The College of Arts and Sciences sponsors the A&S Fellows Program for undergraduate students to work under the mentorship of a URI faculty member in an area of research, scholarship, or creative work.

As part of a fellowship, Thomas Lenehan ’20, a chemistry major, worked alongside mentor Dr. Jimmie Oxley, professor of chemistry and co-director of URI’s Center of Excellence in Explosives, Detection, Mitigation, and Response, to study the mitigation of sensitive explosives. They researched the sensitivities of peroxide-based materials by examining how various energetic peroxides are formed, how energetic they are compared to each other, what makes them dangerous compounds, and how to safely dispose of them.

Using this data, they then explored how to mitigate, contain, and safely dispose of energetic peroxides with the goal of mitigating the dangers these materials pose to law enforcement personnel. “The Fellowship was a great opportunity to further increase my chemistry knowledge,” Thomas says. “Working in Dr. Oxley’s lab has allowed me the ability to determine what interests me and what I want to continue working on after my undergraduate education”