IU South Bend hosts local Chemistry Olympiad

France is going crazy with chemistry this year. They are celebrating 100 years of IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) by hosting two international chemistry meetings. They have also declared nationwide that the academic year from 2018 to 2019 is the "year of chemistry" for university students down to primary school students in accord with UNESCO declaring 2019 to be the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements. So what does this have to do with IU South Bend? It turns out that France is also hosting the International Chemistry Olympiad, which is where winners from the US National Chemistry Olympiad compete as a team against other nations. But to get to the national competition, local competitions first occur throughout the country. 

IU South Bend and Saint Mary's College alternate hosting the local competition for the Chemistry Olympiad; this year was our turn. 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. 

Free ACS Membership for BS Chemistry Graduates

Our department offers three degrees: BS Chemistry, BS Biochemistry, and BA Chemistry. The Bachelor of Science Degree in Chemistry is certified by the American Chemical Society (ACS) which holds national and regional meetings, supports student chapters at colleges and universities, publishes the weekly magazine Chemical and Engineering News (C&EN), records and provides chemical information through its Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS), and supplies a fountain of resources for chemists in school and in industry. This year, the ACS is offering a free three-year membership to our graduates of the BS Chemistry degree. Congratulations to all our graduates!

Spring Semester Research Presentations

[Top Left] Chemistry major Abigail Praklet has been working with analytical chemist Dr. Muna for several years and will graduate this semester. On April 11, she presented her final research at the National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) on the campus of Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia. Her project was the development of a Sensitive Stripping Voltammetric Method for Detecting Lead in Water and Soil. Praklet’s research was funded by a SMART Summer Research Grant and IUSB work study funds.

[Top Right] Pierre Emmanuel N’Guetta gave an oral presentation as a member at the 134th Indiana Academy of Science Annual Meeting on March 30 in downtown Indianapolis. Although he is a biology major, N’Guetta’s research Engineering a Biosensor for the Herbicide Glyphosate was conducted over several semesters in Dr. Rizk’s biochemistry laboratory. N’Guetta remarks that giving presentations helped develop “confidence in myself as a scientist and I was also able to showcase the great education I received here at IU South Bend. Research is definitely my passion and IUSB really allowed me to discover it.” 

[Bottom Left] Hunter Richman, another chemistry major, presented a poster at Emerging Researchers National (ERN) Conference in Washington, D.C. in late February. His poster Understanding the Kinetics and Thermodynamics of Post-synthetic Ligand Exchange in Cu(II) Metal-organic Cages described the research he conducted last summer at the University of Delaware. Richman enjoyed this opportunity to present his worked and he learned a lot from attending other poster sessions and several lectures from scientists and inventors.

[Bottom Right] Finally there was a team poster presentation last Friday at our annual Undergraduate Research Conference from the students of the fall 2019 CHEM-C 486 Biological Chemistry Laboratory class: Expression and Purification of Adenosine Deaminase and Mutants Associated with Severe Combined Immune Deficiency. The work was done over the course of the semester by Ahmad Alsahfi, Sayvon Esper, Winnie Ihano, Anna McBeth (pictured left), Hunter Richman, and Caitlin Schulz (pictured right),

New IR and UV-Visible Spectrometers

This spring the department introduced two new spectrometers to our student laboratories. The Jasco FT/IR-4700 is a Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometer that can probe the vibrational modes of samples. It comes with a single reflection ATR attachment for easy study of liquids. We also have two gas cells that are compatible with the instrument. IR spectrometers are used extensively in the sophomore organic chemistry courses but they see use in other advanced courses as well. We also added a third UV-visible diode array spectrometer (Cary 8454) from Agilent Technologies and upgraded both the software and operating systems for our other two diode array spectrometers. These instruments are heavily used in the junior/senior biochemistry laboratory course and also in our two biochemistry research labs.

Associate Faculty Recognized for Service and Promotion

This afternoon three of our instructors were honored at the annual Associate Faculty Reception. Both David Alonso (not pictured) and Michael Nolt (third from the left) were recognized for ten years of teaching at IU South Bend. Alonso is a regular instructor for our sophomore organic chemistry laboratories and Nolt enjoys teaching our freshman "Natural World" chemistry course which fulfills a campus-wide general education requirement. Merilee Britt (second from the left) was recently awarded Merit Status for her outstanding service.  Britt has been teaching the introductory freshman course for science and health science majors who have not had chemistry in high school. We are very proud of and grateful to all of our associate faculty. They provide excellent instruction and have a sincere desire to engage with and help our students.

Graduate School Panel

You may be working part-time to pay your way through school right now at IU South Bend, but did you know that most students GET PAID to attend graduate school? The IU South Bend Biology-Chemistry Club is sponsoring a panel discussion Tuesday night that will include professors Shahir Rizk (biochemistry) and Henry Scott (physics) along with a couple of graduate students. Come to learn about what graduate school can do for you, what it is like, and how you can prepare yourself to be an attractive candidate. All students are welcome, but if you are a sophomore or junior, then this even is definitely for you!