Welcome to the site!

The objective of our work is the development of  multichannel optical spectral measurements and multivariate data analysis methods for characterizing reaction networks  in the complex samples encountered in biological, environmental and clinical analysis. We focus on combining multichannel spectrochemical measurements with multivariate signal processing and data mining methods because they provide the enhanced selectivity required to monitor multiple species simultaneously. Our current work is focused on characterizing pathways in photosensitization reaction networks in pollutant weathering and phototherapy.

The site is organized around four main topics:
1) the development of multichannel optical spectral measurements;
2) the development of model-independent multivariate signal processing and data mining methods to maximize information recovery from multichannel spectral measurements;  
3) monitoring and characterization of reactive oxygen species (ROS) mediated photoinduced processes and reaction networks;
4) characterization of organized (microheterogeneous) media in order to understand the impact of structured media on reaction pathways and networks.

Descriptions of current and past research projects under each of these topics can be accessed on the right.

The summaries below provide links to short descriptions of work in each of these topics.  If you have questions that are not answered here or desire additional information, Prof. Neal can be contacted at sneal@udel.edu or (302)831-0719 (office).

Current Research Summary