Homepage for Dr. Heather Voegtle

Assistant Professor of Chemistry

Department of Chemistry and Physics

Wingate University

228 Smith Science Building

Office phone:  704-233-8391

E-mail Address:  hvoegtle@wingate.edu

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Education

B.S. Mercer University (1998)

    Chemistry

Ph.D.  University of South Carolina (2002)

    Organic Chemistry

Background

I received my undergraduate degree from Mercer University (1998) and my Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina (2002).  After receiving my doctorate, I took a little time off from chemistry and lived overseas (North Africa) where I taught ESL.  In 2005, I began working at the Virginia Military Institute as a postdoctoral fellow.  There I taught chemistry and began research in the field of chemical ecology.  In 2006 I started teaching here at Wingate University.  I teach mainly organic chemistry and general chemistry.  This coming fall (2007) I will also be teaching Wingate 101 and a W'International class.

Outside of teaching and research, I play the clarinet and am involved in my church.   

Research Interests

My area of interest is synthetic organic chemistry.  Right now, I am focusing on synthesizing compounds found in insects, in particular in ants. 

Everyone has had some experience with ants.  Probably one of the most widely studied is the fire ant.  These are common to the Southern United States and have been found to be a serious agricultural problem and health hazard.  Extensive research has been done to determine the components of fire ant venom and this research has been used and continues to be used to understand fire ants. 

Fire ants contain compounds that are called alkaloids.  Not all ants contain these.  Some ants contain isocoumarins.  Isocoumarins have been found to exhibit interesting biological properties such as antifungal, anti-inflammatory and anti-tumor effects.  One ant in particular, Camponotus Qudrisectius F. Smith, contains two isocoumarins, mellein and 4-hydroxymellein.  Mellein has been seen before in other ants, but 4-hydroxymellein has not been seen before in any insects.  This compound has also never been synthesized. 

Summer Research

This summer I am working on synthesizing 4-hydroxymellein.  A student here at Wingate University, Brenton Smith, is working on this project with me.  Along with the synthesis, we are using NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) and GC-MS (gas chromatography-mass spectrometry) to analyze our results.

                                                 

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