Women are making great strides in fields relating to science, technology, engineering and math – the noted STEM fields – and DéJa Graves is taking her degree in chemistry from the University of Tennessee at Martin and moving further toward a STEM career.
Graves was UT Martin’s first graduate with a chemical physics concentration. She completed her senior research project with Dr. Jason Alexander, associate professor of physics, designing and constructing a diode laser system intended for experiments in biochemistry.
The chemical physics concentration was first offered at UTM in fall 2023 and is offered for students who seek a physics interpretation of chemical phenomena. Chemical physics is a physical science that studies chemical processes using physics principles. The concentration serves as a solid preparation for chemical physics or physical chemistry careers.
Graves also took pilot courses at UT Martin in quantum information science and laser spectroscopy.
Graves played basketball at Westview High School in Martin and earned a scholarship to play at Union University in Jackson, but opted to transfer to UT Martin after one year to focus more on her education.
That turned out to be a good choice. Graves earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry and took part in the commencement exercises May 3.
Graves is an example of the fact that the word “commencement” means “beginning,” not “ending.”
“I have been accepted to the master’s program at Western Washington University in physical chemistry,” she said. “Eventually, I want to go to the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (in Garching, Germany).
“When I was at UTM, I worked with Dr. Alexander in the laser lab, and I got really interested in laser spectroscopy and optics. That became my bread and butter in everything; I told all of my friends: ‘I’m going to the laser lab; I’m going to work on my laser!’”
Graves said a lot of her friends did not know that UT Martin has a laser lab or that students work with its equipment.
Graves said she wants to work in the science industry for a couple of years, gain experience, then come back to teach so she can use the real-world experience in her classes.
“I want to let students know they can go both ways (work in the science industry and teach),” she said. “A lot of people say, ‘Go to grad school and come back and teach,’ and they never experience the industry part of it.
“(A former UTM instructor,) Dr. Adam Bruner, worked in the industry, and he thought that a lot of people should have that experience in the industry and grad school and teaching. He had a great perspective that teaching should involve industry perspective as well.”
Graves said she has always enjoyed science, mixing chemicals as a youngster and always building things.
“My aunt thought I was going to be an engineer because I was building these amazing contraptions in her living room,” she said. “I’d put boxes together and ask for glue to make towers and connect them and learn how things work.”
What she enjoys now about her work with laser spectroscopy is being able to work with the tools in the lab.
“It can be used for atomic emission projects,” she said. “We can see the spectral lines of certain elements, where we see the colors of the lines and see how certain elements are made.”
Graves served as president for the UTM chapter of the Society of Physics Students. She also served as a tutor in the Office of Intercollegiate Athletics, as a laboratory assistant for the Department of Chemistry and Physics and as a special projects worker in the university’s Women in STEM program.
Graves said she is proud of attending a university that has so much to offer students in her field.
“It’s crazy how a lot of schools don’t have what UTM has,” she said. “We have an amazing physics program with amazing physicists. … Great scientists are here; they come to UT Martin. I was educated and taught by some of the greatest minds I’ve come to know. I think they have a great influence to create the great scientists.
“The friends I’ve worked with – research students and research partners – have gone on to do great things. One of my friends has gone to the University of California, Merced. He’s getting his Ph.D. in computational chemistry. We wouldn’t have this great experience if we didn’t come to UTM.”
PHOTO: UT Martin graduate DéJa Graves is shown receiving her diploma from UT Martin Chancellor Yancy Freeman during the May 3 commencement exercises. Graves is the first UT Martin graduate to receive a chemical physics concentration, and has been accepted into the master’s program at Western Washington University.
