D’Arcy has brought a spirit of discovery to Clark’s School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, said Don Spratt, Clark’s director of STEM undergraduate research and a fellow chemistry professor.
Julio D’Arcy set out to study biology. But, taking classes on the subject in college, he found a related topic caught his interest.
“I really fell in love with the concept of ions,” he said. “I kept asking questions about ions, and my professor would remind me that that’s a chemistry question.”
Today, as a trained chemist and the Carl J. and Anna Carlson Endowed Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Clark University, D’Arcy leads a lab studying cutting-edge materials with potential for addressing global sustainability issues.
D’Arcy has brought a spirit of discovery to Clark’s School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, said Don Spratt, Clark’s director of STEM undergraduate research and a fellow chemistry professor.
“He’s a dynamo,” Spratt said. “He’s got very diverse interests, and his energy and enthusiasm are really important aspects to attracting undergrads.”
D’Arcy enjoys helping his students find topics that light up their minds the way ions did for him.
“The students are very passionate about their science,” he said. “The laboratory is just a big playground for students like that.”
D’Arcy’s lab includes graduate students heading for careers in materials science and undergrads who may be majoring in a distantly related field like premed. Either way, he said, they have the chance to learn about experimental science, make mistakes, and gain confidence in their own abilities.
They also get to contribute to cutting-edge technologies. D’Arcy’s work focuses on conductive polymers: plastics conducting electricity, which is useful in applications like medical devices where softness and flexibility are crucial.
Some of the lab’s work involves hematite, a kind of rust that can conduct electricity. Ordinary red bricks are full of the stuff, and that means that, with a few tweaks in the lab, they can be transformed into smart bricks that store electricity.
“I always think about emergency lights,” D’Arcy said. “What if the power source was in the wall itself? Then you would always be able to have that emergency light when you need it.”
Even in the case of a natural disaster destroying a wall, smart bricks can continue functioning as batteries, keeping lights on and allowing for things like charging a phone.
D’Arcy and his students have taken to making trips to Home Depot to buy materials, from roofing tiles to pots for houseplants, to see if they can be modified in the same way.
Along with power storage, another application they’ve found for this technology is in sanitizing surfaces. Applying a small bit of electricity to smart bricks and tiles creates a chemical reaction producing a germ-killing peroxide chemical.
Umama Akther, a PhD student at Professor D'Arcy's Lab Photo | COURTESY OF CLARK UNIVERSITY
One potential application for this is replacing dangerous ultraviolet light used to sanitize operating rooms, D’Arcy said.
Prior to arriving at Clark in 2022, D’Arcy worked as a postdoctoral scholar at MIT and then taught at Washington University in St. Louis. While Clark is a smaller institution, D’Arcy said he takes inspiration from an odd object found in one a university basement: a metal lathe Robert Goddard used in his rocketry experiments.
“That is a huge inspiration for everyone in chemistry to know that this is what Clark produced back in the day,” D’Arcy said. “We don’t work with rockets, but a lot of the time we feel that we are chartering territory that’s unknown to us.”
Even without the number of students or money of an institution like MIT, Clark students have the chance to do original work that breaks new ground, he said.
Along with his work with Clark students, Spratt said D’Arcy includes the broader Worcester community in his lab’s work, inviting local middle and high school students to learn about the opportunities in STEM fields.
Regardless of a student’s age or experience, D’Arcy said each person brings their own unique personality to lab work. Some students are more meticulous. and others are more free-flowing in their approaches; but he encourages all of them to take risks and learn from each other.
“My laboratory is a happy place,” he said. “If you come here and you’re happy, that’s the first battle won. What they get out of this environment is up to them.”
“I really fell in love with the concept of ions,” he said. “I kept asking questions about ions, and my professor would remind me that that’s a chemistry question.”
Today, as a trained chemist and the Carl J. and Anna Carlson Endowed Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Clark University, D’Arcy leads a lab studying cutting-edge materials with potential for addressing global sustainability issues.
D’Arcy has brought a spirit of discovery to Clark’s School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, said Don Spratt, Clark’s director of STEM undergraduate research and a fellow chemistry professor.
“He’s a dynamo,” Spratt said. “He’s got very diverse interests, and his energy and enthusiasm are really important aspects to attracting undergrads.”
D’Arcy enjoys helping his students find topics that light up their minds the way ions did for him.
“The students are very passionate about their science,” he said. “The laboratory is just a big playground for students like that.”
D’Arcy’s lab includes graduate students heading for careers in materials science and undergrads who may be majoring in a distantly related field like premed. Either way, he said, they have the chance to learn about experimental science, make mistakes, and gain confidence in their own abilities.
They also get to contribute to cutting-edge technologies. D’Arcy’s work focuses on conductive polymers: plastics conducting electricity, which is useful in applications like medical devices where softness and flexibility are crucial.
Some of the lab’s work involves hematite, a kind of rust that can conduct electricity. Ordinary red bricks are full of the stuff, and that means that, with a few tweaks in the lab, they can be transformed into smart bricks that store electricity.
“I always think about emergency lights,” D’Arcy said. “What if the power source was in the wall itself? Then you would always be able to have that emergency light when you need it.”
Even in the case of a natural disaster destroying a wall, smart bricks can continue functioning as batteries, keeping lights on and allowing for things like charging a phone.
D’Arcy and his students have taken to making trips to Home Depot to buy materials, from roofing tiles to pots for houseplants, to see if they can be modified in the same way.
Along with power storage, another application they’ve found for this technology is in sanitizing surfaces. Applying a small bit of electricity to smart bricks and tiles creates a chemical reaction producing a germ-killing peroxide chemical.
