Zukoski joined the UIUC faculty in 1985 and holds the title of William H. and Janet G. Lycan Professor and Vice Chancellor of Research. Zukoski was designated a 1986 National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator and Zukoski was the 1997 recipient of the American Chemical Society Ralph K. Iler Award in the Chemistry of Colloidal Materials and the 2002 Alpha Chi Sigma Award form the American institute of Chemical Engineers. Vice Chancellor, Zukoski is the senior campus officer responsible for advancing research at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which is amoung the top ranked American research universities.

Suspensions of small (0.05-10 micrometers) particles are commonly used in materials processing operations where rapid solids transport and large surface areas are required. These colloidal particles have applications in a wide range of fields including drilling muds, paints, cements, emulsions, and ceramics. Despite their diverse forms, the properties of these suspensions are linked by a common underlying physical chemistry. The research carried out by Zukoski's group concentrates on understanding the relationships between surface physical chemistry and the material properties of colloidal suspensions. Particular attention is paid to methods of manipulating interparticle forces to alter particle and suspension properties.

Currently he is studying the properties of saturated and partially saturated granular materials. Issues of significance are how particle interactions control the microstructure within sheared and compacting slurries and how these forces are manifested in crack formation in drying slurries. Theses problems arise in diverse applications such as ceramic fabrication, production of photonic band gap materials, and coatings on paper used for inkjet printing. How stress develops and is propagated in stable and aggregated suspensions and the long-range effects of container walls in controlling stress transfer are questions we investigate.

In a second series of problems, Professor Zukowski is concerned with phase behavior of nanoparticle suspensions. Altering the strength of particle interactions and their concentration results in fluid/fluid, fluid/solid, and gel transitions. Each of these transitions has its applications. He is studying the role of the strength and range of the particle interaction potential in controlling which transition takes place. One application of these ideas lies in the formation of responsive fluids where prominently sensitive polymers are used to alter the state of the suspension. A second application is understanding the crystallization of globular macromolecules of biological significance. Here Zukoski is developing methods of rapidly locating solution conditions that give rise to protein or RNA crystals. This research leads to detailed studies of how to characterize the strength of nanoparticle interactions on samples containing a few microliters and to developing microfluidic devices where rapid solution screens can be carried out on small amounts of material. Zukoski investigates how the formation of x-ray quality crystals is influenced by the strength of interactions and how additives alter rates of nucleation and growth at a fixed supersaturation.