This article will be focusing on a very commonly used instrumentation, Liquid Chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS). Who wins in the battle between LC-QqQ, QTOF, TOF?
Category: General Interest
How much pesticides are in your food? – Sample preparation in a nutshell
How do we know we are safe with what we eat? Here, the authors introduce a fast and easy way to dig out the pesticides from our food for analysis.
“Chemical-free”
Here the authors describe all of the consumer products that are utterly and completely chemical-free. I hate to ruin the surprise, but their aren’t any.
Questions are raised about “unclick” reaction
Click chemistry, a term used to describe a number of high yield reactions, is used far and wide by chemists. The azide alkyne Huisgen cycloaddition typifies click chemistry and awhile back, I described it as my favorite reaction.
The survey results are in…
I found the results of the recent Astrobites graduate student life survey fascinating. Please take some time to read through the Astrobites article summarizing the results.
A Discussion about Graduate Student Life
A recent email has caused quite a buzz in the astronomy community. The email pertains to the expectations placed on graduate students. We are reminded that similar letters have been written in the chemistry community – see this post on Chemistry Blog. Our friends over at…
It is that time of year again…….
If you are thinking about applying to graduate school it is time to start on your applications! Please check out last year’s post for some helpful tips, including links to some very helpful and thorough articles – http://chembites.org/2011/09/29/applying-to-grad-school/ Good luck to everyone applying this year!
Ambient-Temperature Isolation of a Compound with a Boron-Boron Triple Bond
Title: Ambient-Temperature Isolation of a Compound with a Boron-Boron Triple Bond DOI: 10.1126/science.1221138 Author: Holger Braunschweig, Rian D. Dewhurst, Kai Hammond, Jan Mies, Krzysztof Radacki, Alfredo Vargas Journal: Science Affiliation: Institut für Anorganische Chemie, Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, Am Hubland, 97074 Würzburg, Germany Take-home Importance According to the Authors: Homoatomic triple…
Safety in Academic Labs
The Sheri Sangji case at UCLA is a horrible tragedy and confronts an uncomfortable topic for many chemists – safety in academic labs. Often with professors pushing students to complete work as fast as possible proper safety precautions are not taken, people are not trained well,…
Harry: Do you know my blood type?……………….. Riddle’s Diary: Yes
Paper-Based Blood Typing Device That Reports Patient’s Blood Type “in Writing” Li, M.; Tian, J.; Al-Tamimi, M.; Shen, W. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2012 …
Prettier than dyed eggs?
The cocoons, the silkworm itself, and the produced silk become colored when dye is incorporated into the silkworm feed. The concentration of dye in the produced silk changes based on how hydrophobic the dye is (increasing partition coefficient).
Update to “Women and Named Reactions”
Accounts of Chemical Research recently published some additions and corrections to their article “Named Reactions Discovered and Developed by Women.” They were informed of another reaction unambiguously named for a woman – the Catellani reaction. Prof. Marta Catellani of the University of Parma reported…
Online Resources for Doing Organic Chemistry
Yes!!! 100% conversion to product, zero impurities, and a workup so easy I finished it while writing this sentence!Well, that’s what writing it down on an o-chem problem set might make it seem like at least. Turns out doing organic chemistry in practice isn’t so straightforward,…
Reader Survey
Please help Chembites become a better resource by taking our Reader Survey! It should be quick (~5 min) and painless.
Your answers will help us develop our features, posts, and ultimately decide where Chembites goes in the future.
The Computer Chemist
Chemists have limited time to do chemistry because, shockingly, they need to eat, sleep, even socialize…. but computers on the other hand…
Copper (I) Hydroxide–Cuprice
Chemists probably would not willingly search for CuOH unless there is some theoretical basis for its existence. Without changing the oxidation states, a readied reaction could be 2 CuOH –> Cu2O + H2O. Its existence has been speculated on, now the really interesting work begins with the compound’s isolation (for a synthetic chemist).
Thinking about summer? Think about an REU!
I really can’t praise REU programs enough. You get paid (most programs give a stipend and pay for housing) for an amazing experience, both in terms of the research and the chance to travel to really interesting parts of the US and the world. And remember, if you are applying to grad school, undergraduate research is a necessity, so take advantage of these wonderful programs!
A Useful Tool for any Chemistry Student – Chemical Spell-Check Dictionary
If you write lab reports, papers, make posters, design presentations, or make any other sort of documentation with technical chemistry language, a recent article in the Journal of Chemical Education will be of interest to you. Adam Azman of Butler University has developed a spell-check dictionary…
Controlling Nanoscale Architecture – Stepping Towards Synthetic Light Harvesting Complexes
Title: Anisotropic Organization and Microscopic Manipulation of Self-Assembling Synthetic Porphyrin Microrods That Mimic Chlorosomes: Bacterial Light-Harvesting Systems Journal of the American Chemical Society Authors: Chappaz-Gillot, C., Marek, P. L., Blaive, B. J., Canard, G., Bürck, J., Garab, G., Hahn, H., Jávorfi, T., Kelemen, L., Krupke, R., Mössinger, D., Ormos,…
The ChemCam Instrument Suite on the Mars Science Laboratory Rover Curiosity: Remote Sensing by Laser-Induced Plasmas
Title: The ChemCam Instrument Suite on the Mars Science Laboratory Rover Curiosity: Remote Sensing by Laser-Induced Plasmas Authors: Wiens, R. C., S. Maurice, and the ChemCam Team Journal: Geochemical News Affiliations: Los Alamos National Laboratory (USA), Institute de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planetologie (France) Take Home Importance According to Authors: The ChemCam…
Thanksgiving chemistry- cranberries and your blood
To do the biological study of how particular (good) chemicals like antioxidants affect people, there needs to be a quick, reliable, and consistent way to measure those chemicals in humans. Furthermore, a good method would test for multiple chemicals, because the health benefits from some chemicals only exist in the presence of others (phenolic acids and flavonoids in this case). The authors of this paper demonstrate a gas-chromatography mass-spectrometry (GC-MS) method to investigate how some of the chemicals present in cranberries (from cranberry juice) go into your bloodstream after you ingest them.
Continuous in situ generation and reaction of phosgene in a microflow system
Title: Continuous in situ generation and reaction of phosgene in a microflow system Authors: Shinichiro Fuse, Nobutake Tanabe, and Takashi Takahashi* Journal: Chemical Communications Affiliation: Department of Applied Chemistry, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japan. Take-Home Importance according to the Authors: Continuous in situ generation of…
Stand with Science
MIT news has a very interesting article this week about a student group at MIT, the Science Policy Initiative, that has started a petition to Congress asking to avoid cutting federal funding for R&D. I encourage everyone to take a look at the petition. I personally believe that…
Chemistry Blog Carnival!
I’m sorry it took me so long to get a post out on this, but the good people at the IYC Blog (part of the C&EN family) put together a wonderful post about all of the Chemistry Blog Carnival submissions – http://cenblog.org/iyc-2011/2011/10/favorite_reactions_chemistry_blogging_carnival/ As you may remember I…
Shechtman’s quasicrystals win this year’s nobel prize
Title: Metallic Phase with Long-Range Orientational Order and No Translational Symmetry Authors: D. Shechtman, I. Blech1, D. Gratias2, and J. W. Cahn3 Journal: Physical Review Letters Affiliations: 1Department of Materials Engineering, Israel Institute of Technology Technion, 3200 Haifa, Israel. 2Centre d’Etudes de Chimie Metallurgique, Centre National de la Recherche Scientiftque,…