About Me

Hi, folks! My name is Dr. Zach Palmer, and I recently graduated from the University of Mississippi with my Ph.D. in chemistry under the advisement of Dr. Ryan Fortenberry. Since 2017, much of my research career has been within the field of computational astrochemistry with much of my dissertation work focusing on the prediction of rovibrational spectral data for small molecules. As of August 2025, I started my position as a joint postdoctoral research fellow at the Missouri University of Science and Technology (MS&T) and the University of Missouri (Mizzou). Now, my research explores the quantum chemical treatment and prediction of the energetics for homogenous and heterogenous molecular clusters featuring weakly bound, non-covalent interactions.

As a computational quantum chemist, I have extensive experience with several quantum chemical methods. As such, I am moderately proficient in electronic structure methods within both wave function theory and density functional theory, though much of my published work utilizes wave function-based explicitly correlated coupled cluster theory. In my time, I have also worked with quite a few different quantum chemical programs including Molpro, Gaussian, Psi4, CFOUR, PySCF, and ORCA. Though I have extensive experience with these programs and methods, I am always working to hone and strengthen my skills in order to use these tools to the best of their ability.