POSTDOC
Princeton University
Postdoctoral Teaching Fellows Program

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Dr. Todd J. Minehardt,
graduated from Lehigh University in 1991. After fleeing to Texas later that year, he entered graduate school at The University of Texas at Austin in the Energy and Mineral Resources program within the Department of Petroleum Engineering. He did not complete his M.S. in this department, instead choosing to pursue an M.A. in the Department of Geological Sciences. Here, he studied chemical hydrogeology with Dr. Philip C. Bennett and focused on elucidating how nitroaromatic and nitramine high explosives are transported in the subsurface. His doctoral work (in Dr. Robert E. Wyatt's group in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry) was in the broad area of theoretical chemical physics. Dr. Minehardt first examined applied mathematical techniques for extracting eigensystem information from large, sparse matrices; he then completed classical and quantum dynamical simulations of vibrational energy flow in benzene. During his stay at The University of Texas at Austin, Dr. Minehardt was a graduate teaching assistant for 8 semesters, held a Dreyfus Foundation fellowship for 2 years, won a Welch Teaching Excellence Award, was awarded a University of Texas Continuing Fellowship, and published 7 papers.

Dr. Minehardt was selected for a University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellowship in 1999 and studied with Dr. Peter A. Kollman in the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the University of California, San Francisco. During his 11 month stay at UCSF, Dr. Minehardt used molecular dynamical techniques to study structural, mechanistic, and energetic characteristics of motor proteins (ncd and myosin). In collaboration with Dr. Edward F. Pate and Dr. Roger Cooke, they predicted a conformational change in ncd that could explain how chemical energy is converted to mechanical energy. Their hypothesis was recently confirmed by experiment. In his teaching duties, he inflicted the principles of physical chemistry upon unsuspecting first-year pharmacy students.

Tired, cold, and poor, Dr. Minehardt retreated from San Francisco to Princeton University in March, 2000, where he joined Dr. Roberto Car's research group in the Department of Chemistry. He continues to study motor proteins and now employs the Car-Parrinello technique for performing molecular dynamics simulations within a completely quantum mechanical framework. Dr. Minehardt runs a precept for Chemistry 207 (Advanced General Chemistry - Materials Chemistry) and occasionally gives class lectures, both under the supervision of his teaching mentor, Dr. Andrew B. Bocarsly. Continuing to expand on work started in Texas, Dr. Minehardt collaborates with Dr. J. David Adcock in producing animations of complex physical phenomena; these productions are used in classroom demonstrations in CHM 207. Other interests include racing road bikes, brewing the perfect espresso, and antagonizing his landlord.