While I attempt to ease myself back into blogging, here’s a photo from a recent holiday. This sheep seems to be talking to us. Captions?
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Well last week was busy! National Science and Engineering week often falls at the wrong time in the academic year – middle of semester, surrounded by marking and other catastrophes. This year I’ve been fortunate to take part in two events, I’m a Scientist and Voice of the Future.
I will freely admit that I’ve been following the I’m A Scientist event for a couple of years now. I applied last March but wasn’t picked, couldn’t apply for the June one because I was 8 hours out of synch in Canada. In the middle of a particularly busy period earlier this year I updated my details and was delighted to be selected to take part in the Germanium Zone.
So what is I’m A Scientist? Basically it’s engaging with schools from the comfort of your office (or sofa). Scientists from all disciplines are split into zones and answer questions by school students and take part in live chats using chat room style software. It is amazing! Live chats are possibly the most overwhelming yet brilliant thing I’ve done in quite some time. The questions asked are on a huge variety of topics, but popular subjects include the end of the world, the beginning of the universe, stuff to do with research, general questions about what a scientist is/does and then the odd stuff…you know, things like whether its a good idea to eat Mentos and diet coke at the same time, or why bananas are yellow, or…well go look at the zone and see what we’ve answered. And the ‘Get Me Out Of Here’ bit? The school students vote for their favourite scientist in each zone and there are evictions each day this week starting tomorrow (nervously bites nails and looks twitchy).
I was fortunate to be invited by the Royal Society of Chemistry to attend the Voice of the Future Event at the Houses of Parliament last Wednesday. This event, for young scientists (I still qualify – yay!) and organised by the Society for Biology gave us the opportunity to quiz various MPs on issues related to science and technology in the UK. We were in Portcullis House, and while many of us were in the public gallery, some scientists were selected to sit in the seats usually reserved for the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee and ask questions of the witnesses called before the Committee. These witnesses included Rt. Hon. David Willets MP, Minister for Universities and Science; the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee; and Chi Onwurah MP, Shadow Minister for Innovation and Science. It was an absolutely fantastic opportunity to watch these MPs in action and to hear their responses to a huge range of questions submitted to the event. I suspect a longer blog post on some of the issues raised will be coming soon. My thanks must go to all the organizers and the RSC for the invitation.
Screenshot from www.thefreedictionary.com/MAD And I am angry. The link in this tweet set me off the other day. The article is about 10 fascinating and beautiful chemistry experiments, and it is safe to say that the execution of any of them is no cause to doubt someone’s mental stability.
The link in question is: http://www.neatorama.com/2009/11/04/top-10-mad-science-worthy-chemistry-experiments/ Example number 1 is the Briggs-Rauscher reaction, an elegant oscillating reaction that reveals its complexity through a number of repeating colour changes until one reagent is consumed. The other examples include wonderful demonstrations (mercury heart, elephant’s toothpaste, dry ice and magnesium) and other examples of chemistry such as flame tests and ferrofluid. For some reason I had forgotten that chemistry was the domain of the unpredictable and dangerous scientists, the mad scientists, and that any example of the subject that might interest or captivate anyone must be linked to mental illness. I’m not sure where the greater disservice lies, in the casual disrespect for very serious, life altering conditions, or the perpetuation of a lazy stereotype. In any case, it’s time to get a better vocabulary to describe science that we can’t easily explain, that may scare us a bit and that appears almost magical in effect. In case you were wondering, the images of mad scientists are pretty much widespread. I think we’ve talked about this before. http://www.possibilitiesendless.com/?p=835
I did have a passing interest in the first usage of the phrase ‘mad scientist’ so decided to use the Google Ngram Viewer to look it up.
http://books.google.com/ngrams/ search mad scientist. As you can see there are a a few mentions in books prior to 1940 then the usage takes off. I suspect that there are many reasons that this could be related to – improved media coverage, greater public awareness of science and scientific discoveries (now that could be ironic), and greater public awareness of the destructive power of some applications of scientific knowledge. The mad scientist image is extremely damaging, both for science in general, but for the participation of underrepresented groups as well and it takes a great deal of effort to counteract it (for example: http://ed.fnal.gov/projects/scientists/ ). Seriously, get a better stereotype.
Below I’ve listed the key chemicals or elements found in a commonly available product, which may (or may not) be slightly UK-centric. All chemicals drawn below are part of the same product. I’ve drawn the chemical structures of principal components where simple and appropriate; given the E number or CAS number (however tempting Sigma-Aldrich catalogue numbers would be) if no simple chemical structure exists for an additive; and given the chemical formulae or name if neither of the above make sense. See if you can guess what this is! If no one gets it within 24 hours, I will post a clue. If you guess on Twitter (@kjhaxton), please DM your guess so others can play.
If you’ve been reading here for a while, you’ll know that one of my projects is to work with the Blists Hill museum to identify the contents of jars in its Victorian Pharmacy. This is a fairly slow process, mainly due to the constraints of other pressing tasks such as teaching, but it is a fascinating process. The pharmacy exhibit has a number (in excess of 300) of jars of pharmaceutical ingredients of some description, mostly labelled but some are not. Over the years some of the contents have been replaced with innocuous chemicals such as sugar, table salt and coloured water or oils. This process has not been documented and so no one really knows what is the real thing (as labelled) and what is a substitute. Where do you start in this process? Well we started with a list of the labels on jars, then worked out which were full and which were empty. We set out to sample the jars over a period of time so that we could bring small quantities back to the lab to analyse. Some passed visual inspection, for example the copper sulfate looked like copper sulfate, others passed smell inspection such as oregano oil, but others give no clue to their identity by sight, smell or label. Where possible we start by comparing the substance to a modern day known sample. For example, we compared Pulv Rhei (rhubarb powder) to ground rhubarb (with sodium chloride to help break it down) and to oxalic acid by infra red spectroscopy. Yes, we put rhubarb on our ATR-IRs! (a specific type of infra red spectrometer) Or we compared the smell of rose water to a bottle of rose water swiped from my kitchen cupboard. If that doesn’t work, we try to figure out what it could be. In the case of Pulv. Rhei., the sample was a crystalline white solid, reminiscent of sugar or table salt. It was simple from there to perform a test to confirm the presence of sugar such as Benedict’s test or with Fehling’s solution. This can be verified by looking at the infrared spectrum, or grabbing a proton NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) for the high tech approach. The potential inorganic substances provide a slightly greater challenge. Obvious things such as pH for suspected solutions of acid work quite nicely but don’t tell the whole story. Precipitation reactions provide an elegantly old fashioned way to tackle the identification. The sample of interest at the moment is Hydrarg Ammonat., which has been identified by colleagues as ammoniated mercury, and not something we would desire as a remedy these days. It was (and from a quick internet search, may still be), used as a remedy for skin complaints when formulated with petroleum jelly or similar. Now clearly the high tech identification technique would be some kind of trace metal analysis, and I could dissolve up the sample and put it through the ICP-OES (inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectroscopy, determines type and concentration of metals). Instead, I’ve taken the more Victorian approach to the problem and gone for lo-tech precipitation reactions. The USP Monograph states a few tests that might be used to confirm the identity of ammoniated mercury (mercury (II) amidochoride: - formation of yellow colour on heating with 1N sodium hydroxyde, ammonia gas evolved - formation of red precipitate in warm acetic acid with potassium iodide added, residual solution forming white precipitate with silver nitrate. Well it turns out that the sample turns red with potassium iodide which I presume to be the formation of HgI2 which is a similar reaction to the one in this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFovlKpPCbI. As this sample is presumptive positive for mercury, I’ll be handling it with even more care and using the ICP-OES to confirm my ‘diagnosis’! Below I’ve listed the key chemicals or elements found in a commonly available product, which may (or may not) be slightly UK-centric. All chemicals drawn below are part of the same product. I’ve drawn the chemical structures of principal components where simple and appropriate; given the E number or CAS number (however tempting Sigma-Aldrich catalogue numbers would be) if no simple chemical structure exists for an additive; and given the chemical formulae or name if neither of the above make sense. See if you can guess what this is! If no one gets it within 24 hours, I will post a clue. If you guess on Twitter (@kjhaxton), please DM your guess so others can play.
 Photo by jo-h CC BY 2.0
Remember these? Or if you’re unfamiliar with the ‘flying saucers’ (hence a clue on Twitter: Fox Mulder’s favourite sweeties), they are essentially sherbet wrapped up in coloured rice paper (starch really). Sweeties is really a misnomer – in many cases the joy of sweets is the sourness, often caused by tartaric, citric or malic acid, and a fizz caused by a reaction between the acid, water (such as saliva or water if sherbet drink crystals), and some source of carbon dioxide such as a sodium bicarbonate. The carbon dioxide is produced in the reaction, giving that glorious bubbly sensation on your tongue. In the case of the ‘What Am I?’ below, tartaric acid and sodium bicarbonate and a bit of sucrose were wrapped up in a starchy wrapper of various colours. Sherbet comes in a variety of forms – soda crystals such as Creamola Foam (sadly no longer made under that name), the sherbet dib dab (a lolly for sticking into sherbet powder, Dumbledore’s favourite sherbet lemons (although I prefer the strawberry ones) and the sherbet fountain which I always found wonderful but for the vile licorice that came with it. I have to go now and teach some acid-base chemistry to some first year students, but perhaps I’ll see if any of them know of a common acid base reaction that goes on in their mouths when they eat sherbet sweeties…
Below I’ve listed the key chemicals or elements found in a commonly available product, which may (or may not) be slightly UK-centric. All chemicals drawn below are part of the same product. I’ve drawn the chemical structures of principal components where simple and appropriate; given the E number or CAS number (however tempting Sigma-Aldrich catalogue numbers would be) if no simple chemical structure exists for an additive; and given the chemical formulae or name if neither of the above make sense. See if you can guess what this is! If no one gets it within 24 hours, I will post a clue. If you guess on Twitter (@kjhaxton), please DM your guess so others can play.
  A while ago I wrote a blog post about a molecule I was particularly fond of as part of a chemistry meme (May 2010 http://www.possibilitiesendless.com/?p=186). I will not name the molecule for reasons that will become clear later. About 7 months later I noticed that my blog was getting a number of hits from people searching for the formula of the molecule in question, the synthesis and characterisation of which formed part of my laboratory course in spectroscopy. More to the point, those queries, coming from my university for the most part, were framed exactly like the questions that I’d written in the pre-laboratory exercise for the experiment. OK, so what’s the big deal? Student use search engines to look up information for assignments. Well, actually that is a big deal. Firstly the assignments in question were not about information retrieval from the internet, they were about using basic chemical skills and information that most students should know. Secondly, the information the students were seeking online was, at best trivial, at worst, demonstrating an alarming lack of effort or understanding on their part. It seemed to me as if I had set a question that was unreasonably difficult or that the students lacked the knowledge to answer it. That sound fair enough though, doesn’t it? People should be allowed to look hard stuff up online. Yes generally, but in this case the students had been supplied with a picture of the molecule (coloured ball and stick, with key to decipher the colours). The question was simply to write down its molecular formula. All that was required was to count the number of pink, purple, black, grey and blue balls in the picture and write them in the standard form. I decided to take some action. I searched for the name of the compound and realised that my original blog post was the number 1 hit. I created another blog post (October 2010: http://www.possibilitiesendless.com/?p=400) and gave some instructions on how to complete the task: “You have a picture of the molecule in your lab manuals, and also in colour on the [electronic] version of the lab manual. It may be old fashioned, but I suggest you try counting the atoms to try and figure out the formula”. This year has seen a massive increase in the number of hits to my blog searching for this compound and the range of queries has broadened from the one above to include almost all aspects of synthesising and characterising this material. I’m a little intrigued by the motivation of the students who do this. Are they simply looking for reassurances that their answers or interpretations of data are ‘correct’? Are they too lazy to think for themselves and looking for a source of information to reword as needed? Do they not understand aspects of the tasks and so need additional support? Is the lab manual unclear as to the requirements? Is it easier to search for data than to interpret it themselves? These questions form two broad categories, one in which the terms of the assignment are deficient, and one in which the deficit lies with the abilities and/or attitudes of the students. I should probably note at this point that I’m not seeking to criticise the students for using the internet to help with assignments, more to understand what motivates them to use it and to try to correct which ever deficit exists. If I could work out where the deficit lies, then I’ll be happy to start criticising. More broadly however, the chances of me noticing this kind of behaviour are quite slim. It is only because this experiment is not widely carried out in undergraduate laboratories that I even noticed the hits. My reasoning for this is simple: search for ‘synthesis of aspirin’ and have a look at the information available. No thinking required what so ever to produce a write up of that experiment, and it is even possible to download completed lab reports on the topic for modification. If we assume the behaviour I have observed is normal for our students and happens for most lab assignments then we should seriously consider the nature of those assignments. The key question should be: what percentage of lab marks in any given assignment can be achieved by sourcing information from the internet and regurgitating it into the report? What percentage of marks can be gained by simply recognising that a diagram or webpage contains the answer to the question and reformatting it? And if we want marks to be awarded for thinking and demonstrating understanding of the techniques and procedures involved, how do we encourage students to do so without help from the internet? It is clearly unnecessary for students to memorise vast quantities of facts in order to graduate. Information handling (retrieval, processing, whatever!) is a vital skill and one that graduates should be able to do, but not as a shortcut to avoid thinking or asking for appropriate help. I want to say something like ‘good students don’t google’ but I have no evidence to support the statement – I don’t know which students are doing it. For now I shall content myself with the notion that my lab assignment is not the synthesis of aspirin, that the quantity of information available on the internet is incredibly small for this particular experiment, and I shall bare this experience firmly in mind as I develop a couple of new experiments for next semester. I will be googling the questions as I set them and working out what percentage of marks will be available to reward that behaviour. It will be as low a percentage as I can possibly make it. University of Great Britian, Faculty of Physical Sciences: Course Proposal Form Proposed Title: FFS-101 Future for Scientists: Prognostication Purpose and Reason for Introduction: The purpose of this course is to equip students with the ability to predict the future using a variety of techniques and to appreciate the inherent error in such methods. This course has been introduced in response to requirements for academics to assess the National Importance of research work over a 10 – 50 year time span when applying for research grants from certain funding bodies. The course team realise that the existing physical sciences course lacks adequate training in prognostication and this course is therefore compulsory for all students wishing to pursue a career in academia. Intended Learning Outcomes: 1. Gain an appreciation for and describe a range of prognostication techniques available including, but not limited to: tarot card reading, astrology, hepatomancy (reading entrails), Mayan prophecy. 2. Understand, describe and explain the limitations of prognostication in the current research climate, and sources of major and minor errors such as climate change, changes in policy, and changes in Government. 3. Describe and explain the results of a prognostication activity with a specific research goal in mind in a written report of suitable format for inclusion into a research grant application. (Formative Assessment) 4. Successfully complete the outcomes of a practical course involving hands on experience of a variety of techniques* taught by academic staff and guest lecturers. Assessment: Formative Assessment: As per learning outcome 3. Students will receive feedback from staff 2 weeks in advance of the deadline for this assignment. Summative Assessment: 50 % final exam; 50% written report based on students own prediction of module grade using one or more of the techniques in the practical course.
*Please note that the hepatomancy class will be held in the afternoon, however due to the nature of the specimens under study, students are advised to avoid lunch, particularly processed meat products.
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