Sergio Aragón

Professor of Chemistry

Office: Thornton Hall 965

Office Phone: 415-338-7712

E-mail address:  aragons@sfsu.edu

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Education:

B.S. Chemistry, Rice University, 1971 (Magna cum Laude)
M.S. Physics, Stanford University, 1976
Ph.D. Physical Chemistry, Stanford University, 1976

Research Interests: Chemical Physics/Physical Chemistry/Biophysics

The study of macromolecules (natural or synthetic) in solution by dynamic laser light scattering, transient electric birefringence and super computer Monte Carlo simulation techniques. Measurements are made of various transport properties of systems at or near equilibrium to obtain information on size, conformation, shape and flexibility. In addition, a major thrust of this research is to develop appropriate theoretical models relevant to the measurements mentioned above. These involve the statistical mechanics of molecular motion in fluids, including internal motions, and the electromagnetics of scattering processes in the Rayleigh-Debye and Mie regimes. Computer algebra techniques are used in the theoretical and computational aspects of these problems. Recent research includes the application of boundary element methods for the accurate hydrodynamic computation of transport properties of proteins and nucleic acids in solution with the stick boundary condition and small to intermediate size molecules with the slip boundary condition.  Boundary element methods have also been developed for the accurate and precise computations of capacitances and electric polarizability tensors of arbitrarily shaped dielectric bodies.


 

Representative Publications:

24. S.R. Aragón. "Polarized dynamic light scattering from wormlike chains with hydrodynamic interaction:, in "Static

      and Dynamic Light Scattering in Medicine and Biology", R.J. Nossal, R. Pecora, and A.V. Priezzhev, Eds., SPIE

      1884, 33 (1993).
25. D. K. Hahn and S.R. Aragón, "Mie scattering from anisotropic thick spherical shells", J. Chem. Phys. 101, 

      8409 (1994).
26. E.S. Yamaguchi, R.L. Primer, S.R. Aragon, and E.Q. Labrador, "Dynamic Light Scattering Studies of Neutral

      Diisobutyl Zinc Dithiophosphate", Tribology Transactions, 40, 330-338 (1997).
27. E.S. Yamaguchi, R.L. Primer, S.R. Aragón, and E.Q. Labrador, "Dynamic Light Scattering Studies of Basic

      Diisobutyl Zinc Dithiophosphate", Tribology Transactions, 41, 233-240 (1998).

28. S.R. Aragón, “A precise boundary element method for macromolecular transport properties”, J. Comp.

      Chem., 25, 1191-1205 (2004).
29. S.R. Aragón, “Algebraic structure of physical quantities”, J. Math. Chem. 36, 55-74 (2004).

30. J. Michael Schurr, David P. Rangel, and Sergio Aragon, “A contribution to the theory of preferential interaction coefficients”, Biophysical J. . 89, 2258-2276 (2005).

31. Sergio Aragón*, Martin Perez, Kerwin Ng, and Don Eden, “Optical Kerr effect of Dna oligomers and Rna”, in Molecular and Colloidal Electro-optics, S.P. Stoylov, Ed.  CRC Press, 2006.

32. Sergio Aragón and David K. Hahn, “The Pre-Averaged Hydrodynamic Interaction Revisited via Boundary Element Computations”, J. Chem. Theory & Comput. 2, 12-17 (2006).

33. Sergio Aragón and David K. Hahn, “ The polarizability and capacitance of Platonic solids and the Kerr constant of Proteins”, Lecture Series on Computer and Computational Sciences Vol. 4, Brill:Leiden, 2005, p. 25-32.

34. Sergio R. Aragón and David K. Hahn, "Precise boundary element computation of proteins transport properties:

        Diffusion tensors, specific volume and hydration”, Biophysical Journal, 91:1591-1603 (2006).    

35. D. Hahn and S.R. Aragón, “The intrinsic viscosity of proteins from high precision boundary element calculations”, J. Chem. Theory & Comput. 2: 12-17 (2006).

36. Aragon and David K. Hahn, “Polarizability and Kerr constant of Proteins by boundary element methods”, Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces”, 56, 19-25 (2007).

Research Laboratory and Computational Facilities

Computational Cluster:  AMD Opteron with 40 processors, including an 8-way dual core system and a new Opteron dual core 8000 series 16-way system.

Dynamic Laser Light Scattering: Research system on optical table.

Electric Birefringence:  Transient Electric Birefringence and Optical Kerr Effect research systems.

Hydrodynamics Software

Mathematica and Excel Notebooks
Boundary Element Methods

Group Members

Chris Kao, B.S. Chem UCB

Qiuting Hong, M.S. SFSU

Paul Brandt, M.S. SFSU
David K. Hahn, Post-Doctoral Fellow.

 

Past Group Members
Jared Thompson, B.S. Chem, SFSU, Ph.D. (candidate)Purdue

Takako Takeda, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D. (candidate) George Mason U..
Chris Zimmer, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D. (candidate) UC-Davis
 Tilman Rosales, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D. (candidate) U. Maryland 
Martin Perez, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D. (candidate) UC-San Diego 
Russel Primer, M.S. SFSU
Richard Janek, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D.,UC-Davis
Ben Lange, M.S. SFSU, PhD. Stanford
David Hahn, M.S. SFSU, Ph.D. U. Montana
Rolland Luo, M.S. SFSU
Felix Gandara, M.S. Virginia Tech.

 Courses

Chem 251 Mathematics & Physics for Chemistry
Chem 351 Physical Chemistry I
Chem 353 Physical Chemistry II
Chem 850 Valency & Spectroscopy
Chem 852 Statistical Mechanics: Molecular Relaxation

Brief Bio:

I was born and raised in Guatemala. After completing my University education in the United States, I returned to Guatemala after a short postdoctoral appointment at Stanford. In Guatemala I initiated a modern program in Chemical Sciences with degrees in Chemistry, Biochemistry, Food Science & Technology and Chemical Engineering at Universidad del Valle de Guatemala. After nearly 9 years of this pioneering work I decided to emigrate to the US with my family. I joined the chemistry faculty at SFSU in 1985 and have engaged in the research described above.  Besides rock climbing, I enjoy climbing high icy mountains and skiing in all types of terrain.
 
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