PNNL

Christopher Hossack is a postdoctoral researcher at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in the Radiological Materials Group and has been working under the mentorship of Matthew Asmussen and James Neeway. His current research project focuses on expanding our understanding of the chemical behavior and speciation of non‑pertechnetate Tc‑compounds in Hanford Site tank waste and cementitious nuclear waste forms. 

Hossack earned his PhD in inorganic chemistry from George Washington University under the co-supervision of Christopher Cahill and Claire Besson, where he studied the electronic structure and properties (optical, magnetic) of molecular lanthanide complexes. Consequently, Hossack developed an expertise in characterizing bulk material properties and identifying their structural/compositional origin, even at the molecular/atomic level. To achieve this, he utilized a host of synthetic and analytical techniques such as crystal growth, single crystal and powder diffraction, optical and magnetic spectroscopies, magnetometry as well as basic density functional theory and active space calculations.

• PhD in chemistry, George Washington University, 2024
• BS in chemistry, University of the West Indies, Mona, 2019

• American Chemical Society (ACS)
• National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE)

2026

• Lawter, A., Saslow, S., Dardenne, K., Rothe, J., Prüßmann, T., Hall, G., Rahmon, S., Lapeyre, J., Doughman, M., Munoz, V., Levitskaia, T., Westesen, A., Hossack, C., Asmussen, R. M. The Leaching Behavior of Non-Pertechnetate Species in Cementitious Waste Forms. ACS Earth and Space Chemistry, 2026. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1021/acsearthspacechem.5c00222)
• Asmussen, R. M., Clark, G. G., Anderson, J., Bourchy, A., Ferrer, J., Hossack, C., Lapeyre, J., Peterson, M., Rahmon, S. A., Reiser, J. T., Riley, B. J., Saslow, S. A., Silva, C. A review of the cast stone formulation for nuclear waste immobilization. Waste Management 2026, 211, 115277. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2025.115277)

2024

• Smith, J. A., Singh-Wilmot, M. A. Hossack, C. Cahill, C., Ford, R. A. C. Expanding the Library: Twenty New Ln(III) Metal–Organic Frameworks, Including Two Isoreticular Pairs, from Dihaloterephthalic Acid. Cryst. Growth Des. 2024, 24 (19), 7822–7836. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.cgd.4c00558)

2023

• Hossack, C. Besson, C. Cahill, C. Utility of All-Pyrazole Heteroscorpionates in f-Element Chemistry. Dalton Trans., 2023, 52, 17656 – 17665. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1039/D3DT02737F)
• Hossack, C., Abdul, F., Cahill, C. Besson, C. Tuning the Optical and Magnetic Properties of Lanthanide Single-Ion Magnets using Nitro-functionalized Trispyrazolylborate Ligands. Dalton Trans., 2023, 52, 7336 – 7351. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1039/D3DT01018J)

2021

• Hossack, C., Butcher, R., Cahill, C. Besson, C. Structural Diversity of Lanthanide 3‑Nitrotrispyrazolylborates: Tunable Nuclearity and Intra-Ligand Charge Transfer Sensitization of Visible and NIR Ln³⁺ Emission. Inorg. Chem., 2021, 60 (20), 15724 – 15743. (doi: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.1c02390)