Scott Saavedra

Professor, Chemistry and Biochemistry

S. Scott Saavedra, Ph.D., is a Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry and a member of the BIO5 Institute at the University of Arizona. He received his B.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1981, and his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Duke University in 1986. He was a Senior Scientist at the Perkin-Elmer Corporation during 1986-1989, then was appointed as an NSF-ERC Postdoctoral Fellow and Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Duke University in 1989-91. He began his career at the University of Arizona in 1991 as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry Dr. Saavedra’s research interests are multidisciplinary, spanning the areas of surface spectroscopy and spectroelectrochemistry, optical waveguides and interfacial optics, photovoltaic materials and interfaces, chemical and biological sensors, and biointerfaces and biomaterials. He has authored over 125 peer-reviewed publications in these areas. In the energy sciences field, his current research programs are focused on the design of new materials and engineered interfaces for organic and perovskite photovoltaic cells and photoelectrochemical platforms for solar fuel generation.