IU South Bend hosts the 2017 Chemistry Olympiad

The Chemistry Olympiad is a yearly event that begins at high schools throughout the country and ends in an international competition (this year in Thailand).  Each high school nominates just two students to send to a local college or university to compete further.  IU South Bend and Saint Mary's College alternate hosting the students; this year was our turn.  More information about the national competition can be found at the American Chemical Society while information about the international competition can be found elsewhere: ICHO website and the 2017 ICHO Competition in Thailand.

Laboratory supervisor Connie Fox and assistant Brenda Beatty were contacted ahead of time to order chemicals, prepare solutions, and set up instruments for today's competition.  The high school students spent the morning taking a written test and then after a break for lunch put all of their problem solving skills to work in the laboratory for chemical synthesis and analysis. 

Associate Faculty are Honored for Service

 

Three of our associate faculty were honored yesterday in a reception for their years of service. Pat Boettcher (left) has taught general chemistry and organic chemistry laboratories for us for the past five years.  Both Pete McCasland (center) and Clark Hartford (right) have been with us for 15 years. McCasland and Hartford routinely teach freshman laboratory classes but have also taught lecture courses: both have taught the introductory course for health science majors and Hartford has, on occasion, taught the upper-level analytical chemistry and instrumental analysis lectures and laboratories.  We are very grateful to have these men - and all our other associate faculty - diligently and proficiently teaching for us. Without them, it would not be possible to offer as many courses as we do. The years of experience of our associate faculty, often in industry, nicely support and complement the more academic experience that the full-time faculty have.  We hope that they will continue to teach with us for many years to come.

Rizk Publishes in Scientific Reports

 

Professor Shahir Rizk recently published in Scientific Reports of the Nature Publishing Group. This effort began in a post-doctoral position at the University of Chicago and finished here at IU South Bend. As main author, Rizk collaborated with several researchers with connections to the University of Chicago, the New York University Langone Medical Center,  and the New York University School of Medicine - scientists that he continues to collaborate with.  Rizk explains the article's theme in the following paragraph, but you can read the abstract and full paper by clicking here.

 

Many diseases result from a mutation that causes an enzyme deficiency. This typically impairs the function of an essential enzyme, leading to disease manifestation. In many cases, the mutation impairs the ability of the enzyme to adopt the correct 3D structure required for proper function. This article addresses the question: How can we bring an enzyme that has been disrupted by mutation back to life? We focused on Isocitrate Dehydrogenase I, a metabolic enzyme that is mutated in a large percentage of individuals with brain tumors. The goal was to restore function to the mutant enzyme by trying to force it to adopt the correct 3D structure. We used a technique called phage display, which allowed us to engineer an antibody fragment that binds to the natural 3D structure of the enzyme. When added to the mutant enzyme, the engineered antibody fragment was able to restore natural function to the mutant enzyme. While this study was done in the test tube, it is a fist step in the design of "activator molecules" that can hopefully help restore function to a large number of mutant enzymes. 

Work Study Positions

Pictured above are Biochemistry majors Victor Gutierrez-Schultz (left) and Khai Pham (right).  They are both working with Professor Anderson this semester to develop and trouble-shoot experiments for Anderson's upcoming freshman-level nanotechnology course CHEM-N 190 Natural World - Introduction to Nanochemistry.  Gutierrez was able to participate in this work as part of our Work Study Program which offers part-time employment to students who meet certain criteria and have completed a FAFSA form.  Working in your department not only provides a source of income, it also develops skills and knowledge relevant to your discipline.  If you are interested in a work study position, please contact a faculty member in your department - they may know of a position suitable to you.

2017 Undergraduate Research Conference

Last week the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry was represented by five students at the annual  IU South Bend Undergraduate Research Conference.  Biochemistry major Alexandra Hochstetler won the poster prize while Chemistry major David Aupperle received an honorable mention for his poster.  For the presentations, Biochemistry major Michele Costantino was awarded an honorable mention in the Natural Sciences category. Aupperle and Costantino both presented work done on campus with faculty from the department (Professors Muna and Rizk, respectively) while Hochstetler's research came from her summer experience at the IU School of Medicine.  David Aupperle (left) explains the how to best make a glassy carbon electrode below.

Also presenting were Biochemistry students Victor Gutierrez-Schultz and Khai Pham.  Gutierrez-Schultz had spent his last summer working on campus in Professor Anderson's laboratory while Pham spent her summer on an internship at Leco Corporation.  We are very proud of all our student researchers and are glad that they have had these opportunities to shine outside of the classroom.  Khai Pham (right) discusses gas chromatography and mass spectrometery in the picture below.

DAVID AUPPERLE
Electrochemical Detection of Steroid Hormones

MICHELE COSTANTINO
Reversible Self-Assembly Using Protein Conformational Changes

VICTOR GUTIERREZ-SCHULTZ
Developing a Non-enzymatic Decontamination Method of Arsenic

ALEXANDRA HOCHSTETLER, SARA SANTIGUEL, DANIEL LEE, WOAN LOWE, MARGARET SCHWARZ MD　
Role of AIMP1 in Pulmonary Morphogenesis

KHAI PHAM, DAVID E. ALONSO, CHRISTINA KELLY, JOE BINKLEY
A Novel Benchtop Time of Flight GC/MS System For High Throughput Qualitative And Quantitative Analysis of Drugs of Abuse in Human Urine

In the photograph below we see Victor Gutierrez-Schultz stand by his work (in more ways than one) with arsenic oxidizing enzymes.