Cláudio Verani, professor of chemistry and associate dean in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wayne State University, has accepted a five-year appointment as dean of the UWindsor Faculty of Science starting July 15, provost Robert Aguirre has announced.

“We are very pleased to have attracted a scholar of Dr. Verani’s experience and stature to this role following a highly competitive search,” Dr. Aguirre says. “He will provide crucial leadership in our teaching and research missions, advancing faculty, staff, and student excellence.”

Conducting research in bio-inorganic and in physical-inorganic chemistry, Verani has developed comprehensive externally funded programs relevant to electron transport in molecular electronics, and to the mechanistic understanding of fuel production from water. He is also interested in environmentally benign metal recovery and corrosion mitigation and in the past, has worked on metal-containing drugs that inhibit tumour cell growth.

His teaching has spanned a broad range of courses, from introductory courses in chemistry to intermediate bioinorganic chemistry, to advanced symmetry and group theory, adding when appropriate the concepts of flipped classes, primary literature search, and the development of projects and public presentations.

During Verani’s seven-year tenure as associate dean, he oversaw the research activity of 20 departments across the humanities, life, physical, and social sciences, and led the restructuring of the research support team and the proposal submission process and established grant writing workshops for the faculty. He contributed vitally to the management of physical space, research labs and instrument cores, IT infrastructure, aspects of faculty affairs, community engagement, and special projects serving the needs of faculty, staff, and students and bridging Wayne State’s largest college to the broader university community.

Verani notes he has followed the University of Windsor with interest, collaborating and co-authoring papers with its faculty.

“I am humbled by the opportunity to serve the institution at a moment where there is tangible ambition to lead in education and become an even stronger research and scholarship powerhouse, well beyond Ontario and Canada,” Verani says.

Aguirre extended a note of appreciation to Dora Cavallo-Medved, who has been serving as acting dean since September 2022: “We owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. Cavallo-Medved for her leadership in the Faculty of Science during our search for a successor.”