David Hales
UW Honors Graduates
David Hales

Chemistry (ACS cert.); Physics (Applied)
Designation: Departmental Honors
Honors Grads 2019/2020
Proudest Moment: Learning enough German in 9 months to have meaningful conversations during my study abroad.
Thesis: Functionalizing Exfoliated Black Phosphorus with Rhenium Carbonyl Species
davidhales@berkeley.eduI came into UW undeclared and unsure about my academic interests. My first-year year I made some good friends in the honors general chemistry sequence and enjoyed the content so I applied to the chemistry major. I was lucky to find communities in STEM, music, and ultimate frisbee that helped me find a place in college. I'm super grateful for those communities and the all the awesome people I met through them. Spring and summer of my sophomore year I studied abroad in Heidelberg, Germany, and took classes in chemistry and German. As a lifelong introvert, my study abroad really helped to push me out of my comfort zone in a constructive way. Winter quarter of my junior year I started zooming through my double major in physics, which has been a uniquely challenging experience. At the same time, I also started research on black phosphorus chemistry as part of the Velian group. I'm thankful to Prof. Velian and all of the members of the Velian group for their patient mentorship and support as I learned what it means to be a scientist. I'm proud to graduate with departmental honors in both chemistry and physics. After graduation, I will pursue a PhD at UC Berkeley in synthetic inorganic chemistry.