Harshica Fernando
Education
- B.Sc. (Honors), Chemistry University of Colombo, Sri Lanka -1991
- PhD. Chemistry, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL – 1998
Research Interests
- Kinetics and mechanisms of interaction of nanoparticles with environmental pollutants, and DNA interactions with polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and nanoparticles.
- Lipidomics: Lipid analysis of food, their relevance to fatty liver disease.
- Evaluation of food contaminants using analytical methods and assays and development of sensitive assays for detection of contaminants (collaboration).
- Molecular modelling of (i) DNA interactions with methylating agents, (ii) metal-ligand complexes and cellobiose interactions (collaboration).
Teaching Interests
- General, physical and analytical Chemistry.
- Courses at PVAMU: Undergraduate – General Chemistry I&II (lecture & lab), Quantitative analysis (lecture & lab), Physical Chemistry I (lecture & lab), Physical Chemistry II (lecture), Instrumental analysis (lecture & lab).
- Graduate – Instrumental analysis (lecture & lab), Advanced Analytical Chemistry and Advanced Physical Chemistry.
Selected Research Publications
- Williams, B., Gautam, I., Grady, T., and Fernando H. Redox Properties and Temperature Dependence of Silver Nanoparticles Synthesized using Pasteurized Cow and Goat Milk. Green chemistry letters and reviews. 2022, 15, 69-80.
- Fernando, H and Amarasekara, A. S. The effect of Dicarboxylic acid catalyst structure on hydrolysis of CelluloseModel compound D-Cellobiose in water. Current Organocatalysis: 2021, vol 8.
- Fernando, H and Amarasekara, A. S. Interactions of Cellulose Model compound D-Cellobiose with selected metal chlorides in water: identification of Chelating oxygen atoms. Euro. Org. Chem. 2021, 4968-4973.
- Rowe, G. R., Fernando, H., Elfrink, C., Ansari, S., Sullivan, J., Heathman, T., Quigg, A., Petronella, S., Wade, T., and Santsch, P.H. Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) cycling and fates in Galveston bay, Texas, USA. PLoS One 15, e0243734, 2020.
- Fernando, H., Ju, H., Kakumanu, R., Bhopale, K.K., Croisant, S., Elferink, C., Kaphalia, B.S., and Ansari, G.A.S. Distribution of petrogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in seafood following Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Mar. Pollut. Bull. 145, 200-207, 2019.
- Amarasekara, A. S., Ali, S. R., Fernando, H., Sena, V., and Timofeeva, T. V. A comparison of homogeneous and heterogeneous Bronsted acid catalysts in the reactions of meso-erythritol with aldehyde/ketones. SN Applied Sciences 1, 212, 2019.
- Fernando, H., Jackson, D., Huang, M., Ansari, S., Howarth, M., Mesaros, C., Penning, T., and Elferink, C. Using Precision Environmental Health Principles in Risk Evaluation and Communication of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. New Solutions 28, 599–616, 2019.
- Sullivan, J., Croisant, S., Howarth, M., Rowe, G. T., Fernando, H., Phillips-Savoy, A., Jackson, D., Prochaska, J., Ansari, G. A. S., Penning, T. M., Elferink, C., and community partners. Building and Maintaining a Citizen Science Network with Fishermen and Fishing Communities Post Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Using a CBPR Approach. New Solutions. 28,416-417, 2018.
- Fernando, H., Bhopale, K.K., Kondraganti, S., Kaphalia, B.S., and Ansari, G.A.S., Alcohol Induced Hepatic Steatosis: A Comparative Study to Identify Possible Indicators(s) of Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease. J of Drug and Alcohol Res. Vol 7, 2018.
- Bhopale, K.K., Kondraganti, S., Fernando, H., Boor, P.J., Kaphalia, B.S., and Ansari, G.A.S., Alcoholic Steatosis in Different Strains of Rats. J of Drug and Alcohol Res. Vol 4: 2015.
- Fernando, H., Wiktorowicz, J.E., Soman, K.V., Kaphalia, B.S., Khan, M.F. and Ansari, G.A.S., Liver proteomics in progressive alcoholic steatosis. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol. 266: 470-480, 2013.
- Fernando, H., Bhopale, K.K., Boor, P.J., Ansari, G.A.S. and Kaphalia, B.S., Hepatic lipid profiling of deer mice fed ethanol using 1H and 31P NMR spectroscopy: A dose-dependent subchronic study. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol, 264:361-369, 2012.