• Professional Training:
  • Ph. D. (2013) Physical Chemistry, North Dakota State University
  • Postdoctoral Scholar (2013- ) Center for Nonlinear Studies, Los Alamos National Lab
  • Reviewer for J. Phys. Chem., J. Chem. Phys., Phys. Chem. Lett., PCCP, RSC Advances, Nanoscale

Research Interests:

• Excited State Molecular Dynamics
• Organic Semiconducting Materials
• Energetic Materials
• Device Applications of Molecular Excited States
• Nonlinear Optical Properties
• Nonadiabatic Dynamics
• Coherent Control of Chemical Processes

Selected Recent Publications:

1. Bjorgaard, J. A., Sifain, A. E., Nelson, T., Myers, T. W., Veathier, J. M., Chavez, D. E., Scharff, R. J. Tretiak, S. Two-photon absorption in conjugated energetic molecules, J. Phys. Chem. Submitted
2. Bjorgaard, J. A., Velizhanin, K. A., Tretiak, S. Nonequilibrium solvent effects in Born-Oppenheimer molecular dynamics for ground and excited electronic states, J. Chem. Phys. 144, 154104 (2016)
3. Myers, T. W., Bjorgaard, J. A., Brown, K. E., Chavez, D. E., Hanson, S. K., Scharff, R. J., Tretiak, S., Veauthier, J. M. Energetic chromophores: low energy laser initiation in explosive Fe (II) tetrazine complexes, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 138, 4685 (2016)
4. Nelson, T. R., Bjorgaard, J. A., Greenfield, M. T., Bolme, C. A., Brown, K. E., McGrane, S. D., Scharff, J. R., Tretiak, S. Ultrafast photodissociation dynamics of nitromethane, J. Phys. Chem. A 120, 519 (2016)
5. Xue, B., Katan, C., Bjorgaard, J. A., Kobayashi, T. Non-degenerate two photon absorption enhancement for laser dyes by precise lock-in detection, AIP Adv. 5, 12 (2015)
6. Yilmaz, B., Bjorgaard, J., Lin, Z., Kose, M. E. Phthalimide containing donor-acceptor polymers for effective dispersion of single-walled carbon nanotubes, Org. Comm. 8, 3 (2015)
7. Greenfield, M.; McGrane, S.; Bolme, C.; Bjorgaard, J.; Nelson, T.; Tretiak, S.; Scharff, R. Photoactive high explosives: linear and nonlinear photochemistry of petrin tetrazine chloride, J. Phys. Chem. A 119, 4846 (2015)
8. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kalinin, K., Nelson, T., Kuzmenko, V., Velizhanin, K. A., Tretiak, S. Simulations of fluorescence solvatochromism in substituted ppv oligomers from excited state molecular dynamics with implicit solvent, Chem. Phys. Lett. 631, 66 (2015)
9. Bjorgaard, J. A., Velizhanin, K. A., Tretiak, S. Solvent effects in time-dependent self-consistent field methods II: variational formulations and analytical gradients, J. Chem. Phys. 143, 054305 (2015)
10. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kuzmenko, V., Velizhanin, K. A., Tretiak, S. Solvent effects in time-dependent self-consistent field methods I: optical response calculations, J. Phys. Chem. C 142, 044103 (2015)
11. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kose, M. E. Simulations of singlet exciton diffusion in organic semiconductors: a review, RSC Adv. 5, 8432-8445 (2015)
12. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kose, M. E. Simulations of exciton diffusion and trapping in semicrystalline morphologies of poly(3-hexylthiophene), J. Phys. Chem. C 118, 5756-5761 (2014)
13. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kose, M. E.Amplified quenching of conjugated polymer nanoparticle photoluminescence for robust measurement of exciton diffusion length, J. Appl. Phys. 113, 203707 (2013)
14. Bjorgaard, J. A., Kose, M. E.Theoretical study of torsional disorder in poly (3-alkylthiophene) single chains: intramolecular charge-transfer character and implications for photovoltaic properties, J. Phys. Chem. A 117, 3869-3876 (2013)
15. Iyer, A., Bjorgaard, J., Anderson, T., Kose, M. E.Quinoxaline-based semiconducting polymers: effect of fluorination on the photophysical, thermal, and charge transport properties, Macromolecules 45, 6380-6389 (2012)
16. Li, Z., Badaeva, E., Zhou, D., Bjorgaard, J., Glusac, K. D., Killina, S., Sun, W.Tuning Photophysics and nonlinear absorption of bipyridyl platinum (II) bisstilbenylacetylide complexes by auxiliary substituents, J. Phys. Chem. A 116, 4878-4889 (2012)
17. Lin, Z., Bjorgaard, J., Yavuz, A. G., Iyer, A., Kose, M. E. Synthesis, photophysics, and photovoltaic properties of low-band gap conjugated polymers based on thieno[3,4-c]pyrrole-4,6-dione: a combined experimental and computational study, RSC Advances 2, 642-651 (2012)
18. Lin, Z., Bjorgaard, J., Yavuz, A. G., Kose, M. E. Low band gap star-shaped molecules based on benzothia (oxa) diazole for organic photovoltaics, J. Phys. Chem. C 115, 15097-15108 (2011)