We are proud to introduce, one of our Fall 2024 Undergraduates of the Quarter, Mitchell Kenny. Mitchell grew up in Portland, Oregon, where he attended Benson Polytechnic High School. He explored several career options while growing up. He went to an arts middle school, then swapped directions and attended a technical high school. At Benson, he explored and then rejected careers in architecture, computer science, and engineering. Then, in the early stages of the pandemic when he had run out of career ideas, he stumbled upon and promptly tore through what became his favorite sci-fi book series: The Expanse. He applied to college as a chemistry major to pursue the awe-inspiring future he read about, and four years later his goals have not changed. He was accepted at many schools across the country. However, upon receiving the tuition costs, OSU was the involuntary choice, with the added benefits of more easily visiting family and pleasant weather.
Mitchell is currently working with Dr. Kyriakos Stylianou on MOFs. He is involved in several projects, the largest is investigating the structural differences between many new MOFs he has made in the same family. In his quest to explain the vast and inexplicable structural diversity, he continues to encounter new materials and phenomena. He has begun to realize he is suffering from success, wading through the sprawling richness of this MOF family and hoping to understand but a small fraction of its complexity. He started his research with the URSA Engage program, (also with Dr. Stylianou) and became even more involved with a scholarship to travel to Germany and study MOFs all summer. He will be continuing his MOF research with a PhD somewhere after graduation.
When not in school, or the lab, he enjoys lifting heavy objects, playing Doppelkopf, mining Morkite, trance music, and consuming more sci-fi media when he is not doing any of the previously listed things. Picking a single book out of The Expanse saga is difficult—but he will grudgingly settle for the final one as his favorite. His favorite food is the Noodles & Company Wisconsin Mac and Cheese, best served across the street from Powell’s Books. That location has unfortunately been closed. One thing he’d like readers to know is that the show “Dark” on Netflix is perhaps the most beautiful and perplexing piece of science fiction television that exists. Watch with subtitles and without spoilers and be amazed, although it is a slow burn.
