Several undergraduate research groups from CSUCI presented
their research this year at the 251st ACS meeting in San Diego. Research
projects conducted at the school focus on a variety of topics ranging from environmental
chemistry, organic synthesis, analytical studies, materials science and
instrumentation.
The American Chemical Society national meetings are the
largest scientific conferences in the world. Besides serving as a platform to
present their own scientific work, attending the meetings represents a chance
for students to develop their professional network. Many young students make
connections at ACS meetings that launch their scientific careers into industry
or graduate school.
CSUCI research students and advisors.
From left to right: Chemistry Dean Simone Aloisio, Courtney Mayhew and Timothy Goodman
presenting a project measuring the levels of mercury in rice.
From left to right: Simone Aloisio, Samantha Freitag and Kylan Malloy. Research
concerned with measuring mercury levels in commercial cigarettes was also credited to
Melissa J Soriano, not pictured.
From left to right: Cameron McLaughlin, Angel Torres, Aisling Williams and
Professor Brittnee Veldman, advisor. Research on self-assembling nanocomposite materials.
While attempting to develop a new method to produce
synthetic diamond, scientists at North Carolina State University have discovered
an entirely new phase of carbon called “Q-carbon”. This new material was found
to possess fascinating physical and chemical properties some of which resolve
long-standing scientific mysteries. It is harder than diamond, magnetic at room
temperature, stable at ambient conditions and is electrically conductive. Further,
its production doesn’t require extreme temperature and pressure and it can easily
be converted into conventional diamond.
Phase diagram of carbon. Conventional methods to produce
diamond push graphite into diamond by increasing temperature
and pressure. The dotted green line shows the interface between
supercooled liquid carbon and diamond, which can be crossed
at ambient pressure.
Source: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4936595
Diamond is an extremely useful material due to its physical
characteristics. Its hardness and clarity lend it to use in a wide variety of
industrial applications such as in abrasives and optics while its thermal and
electrical traits are useful in technological hardware. However, the scarcity
of diamond of appropriate quality in nature forces scientists to look for ways
to mass produce it. The conventional approach requires extremely high
temperatures and pressures along with chemical catalysts. This is extremely
energy-intensive, costly and inefficient.
Researchers Jagdish Narayana and Anagh Bhaumik at North
Carolina State were hoping to find a more straightforward synthetic pathway to
diamond by utilizing a strange quirk of physics called ‘supercooling’. Most
people are familiar with supercooling as it applies to water. A common
demonstration involves placing a bottle of very pure water in the freezer and
taking it out after around two and a half hours. It appears liquid, but upon
hitting it against a surface, it suddenly crystallizes and forms fluffy ice.
This is a slightly different process from the one used for
making Q-carbon, though. While the water demonstration starts in the liquid form,
becomes supercooled liquid and then returns to its normal freezing point to
crystallize into ice, the scientists at NCSU melted solid carbon with a laser
tuned to a highly specific energy. The laser excites the atoms electrically
rather than thermally, and so their crystal structure falls apart at a much
lower temperature than it conventionally would. This liquid carbon was then cooled
extremely rapidly, a process known as ‘quenching’ (hence the “Q” in Q-carbon).
This locked the carbon atoms in their unusual physical arrangement. The rapid
cooling doesn’t allow the atoms any time to form an organized crystal, and thus
Q-carbon was born.
(left) Q-carbon formed by quenching supercooled liquid carbon, (right) a thread
of Q-carbon (white) ending at a crystal of conventional diamond.
Source: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4936595
Subsequent
characterization experiments revealed its surprising physical properties. Its
magnetic qualities solve an old mystery regarding carbon’s potential as a candidate
for ferromagnetism. Scientists had theoretically predicted it, but it had never
been experimentally verified until now. It is also suggested that because the
physical conditions necessary to produce it exist at the centers of many of our
solar system’s planets, it could potentially be responsible for their magnetic
fields.
The potential applications for this new material are as yet
largely unknown. In any case, its ability to transform into conventional
diamond through a second laser pulse is bound to be useful as it circumvents
the problems of current energy-intensive production methods. Further studies
will certainly need to be done before we can be sure that Q-carbon has
practical use, but if verified, the discovery could prove revolutionary for
technology and industry.
Written by: Aisling M Williams
References
Narayan, J.; Bhaumik, A. Novel Phase of Carbon, Ferromagnetism, and Conversion into Diamond. J. Appl. Phys. Journal of Applied Physics.Dec 2015, 118, 215303.
mrsciguy. "Supercooled Water". Online Video Clip. Youtube. 11 Feb 2016. Web. https://youtu.be/DpiUZI_3o8s
Simone Aloisio, PhD (right) with student researchers presenting his
project studying mercury levels in cigarettes.
Five chemistry research projects were represented by CSUCI
students this year at SCCUR.
The Southern California Conference for Undergraduate
Research is an interdisciplinary research conference showcasing the best
undergraduate research currently underway across California. The event includes
research from a wide variety of academic fields ranging from political science
and gender studies to ecology and physics.
Hosted on November 21st at
Harvey Mudd College, the conference attracted student representatives from
across the state. Among those in attendance were CSUCI science researchers
representing five projects carried out under the supervision of advisors Simone
Aloisio (pictured above), Ahmed Awad and Brittnee Veldman.
The event ran from 8 AM to 5 PM and opened with a keynote
address by Nadia Abuelezam, a Harvey Mudd alumni and Harvard graduate. Her talk
entitled Understanding the Global
HIV/AIDS Epidemic with (Sexy) Mathematical Models interspersed discussion of
the technical details of her research with the story of how she came to be
involved with it, along with pieces of advice she learned along the way.
A variety of student-led research presentations followed,
along with three independent poster sessions where rows of posters summarizing research
projects were showcased in the college’s Activity Center. Representatives from
each group stood by their posters to explain the details and answer the
questions of attendees.
The conference is a first for many of the students in attendance,
serving as valuable practice before they move on to present at larger national
events. Students gain insight into a wide variety of research projects along
with experience in public speaking and networking.
The interdisciplinary focus of the conference also provides
a unique opportunity for students to communicate across fields of study.
“A lot of Chemistry researchers were interested in our
poster,” said Angel Torres, whose research focuses on materials chemistry, “but
I feel like I got the most out of explaining the research to non-science
majors. They asked questions I wasn’t expecting which forced me to think about our
project differently. The process of trying to verbalize science concepts without
using jargon actually helped me understand them more clearly myself.”
A commonly-performed chemistry demonstration at W. T.
Woodson High left five students and a teacher injured on Friday morning after
the experiment started an out-of-control fire. All of the students’ injuries
were serious enough to warrant hospitalization, with two of the five being
transported by helicopter. One student is in critical condition.
The experiment in question, commonly referred to as “the
rainbow experiment”, is meant to show how the color of fire depends on the
compound undergoing combustion. Similar experiments are virtually ubiquitous in
high school level chemistry classes, with one even making an appearance in the
TV show Breaking Bad.
The exact cause of the accident is not known with certainty.
However, students present at the time of the accident describe the teacher “adding
more alcohol straight from the bottle” in an attempt to keep the reaction going
after the flame had begun to die down. Shortly thereafter, the students near
the front of the room were suddenly engulfed in flames. One student describes
it not as an explosion, but more of a “sideways fireball”.
Of the 31 students
and 2 teachers present, 5 students and one teacher were injured.
Following the accident, the school was evacuated. The fire
was still burning by the time firefighters arrived and had damaged 50% of the
room, but fortunately it was subdued before it spread further.
This is not the first time the rainbow fire experiment has
caused accidents. According to the American Chemical Society, the demonstration
should not be performed indoors. "These demonstrations present an
unacceptable risk of flash fires and deflagrations that can cause serious
injuries to students and teachers," the ACS said.
An extremely similar incident occurred in 2004. Once the
colored flame began to die down, the teacher attempted to add more fuel before
the small fire had completely gone out. That accident left a 15-year-old student
with burns to 40% of her body. The student in question describes her experience
in the video below.
The effort required to avoid this sort of accident is
minuscule, and yet it continues to occur year after year. This serves to
demonstrate the unfortunate reality that safety measures are often neglected at
every level of chemistry. When accidents are uncommon it is very easy for even
professionals to become complacent. Although it is vital to remain vigilant at
every level, it may be especially true for those teaching younger students. Demonstrations
at the elementary and high school levels are for more than sharing the beauty
of chemistry. They are also an opportunity to lead by example, and to instill
in students a healthy respect for the dangers involved.
Written by: Aisling Williams
Sources.
Jackman, T., Shapiro, T. R., and Brown, E. (2015) Six injured in chemistry classroom fire at Woodson High School in Fairfax. Washington Post. The Washington Post.
(2015) Chemistry Experiment Sparked Explosion in Va. High School. NBC4 Washington.
The steroid growth hormones given to cattle on factory farm
operations have long been of interest to environmental scientists. Because
these drugs pose the most serious risk to aquatic life, past studies have
focused mainly on their transport to bodies of water via surface runoff.
However, a recent study confirms the viability of a vector no one had ever
considered before – dust.
Researcher Brett Blackwell setting up monitoring equipment. Credit: Jerod Foster
Cattle given drugs such as steroids do not break them down
completely. The compounds are excreted in their manure, which can then dry and
be pulverized into airbourne dust.
Researcher Philip N. Smith, an ecotoxicologist at Texas
Tech, first considered the possibility when he was out duck hunting downwing
from a cattle feed yard. The dust in the air was so thick that it coated his
teeth, and he began to wonder what was in it. He and colleages at the Environmental
Protection Agency set up sampling equiptment at five feed yards in Texas and
Oklahoma, which remained collecting samples and taking measurements for two
years.
After analysis was complete, they determined that the most abundant
hormone was the estrogen 17α-estradiol, which appeared on 94% of filters
with a mean concentration of 21-ng/g particulate matter.
The biggest risk posed by such airbourne contaminants is to
aquatic life. The particles were large enough that people are unlikely to
inhale them, as they would not travel very far. Only those people working on
feedlots or living very nearby would be exposed to appreciable quantities, but
the health impacts of such exposures are not well-understood.
The largest feed yard in the study was found to emit 63 mg
of 17α-estradiol per day in dust alone. This amount is comparable to
what might be transported each day in runoff, making dust a significant source
of potential environmental harm.
By: Aisling Williams
Source
Lockwood, Deirdre. “Cattle Feed Yard Dust Can Transport
Steroids Into Environment.” Chemical & Engineering News: (2015) n. pag. 7
July. Web. 25 July 2015.
The European Space Agency’s comet lander Philae has successfully delivered a
long-anticipated data stream to Earth after several nerve-wracking months of
silence.
The dishwasher-sized lander, dispatched from the Rosetta
spacecraft which now orbits comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, landed rather
roughly on the surface back in 2014.Unfortunately, the machine unexpectedly settled
in a shadowy crater and ran out of power after 60 hours without sunlight to
charge its solar cells.
Because the comet has been moving nearer to the sun, the
lander may have been able to harness the increased solar energy and recharge
itself. The earthbound scientists at European Space Operations Centre in
Darmstadt, Germany, held their breath and powered up the lander’s listening
capabilities on March 12th.
A real-scale representation of the comet's size
compared to the city of Los Angeles.
On June 14th Philae’s message finally arrived,
indicating that it is in fact receiving power.
Rosetta is the first man-made object to orbit a comet, and Philae the first to land on one. The
mission promises to be rich with discoveries that will lend insight into many
unanswered questions about the natural world. Comets and other such deep-space
objects represent goldmines of information about the early universe and the
physical history of the solar system, and by extension the Earth and her human
inhabitants.
One such mystery that the mission hopes to investigate is
the relative abundance of left-handed chemical isomers in the biological world.
Many molecules come in mirror-image “versions” of one another. Despite being
composed of the same atoms, and those atoms being connected in identical ways,
they are physical reflections of each other and possess unique physical and
chemical properties. For reasons poorly-understood, biological systems overwhelmingly
favor the left- versions of molecules.
One theory proposed in 1983 posits that spiraling radiation
generated during supernovae is responsible. The polarization of the radiation
emitted during the collapse of primordial stars may have twisted those first
molecules into left-handed orientations, resulting in a dominance that we still
see today. If the preference for left- chirality is found to extend outside the
Earth biosphere, a cosmic origin would be the most reasonable explanation.
The lander possesses an array of cutting-edge scientific
instruments, including UV, visible and infrared spectrometers, remote imaging
systems, and radar.
One of the first images received by the lander revealed what appeared to be "sand dunes". The scale of this image is massive; the length of a human being would be represented as a single pixel.
The mission has already uncovered an abundance of
information about the comet. Although it is massive enough to have a
gravitational field, the rock is only about ¼ to 1/8 the volume of the object
that wiped out the dinosaurs. Its gravity, although strong enough to hold onto
the Rosetta orbiter, is incredibly weak. The escape velocity of the comet is
about 1/300,000th of Earth’s. In
simpler terms, if a person standing
on its surface jumped with the amount of force needed to reach one centimeter
from the ground on Earth, they would escape its gravity and float off into
space, never to return. If you stepped off of a chair on this comet, it would
take you a whole 1.3 minutes to eventually fall to the ground.
As it moves nearer the sun, the comet will heat up and begin
expelling dust and gas. This stream of detritus, when comets such as Philae’s
swing near enough to the sun, can become ionized by solar wind and produce the
luminous glowing tail which is visible from Earth. These mysterious streaks of
light have been objects of wonder since the dawn of human kind, and now through
the culmination of our thousands of years of scientific inquiry, we will for the
first time finally have the chance to reach across the vast gulf of the cosmos and touch one.
Written by Aisling Williams
Sources
Claudia. "The Sound of Touchdown." Web log post. ESA Blog. European Space Agency, 20 Nov. 2014. Web. 16 June 2015.
CSUCI students received national recognition this year at
the ACS meeting in Denver.
The American Chemical Society national meeting is one of the
largest scientific conferences of the year, representing over 10,000 topics
ranging from astronomy to zoology.
Members of the Free Radicals with
Phil Hampton Ph.D, the faculty advisor for the group
The CSUCI student chapter of the ACS, called the Free
Radicals, received an award in acknowledgement of their involvement in science
outreach programs, such as the annual Science Carnival, as well as
their high student participation.
Undergraduate involvement in research and in the scientific
community is a high priority for faculty at CSUCI. In order for students to get
a feel for how scientists work in the real world, it is imperative for them to
get a first-hand experience. Trips to meetings such as these are one of many
ways that this is accomplished.
The meeting mostly focuses on the original research of those
scientists in attendance. Presented on posters, in slideshows and in
presentations, attendees not only learn about the most cutting-edge research ongoing
today, but are given a chance to network with those conducting it.
Oscar Santillan, an undergraduate involved in research focused on
electrochemical materials, was one of the eight CI students in attendance. “The
topics I followed were chemistry of materials and electrochemistry. In
particular, the overlap of the two was of the greatest interest to me. They not
only covered topics I find deeply intriguing, but also did so with concision
and clarity.”
Corie Hill and Amber Kramer, seniors at CI, presented their
research on mercury concentrations in seafood.
“It was an incredibly valuable experience,” said Corie, “being
able to engage with chemistry from around the world, hear cutting edge chemistry
lectures and meeting other students who are at my level as well.”
“I took away how diverse and vast the field of
chemistry is. There are so many institutions that come together in the name of
chemistry: Industry, government and academia and everything in-between. ... It’s incredible to
see the level of detail put into the event.”
Besides serving as a window into the details of ongoing
research, the ACS meeting serves to broaden the scientific horizons of those in
attendance. Students may discover areas of study that they otherwise would
never have known about, and perhaps most importantly, meet and talk to the
people involved in those areas. Ultimately, science is a social undertaking,
and events such as these facilitate the meeting of minds and ideas, which
fosters the birth of insight so crucial to any scientific discipline.
