Alex Mironenko

Dr. Alex Mironenko is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His research focuses on developing quantum mechanical methods to predict catalytic behaviors for renewable energy and chemical production. He leads the Mironenko Lab, which emphasizes computational models for heterogeneous catalysis, reactive force fields, and nanozyme design.

Education:

• PhD in Chemical Engineering, University of Delaware (2018)
• Kadanoff-Rice Postdoctoral Scholar, University of Chicago (2018-2020)
• MS in Chemical Engineering, University of Kansas (2012)
• Diploma of Engineer, Omsk F.M. Dostoevsky State University, Russia (2009)

Research Interests:

• Computational heterogeneous catalysis
• Reactive force fields derived from first principles
• Low-dimensional metal oxide catalysts
• Nanozymes and biomimetic catalysis
• Selective C-C coupling for CO₂ valorization
• Improving density functional theory accuracy

Awards:

• ACS Petroleum Research Fund Doctoral Investigator Award (2021)
• Allan P. Colburn Outstanding Dissertation Prize (2019)
• Kadanoff-Rice Postdoctoral Fellowship (2018-2020)

Advising and Grants:

• Advised PhD student Neil Tran (publication on methanol carbonylation mechanisms)
• Funded by NSF, ACS, and industry partnerships

Labs/Teams:

• Mironenko Virtual Catalysis and Quantum Chemistry Lab
• Collaborations with institutions like University of Chicago and industry partners