Djordje Vuckovic

Djordje Vuckovic is a Ph.D. candidate in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at Stanford. As a student in the Mitch lab, he studied the mechanism of sunscreen toxicity to coral reefs, aiming to guide development of coral-safe sunscreens. Working under a grant from the Woods Institute together with researchers from the Pringle lab at the Stanford School of Medicine, Djordje showed that one of the most common sunscreen ingredients is ironically metabolized into a photo-toxin (the opposite of a sunscreen) in sea anemones, corals, and (even!) humans.

Prior to Stanford, Djordje received an undergraduate degree in chemistry from Columbia University where he designed and synthesised materials for carbon capture and pathogen detection. He also spent a summer at the European Center for Research and Teaching in the Geosciences (CEREGE) in France, studying the application of a material for groundwater remediation. Djordje is an NSF Graduate Research Fellow and a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society.