Sciences . Eugenia then worked as a staff scientist at the Moscow State University before beginning her post-doctorate fellowship supported by Minerva Foundation with Professor Jacob Klein at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. She then joined the research lab of Mitchel Winnick at the University of Toronto in Canada to study multicomponent polymer systems. In 1996, Kumacheva was hired as an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto Chemistry Department, and in 2005, she was promoted to a Full Professor. During her career, Kumacheva has delivered numerous public lectures, co-authored a book, and has been recognized by a number of national and international awards. In 2008, she was the first Canadian recipient of the L'Oréal-UNESCO "Women in Science" Prize. Her book titled “Microfluid reactor for Polymer Particles” was published in 2011, and describes about the use of liquid flow through microscopic channels as a method of polymerization.

Research

Kumacheva’s work focuses on polymer science, nanoscience, microfluidics, and interface chemistry. She has a strong effort in biomimetic research focused biological tissues, fluids, and environments with polymers and nanomaterials. Kumacheva has been involved with important developments in modeling the biological conditions of myocardial infarctions, strokes, pulmonary embolism, and various other blood related disorders or health conditions using polymers and nano-materials. Some of this work is related to mimicking blood vessels in order to gain a greater understanding of the chemistry and physics involved in blood clots. Kumacheva has been involved in research exploring the potential of microbubbles, a gas enclosed by a natural or synthetic polymer for both diagnostic and therapeutic applications such as targeted drug delivery and molecular imaging. An additional medical application of Kumacheva’s work is the creation of hydrogels and various other chemical environments to either support the life of a stem cell, affect necrotic heart tissue as well as deter the metastasis of cancer cells. Kumacheva has been involved in research involving cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and fluorescent latex nanoparticles (NPs), as well as self-assembling nanocubes.

Quantifying the efficiency of CO2 capture by Lewis Pairs

Much of her work relates to climate change and lowering CO2 levels. She has collaborated with Doug Stephan (University of Toronto), to investigate the behavior of frustrated Lewis pairs used to separate various elements of natural gas; namely, ethylene from a mixture of ethylene and methane. This work has great industrial importance due to the need for efficient and precise separation of petroleum compounds in various industries.

Study of Extraction and Recycling of Switchable Hydrophilicity Solvents in an Oscillatory Microfluidic Platform

In another study involving frustrated Lewis pairs, Kumacheva used them to quantify the efficiency of binding CO2 emissions. Measuring the amount of CO2 bound by the Lewis pairs provided information on the amount that was captured into solution. Some of the reactions in CO2 uptake require solvents with different properties, but it is expensive to prepare multiple solvents. As a solution to this problem, Kumacheva has worked on solvents with adjustable properties such as hydrophilicity called switchable hydrophilicity solvents (SHS). For example, a sterically hindered, large, hydrophobic molecule (Dibutylethanol Amine – DBAE) being protonated to become hydrophilic as necessitated by the reaction process.