This blog lists that research that I have conducted as a part of the Bradley Research Group in the Chemistry Department at Drexel University and documents significant events in my young career as a scientist. I am participating in the Open Notebook Science Challenge for which I am performing experiments to measure the solubility of certain compounds (ex. carboxylic acids) in organic solvents. One of the goals of this challenge is to promote transparency in the scientific process. Every reported scientific finding is only as reliable or as meaningful as the steps incorporated to obtain that finding. This challenge requires that a detailed log of all steps completed in the experiment be recorded and posted in order that anyone attempting to repeat the experiment or desiring to better understand the meaning of the reported result is able to observe exactly what steps were carried out. From these solubility experiments, mathematical models are built to predict solubility. These models are used to choose recrystallization solvents and plan synthesis reactions. The products of these reactions are investigated as potential treatments for various diseases such as cancer and malaria.

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

244th American Chemical Society National Meeting and Exposition

From August 19-23, 2012, the 244th National ACS Meeting was held in Philadelphia, PA.  Due to the close location to Drexel's campus, I was able to attend and present at this conference.

On the 19th, I attend a few sessions on applying to graduate school and other sessions covering different subjects in the field of chemistry.  In the afternoon, I presented an 8 minute presentation for the CINFlash session.  This presentation examined errors and missing information that effects literature in the field of chemistry.  The slides for this presentation can be found on slideshare.

On Monday, the 20th, I attended the Open Notebook Science/Open Chemistry/Electronic Lab Notebook sessions organized by my mentor, Dr. Jean-Claude Bradley.  During the afternoon session, I presented a 25 minute oral presentation.  This presentation covered the advantages of being an undergraduate student in a research group that utilized Open Notebook Science, and how to use solubility tools to choose a recrystallization solvent and to plan a reaction synthesis.  The slides for this presentation can be found on slideshare.  The video of this presentation (screen capture with audio) is here:


All in all, I greatly enjoyed the time I spent at the ACS meeting and attended many interesting sessions that revealed to me that there is an infinite number of ways to use chemistry to better the world.  
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