Skip to main content
learning objects
My Learning Objects
groups
My Groups
events and postings
My Ads, Events, and Job Postings
articles
My Professional Activities
Jane Wissinger

Jane Wissinger

Professor Emerita Organic Chemistry and Laboratory Director

she/her/hers

University of Minnesota

Contact

jwiss@umn.edu

Social Media

Google Scholar

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=B886_AYAAAAJ&hl=en

ORCID ID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9240-3629

Bio

Jane Wissinger received her B.A. from Susquehanna University, M.S. from Georgia Institute of Technology and Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Northwestern University. She was a research scientist at Rohm & Haas Co. for five years before beginning her academic career in 1992 at the University of Minnesota. In 1998, Wissinger was hired as the Organic Chemistry Laboratory Director and continued to instruct organic chemistry lecture courses, as well as an upper division Green Chemistry course. Wissinger maintained an active research program focused on the development of curriculum materials for the college and high school levels that exemplify modern green chemistry methodology, advances in sustainable polymers, guided-inquiry pedagogy, systems thinking, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Wissinger was a Senior Principle Investigator in the NSF Center for Sustainable Polymers and passionate about educating students about the need and opportunities for designing better plastics. She is active in promoting green/sustainable chemistry locally and on a national and international level through workshops, publications, and as a conference symposia organizer. Her efforts were recognized with a U of MN Morse-Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor award (2014), an ACS-CEI Award for Incorporation of Sustainability in Chemistry Education (2018), and ACS Fellow award (2023) and the ACS GCI Career Achievement in Green Chemistry award (2024). Wissinger serves on the ACS Committee on Environment and Sustainability and the IUPAC Interdivisional Committee on Green Chemistry for Sustainable Development.

About

Languages

  1. English

Keywords Tags/Expertise

  1. Green Chemistry Education
  2. Systems Thinking
  3. Sustainable Chemistry
  4. Polymers & Plastics

Ongoing Projects

Research website: https://sites.google.com/umn.edu/wissingerresearchgroup/home

 

Systems thinking in chemistry for sustainability: toward 2030 and beyond (STCS 2030+):  https://iupac.org/project/2020-014-3-050/

 

Cross-Disciplinary Goals of Green Chemistry and the Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development:  https://iupac.org/project/2022-021-2-041/

 

Assessment of the Contributions of IUPAC Projects to the Achievement of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.  https://iupac.org/project/2020-011-2-041/

 

COMING SOON! User Groups

Any group that a user is a member of will be displayed here. Groups functionality is currently under development and will be launching soon.

My Ads, Events, and Job Postings

No jobs available at this time.
Please check back regularly for new job postings and opportunities from the community.
No jobs available at this time.
Please check back regularly for new job postings and opportunities from the community.
No events found. Please try a broader search, or if the event is not listed, please consider adding it to the calendar.
No events found. Please try a broader search, or if the event is not listed, please consider adding it to the calendar.

Published Articles

ACS Committee on Environment and Sustainability  https://www.acs.org/about/governance/committees/environmental-improvement.html

 

IUPAC Interdivisional Committee on Green Chemistry for Sustainable Development https://iupac.org/body/041/

 

Chair, UMN Sustainable and Green Chemistry Committee https://sites.google.com/umn.edu/sgcc/home

 

Buenaflor J. P.; Hillmyer, M. S.; Wentzel, M. T.; Wissinger, J. E.. "Synthesis and Characterization of Biobased Lactose Hydrogels: A Teaching Experiment on Sustainable Polymers and Waste Biomass Valorization" J. Chem. Educ. 2023, 100, 10, 3981–3990.  https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.jchemed.3c00195

 

Tundo, Pietro and Wissinger, Jane. "IUPAC Projects Contributions to the UN Sustainable Development Goals: Past, present, and future" Chemistry International, vol. 44, no. 4, 2022, pp. 35-37. https://doi.org/10.1515/ci-2022-0413 

 

Buenaflor, J. P.; Lydon, C.; Zimmerman, A.; Desutter, O. L.; Wissinger, J. E., "Student explorations of calcium alginate bead formation by varying pH and concentration of acidic beverage juices",

Chemistry Teacher International,  2022, doi.org/10.1515/cti-2021-0027

 

Corcoran, E. R; Lydon, C.; Enright, M. C.; Buenaflor, J. P.; Anderson, K.; Wissinger, J. E. Corcoran, E. R; Lydon, C.; Enright, M. C.; Buenaflor, J. P.; Anderson, K.; Wissinger, J. E., "Thirst for a Solution: Alginate Biopolymer Experiments for the Middle and High School Classrooms", J. Chem. Educ. 2022, 99 (2), 1021-1025. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00905  

 

Wissinger, J. E.; Visa, A.; Saha, B. B.; Matlin, S.  A.; Mahaffy, P. G.; Kümmerer, K.; Cornell, S.  "Integrating Sustainability into Learning in Chemistry"  J. Chem. Educ. 2021, 98 (4), 1061-1063. 

10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00284 

 

Goode, S. R; Wissinger, J. E.; Wood-Black, F.  Introducing the Journal of Chemical Education's Special Issue on Chemical Safety Education: Methods, Culture, and Green Chemistry  J. Chem. Educ. 2021, 98 (1), 1-6. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.0c01459 

 

Gormong, E. A; Wentzel, M. T.; Cao, B.; Kundel, L. N.; Reineke, T. M., Wissinger, J. E., "Exploring Divergent Green Reaction Media for the Copolymerization of Biobased Monomers in the Teaching Laboratory", J. Chem. Educ. 2020 98 (2), 559-566. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.0c00688 

 

Aubrecht, K. B.; Bourgeois, M.; Brush, E. J.; MacKellar, J.; Wissinger, J. E. "Integrating Green Chemistry in the Curriculum: Building Student Skills in Systems Thinking, Safety, and Sustainability". J. Chem. Educ. 2019, 96 (12), 2872-2880. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00354

 

Knutson, C. M.; Hiler, A.; Tolstyka, Z. P.; Wilbon, P. A.; Mathers, R. T.; Anderson, C. B.; Perkins, A. L.; Wissinger, J. E. "Dyeing to Degrade: A Bioplastics Experiment for the College and High School Classroom", J. Chem. Educ. 2019, 96 (11), 2565-2573. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00461

 

Palesh, J. J; Gilles, B. C.; Chycota, J.; Haj, M. K.; Fahnhorst, G. W.; Wissinger, J. E. "Iodination of vanillin and subsequent Suzuki-Miyaura coupling: Two-step synthetic sequence teaching green chemistry principles", Green Chemistry Letters and Reviews, 2019, 12 (2), 117-126. doi.org/10.1080/17518253.2019.1609603

 

Knutson, C.; Schneiderman, D. K.; Yu, Ming; Javner, C.; Distefano, M. D.; Wissinger, J. E. "Polymeric Medical Sutures: an Exploration of Polymers and Green Chemistry",  J. Chem. Educ. 2017, 94, 1761-1765. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00835

 

Fahnhorst, G. W.; Swingen, Z. J.; Schneiderman, D. K.; Blaquiere, C. S.; Wentzel, M. T.; Wissinger, J. E. "Synthesis and Study of Sustainable Polymers in the Organic Chemistry Laboratory: An inquiry-based experiment exploring the effects of size and composition on the properties of renewable block polymers", Green Chemistry Experiments in Undergraduate Laboratories; Fahey, J.; Maelia, L. Ed.; ACS Symposium Series, 2016, Chapter 8, pp. 123-147. 10.1021/bk-2016-1233.ch008

 

Giang T. Hoang, Tomohiro Kubo, Victor G. YoungJr., Jacob A. Kautzky, and Jane E. Wissinger "Illustrating the Utility of X-ray Crystallography for Structure Elucidation through a Tandem Aldol Condensation/Diels–Alder Reaction Sequence", J. Chem. Ed., 2015, 92, 1381–1384. 10.1021/acs.jchemed.5b00027

 

Deborah K. Schneiderman, Chad Gilmer, Michael T. Wentzel, Mark T. Martello, Tomohiro Kubo, and Jane E. Wissinger. "Sustainable Polymers in the Organic Chemistry Laboratory: Synthesis and Characterization of a Renewable Polymer from δ-Decalactone and l-Lactide",  J. Chem. Ed., 2014, 91, 131–135. 10.1021/ed400185u

 

Patrick T. Lang, Andrew M. Harned*, and Jane E. Wissinger. "Oxidation of Borneol to Camphor Using Oxone and Catalytic Sodium Chloride: A Green Experiment for the Undergraduate Organic Chemistry Laboratory",   J. Chem. Ed., 2011, 88, 652–656. 10.1021/ed100853f