About

Laura Gagliardi is the Richard and Kathy Leventhal Professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Chicago, with joint appointments in the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering and the James Franck Institute. She is the director of the Catalyst Design for Decarbonization Center (CD4DC), an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the United States Department of Energy. Her research focuses on the development of quantum chemical methods, applying them to problems related to catalysis, spectroscopy, photochemistry, gas separation, actinides, and quantum materials. Her group develops novel wave function-based quantum chemical methods, combining multireference theories with density functional theory, and creates force-fields from first principles for classical simulations. These methods are employed to explore molecular systems and materials relevant to renewable energies, including catalysis, carbon dioxide separations, and heavy-element chemistry. Gagliardi has held academic positions at the University of Palermo, University of Geneva, and University of Minnesota before joining the University of Chicago. She has received numerous awards, including the Pauling Medal, the Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry, and the WATOC Schrödinger medal, and is a fellow of several prestigious scientific societies such as the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Chemistry
• Nanotechnology
• Materials science
• Computational chemistry
• Engineering
• Physics
• Data science
• Organic chemistry
• Mathematics
• Artificial Intelligence
• Computational science
• Machine Learning
• Management science
• Composite material
• Physical chemistry
• Pure mathematics
• Simulation
• Engineering physics
• Chemical engineering
• Chemical physics
• Systems engineering
• Database

Selected publications

• The OpenMolcas <i>Web</i> : A Community-Driven Approach to Advancing Computational Chemistry

  Journal of Chemical Theory and Computation · 2023 · 330 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Computer Science
  • Computational science

  The developments of the open-source OpenMolcas chemistry software environment since spring 2020 are described, with a focus on novel functionalities accessible in the stable branch of the package or via interfaces with other packages. These developments span a wide range of topics in computational chemistry and are presented in thematic sections: electronic structure theory, electronic spectroscopy simulations, analytic gradients and molecular structure optimizations, ab initio molecular dynamics, and other new features. This report offers an overview of the chemical phenomena and processes OpenMolcas can address, while showing that OpenMolcas is an attractive platform for state-of-the-art atomistic computer simulations.

  PublisherDOI

• DFT exchange: sharing perspectives on the workhorse of quantum chemistry and materials science

  Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics · 2022 · 260 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Nanotechnology
  • Chemistry

  In this paper, the history, present status, and future of density-functional theory (DFT) is informally reviewed and discussed by 70 workers in the field, including molecular scientists, materials scientists, method developers and practitioners. The format of the paper is that of a roundtable discussion, in which the participants express and exchange views on DFT in the form of 302 individual contributions, formulated as responses to a preset list of 26 questions. Supported by a bibliography of 777 entries, the paper represents a broad snapshot of DFT, anno 2022.

  DOI

• DFT Exchange: Sharing Perspectives on the Workhorse of Quantum Chemistry and Materials Science

  2022 · 26 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Computer Science
  • Chemistry

  In this paper, the history, present status, and future of density-functional theory (DFT) is informally reviewed and discussed by 70 workers in the field, including molecular scientists, materials scientists, method developers and practitioners. The format of the paper is that of a roundtable discussion, in which the participants express and exchange views on DFT in the form of 300 individual contributions, formulated as responses to a preset list of 26 questions. Supported by a bibliography of 776 entries, the paper represents a broad snapshot of DFT, anno 2022.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Machine learning the quantum-chemical properties of metal–organic frameworks for accelerated materials discovery

  Matter · 2021 · 475 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Machine Learning

  The modular nature of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) enables synthetic control over their physical and chemical properties, but it can be difficult to know which MOFs would be optimal for a given application. High-throughput computational screening and machine learning are promising routes to efficiently navigate the vast chemical space of MOFs but have rarely been used for the prediction of properties that need to be calculated by quantum mechanical methods. Here in this paper, we introduce the Quantum MOF (QMOF) database, a publicly available database of computed quantum-chemical properties for more than 14,000 experimentally synthesized MOFs. Throughout this study, we demonstrate how machine learning models trained on the QMOF database can be used to rapidly discover MOFs with targeted electronic structure properties, using the prediction of theoretically computed band gaps as a representative example. We conclude by highlighting several MOFs predicted to have low band gaps, a challenging task given the electronically insulating nature of most MOFs.

  DOI

• Evolution of water structures in metal-organic frameworks for improved atmospheric water harvesting

  Science · 2021 · 646 citations

  • Chemical physics
  • Materials science
  • Nanotechnology

  Although the positions of water guests in porous crystals can be identified, determination of their filling sequence remains challenging. We deciphered the water-filling mechanism for the state-of-the-art water-harvesting metal-organic framework MOF-303 by performing an extensive series of single-crystal x-ray diffraction measurements and density functional theory calculations. The first water molecules strongly bind to the polar organic linkers; they are followed by additional water molecules forming isolated clusters, then chains of clusters, and finally a water network. This evolution of water structures led us to modify the pores by the multivariate approach, thereby precisely modulating the binding strength of the first water molecules and deliberately shaping the water uptake behavior. This resulted in higher water productivity, as well as tunability of regeneration temperature and enthalpy, without compromising capacity and stability.

  DOI

• NWChem: Past, present, and future

  The Journal of Chemical Physics · 2020 · 671 citations

  • Computer Science
  • Computer Science
  • Data science

  Specialized computational chemistry packages have permanently reshaped the landscape of chemical and materials science by providing tools to support and guide experimental efforts and for the prediction of atomistic and electronic properties. In this regard, electronic structure packages have played a special role by using first-principle-driven methodologies to model complex chemical and materials processes. Over the past few decades, the rapid development of computing technologies and the tremendous increase in computational power have offered a unique chance to study complex transformations using sophisticated and predictive many-body techniques that describe correlated behavior of electrons in molecular and condensed phase systems at different levels of theory. In enabling these simulations, novel parallel algorithms have been able to take advantage of computational resources to address the polynomial scaling of electronic structure methods. In this paper, we briefly review the NWChem computational chemistry suite, including its history, design principles, parallel tools, current capabilities, outreach, and outlook.

  DOI

• Using nature’s blueprint to expand catalysis with Earth-abundant metals

  Science · 2020 · 562 citations

  • Chemistry
  • Nanotechnology
  • Materials science

  Numerous redox transformations that are essential to life are catalyzed by metalloenzymes that feature Earth-abundant metals. In contrast, platinum-group metals have been the cornerstone of many industrial catalytic reactions for decades, providing high activity, thermal stability, and tolerance to chemical poisons. We assert that nature's blueprint provides the fundamental principles for vastly expanding the use of abundant metals in catalysis. We highlight the key physical properties of abundant metals that distinguish them from precious metals, and we look to nature to understand how the inherent attributes of abundant metals can be embraced to produce highly efficient catalysts for reactions crucial to the sustainable production and transformation of fuels and chemicals.

  DOI

Recent grants

• New Multireference Models for Strongly Correlated Systems

  NSF · $242k · 2012–2015

• Multiconfiguration Pair-Density Functional Theory for Complex Chemical Systems

  NSF · $550k · 2018–2021

• Multiconfiguration Pair-Density Functional Theory for Spectroscopy and Photochemistry

  NSF · $550k · 2021–2024

• Multi-Configuration Pair-Density Functional Theory

  NSF · $555k · 2015–2018

• International Collaboration in Chemistry: Aqueous Host-Guest Chemistry with Self-Assembling Metal-templated Cages

  NSF · $485k · 2011–2015

Frequent coauthors

• Donald G. Truhlar

  University of Minnesota

  319 shared

• Christopher J. Cramer

  269 shared

• Connie C. Lu

  University of Bonn

  146 shared

• Matthew R. Hermes

  University of Chicago

  112 shared

• Omar K. Farha

  Northwestern University

  109 shared

• Varinia Bernales

  101 shared

• Abdul Rehaman Moughal Shahi

  Max Planck Institute for Medical Research

  100 shared

• Ivan Infante

  Ikerbasque

  77 shared

Labs

• Laura Gagliardi LabPI

Awards & honors

• Pauling Medal Award
• Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry of the American Chem…
• Award in Theoretical Chemistry from the Physical Chemistry D…
• Humboldt Research Award
• Bourke Award of the Royal Society of Chemistry

Similar researchers at University of Chicago

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• Ian Fosterh-150
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• Jean Decetyh-142
• Graeme Bellh-141