Major: Biochemistry/Biology
Hometown: Rochester, MN
Plans after Graduation: working in the endocrine research lab at the Mayo Clinic
Research Project: The effects of Boswellic Acid Capsules on Anxiety Levels in Mus Musculus
Favorite Chemistry Memories: The fall 2007 p-chem class when students had a mass rebellion, totem pole, Dr. Kugel the Kugar...
SMU Activites: president of the chemistry club, member TriBeta, member biology club, member math club, member physics club
Honors: 2009 AIC chemistry award, 2007 Brother Charles Ambrose Scholarship
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Senior Focus: Bethany Kaufmann
Major: Biochemistry / Medical Technology
Hometown: Green Bay, WI
Plans After Graduation: Clinical Laboratory Science Program at the Mayo School of Health Sciences
Research Project: Analysis of lysozyme Yield and Purification in Gel-Filtration Chromatography
Favorite Chemistry Memory: Attending the National ACS conference meeting in Salt Lake City and Analytical Chemistry Labs on the weekend.
SMU Activities: member of chemistry club, member of TriBeta, member of varsity soccer team, executive board member of habitat for humanity, chemistry tutor
Honors: 2009 AIC Biochemistry Award
Hometown: Green Bay, WI
Plans After Graduation: Clinical Laboratory Science Program at the Mayo School of Health Sciences
Research Project: Analysis of lysozyme Yield and Purification in Gel-Filtration Chromatography
Favorite Chemistry Memory: Attending the National ACS conference meeting in Salt Lake City and Analytical Chemistry Labs on the weekend.
SMU Activities: member of chemistry club, member of TriBeta, member of varsity soccer team, executive board member of habitat for humanity, chemistry tutor
Honors: 2009 AIC Biochemistry Award
JOKES...
What is a chemistry student's favorite bond?
A weekend bond.....
Submitted by Tom Breise and John Nolte
A weekend bond.....
Submitted by Tom Breise and John Nolte
Alumni Update: Joe Flynn
Update from Joe Flynn at 2008 graduate of SMU
"I am currently in Albany, NY serving as a Lasallian Volunteer (LV) and while I'm here I'm working at the La Salle School for Boys. La Salle School is a large, residential and community based child welfare agency. the school serves court adjudicated youth. Some students live on the premises while others commute from home, the boys are ages 10-21. My job is to help them imporve their self-esteem and coping skills. This population is very challenging, but is also one of the most rewarding group of young men with which to work.
As a volunteer here I live on site and coordinate indoor/outdoor recreation & Campus Ministry programs for the trouble youth who reside at the school. I use Campus Ministry and Recreation as gateways to provide the boys with a wide range of religious, service and recreational services. The boys at La Salle are at the core of St. La Salle's teachings and at the heart of the Christian Brothers' mission. These are the boys 'whom no one heard when they cried.' They are the oucasts whom most of society and sometimes even their parents do not want to work with and would rather discard.
My time spent in Albany has been very eye opening. The boys I work with have never really been given a chance. Few have had any guidance to help them do what is right. These boys need someone thy can rely on and trust. That has been my main goal while serving them, to be a figure of consistent support. I know I have to come back everyday no matter how hard the day before was, these boys have been given up on most of their short lives, so for us to make a difference we need to be there for them.
I am one of 56 volunteers who is serving throughout the United States (from Rhode Island to Oregon). Every volunteer works directly with the poor, using education as their main tool to guide young people to a more promising life.
That is what I am doing!!! For hobbies I am doing a lot of running, seeing as much of the East coast as I can, and showing visitors around when they come to see me."
"I am currently in Albany, NY serving as a Lasallian Volunteer (LV) and while I'm here I'm working at the La Salle School for Boys. La Salle School is a large, residential and community based child welfare agency. the school serves court adjudicated youth. Some students live on the premises while others commute from home, the boys are ages 10-21. My job is to help them imporve their self-esteem and coping skills. This population is very challenging, but is also one of the most rewarding group of young men with which to work.
As a volunteer here I live on site and coordinate indoor/outdoor recreation & Campus Ministry programs for the trouble youth who reside at the school. I use Campus Ministry and Recreation as gateways to provide the boys with a wide range of religious, service and recreational services. The boys at La Salle are at the core of St. La Salle's teachings and at the heart of the Christian Brothers' mission. These are the boys 'whom no one heard when they cried.' They are the oucasts whom most of society and sometimes even their parents do not want to work with and would rather discard.
My time spent in Albany has been very eye opening. The boys I work with have never really been given a chance. Few have had any guidance to help them do what is right. These boys need someone thy can rely on and trust. That has been my main goal while serving them, to be a figure of consistent support. I know I have to come back everyday no matter how hard the day before was, these boys have been given up on most of their short lives, so for us to make a difference we need to be there for them.
I am one of 56 volunteers who is serving throughout the United States (from Rhode Island to Oregon). Every volunteer works directly with the poor, using education as their main tool to guide young people to a more promising life.
That is what I am doing!!! For hobbies I am doing a lot of running, seeing as much of the East coast as I can, and showing visitors around when they come to see me."
Alumni Update: DJ Prideaux
Just heard from D.J. Prideaux a 2008 SMU graduate. He is currently working at Ecolab. Some of his projects are formulating a low cost detergent which will be launched in 2011 and another is a disruptive technology which changes the water chemistry so a water softener doesn't need to be used. D.J just moved in an apartment in St. Paul and will start his Master of Business degree at St. Thomas University in the fall.
Alumni Update: Katie Flynn
Just heard from Katie Flynn a 2008 SMU graduate, " I am currently finishing up my first year in the Masters program at DePaul University in Chicago. I have a graduate assistantship with the Chemistry Department. This quarter I taught an Organic Chemistry II lab which is a polymer synthesis lab and a non-majors lab class (a lot like our World of Materials class). I am also conducting research with the faculty polymer chemist here. In this lab we synthesize tri-substituted ethylenes and copolymerize them with 4-flurostyrene. I am also part of a collaboration research project with the Art Institute of Chicago. We received paint samples from the art institute and are conducting thermal analysis (TGA and DSC) on these samples."
Alumni Update: Mike Mulholland
Just heard from Mike - a 2008 graduate of SMU. He is finishing up his first year at NDSU, working for the Rasmussen group on low band-gap materials.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Chemistry Night 2008
As a celebration of National Chemistry Week, the Saint Mary's University Chemistry Department held its annual Chemistry Night on October 23rd and 30th. We had a full house on both evenings with 45 high school students participating and over 20 SMU students assisting. The following schools had students attend: Winona Senior High School, Lewiston-Altura High School, John Marshall High School, Cochrane-Fountain City High School, Cotter High School, LaCrescent High School, Lourdes High School and Westby High School.
Students had the opportunity, working in teams of three, to solve chemical problems with the theme, "Having a Ball with Chemistry", a theme based on chemistry and sports during this Olympic year. The students were able to have hands-on exposure to various wet chemistry and chemical instrumentation, as well as seeing some wild chemical demonstrations (lots of explosions and excitement). Saint Mary's chemistry students assisted the high school students as they tried to solve each of the challenging problems.
Our SMU professors developed a storyline in which the hig school students were investigators that were hired by an athlete advisory commission to investigate and solve the following problems:
1. Use infrared spectroscopy to identify materials used for sports activities and facilities.
2. Analyze several sport drinks and types of water for an estimate of their electrolyte content, and then quantitatively measure certain electrolyte ion concetration.
3. Understand what cross-linking does to the properties of superballs and make a ball that has the highest bounce.
4. Determine if "urine" samples give evidence of anti-doping behavior.
5. Determine if "urine" samples have surpassed the caffeine limit by quantifying the amount of caffeine in samples by UV-VIS spectroscopy.
6. Determine the iron intake of a breakfast food product using the technique of FAAS (flame atomic absorption spectroscopy)
After completeing all of the experiments, the students were treated to wonderful demonstrations put together by the Saint Mary's Physical Chemistry Class. The evening concluded with desserts, conversation, and awards. This year the 1st place winners received a $2000 scholarship for each year they attend SMU, 2nd place winners received a $1000 scholarship for the same duration and 3rd place winners received a $500 scholarship for the same duration.
For the night of October 23rd, first place was awarded to Cochrane-Fountain City H.S.: Ben Suhr, Colin Markowitz, and Jim Joswick. Second place was awarded to Lourdes H.S.: Minh Nguyen, Katherine Kelsey, and Morgan Rea. Third place was awarded to LaCrescent H.S.: Karly Rasmusson, Josh Bear and Nathan Ferrier.
For the night of October 30th, first place was awarded to Lewiston-Altura H.S.: Landon Clark, Joe McMartin, and Matt Schultz. Second place was awarded to Winona Senior H.S.: Isabella Albright and Olivia Eckolf. Third place was awarded to John Marshal H.S.: Julia Lee, Matt Thielen, and Rachel Tamminga.
The Chemistry Department wishes to thank the LaCrosse/Winona ACS Local Section and the Fugere Family Foundation for their generous support of Chemistry Night. We all look forward to next year's National Chemistry Week theme, "Chemistry - It's Elemental!"
Students had the opportunity, working in teams of three, to solve chemical problems with the theme, "Having a Ball with Chemistry", a theme based on chemistry and sports during this Olympic year. The students were able to have hands-on exposure to various wet chemistry and chemical instrumentation, as well as seeing some wild chemical demonstrations (lots of explosions and excitement). Saint Mary's chemistry students assisted the high school students as they tried to solve each of the challenging problems.
Our SMU professors developed a storyline in which the hig school students were investigators that were hired by an athlete advisory commission to investigate and solve the following problems:
1. Use infrared spectroscopy to identify materials used for sports activities and facilities.
2. Analyze several sport drinks and types of water for an estimate of their electrolyte content, and then quantitatively measure certain electrolyte ion concetration.
3. Understand what cross-linking does to the properties of superballs and make a ball that has the highest bounce.
4. Determine if "urine" samples give evidence of anti-doping behavior.
5. Determine if "urine" samples have surpassed the caffeine limit by quantifying the amount of caffeine in samples by UV-VIS spectroscopy.
6. Determine the iron intake of a breakfast food product using the technique of FAAS (flame atomic absorption spectroscopy)
After completeing all of the experiments, the students were treated to wonderful demonstrations put together by the Saint Mary's Physical Chemistry Class. The evening concluded with desserts, conversation, and awards. This year the 1st place winners received a $2000 scholarship for each year they attend SMU, 2nd place winners received a $1000 scholarship for the same duration and 3rd place winners received a $500 scholarship for the same duration.
For the night of October 23rd, first place was awarded to Cochrane-Fountain City H.S.: Ben Suhr, Colin Markowitz, and Jim Joswick. Second place was awarded to Lourdes H.S.: Minh Nguyen, Katherine Kelsey, and Morgan Rea. Third place was awarded to LaCrescent H.S.: Karly Rasmusson, Josh Bear and Nathan Ferrier.
For the night of October 30th, first place was awarded to Lewiston-Altura H.S.: Landon Clark, Joe McMartin, and Matt Schultz. Second place was awarded to Winona Senior H.S.: Isabella Albright and Olivia Eckolf. Third place was awarded to John Marshal H.S.: Julia Lee, Matt Thielen, and Rachel Tamminga.
The Chemistry Department wishes to thank the LaCrosse/Winona ACS Local Section and the Fugere Family Foundation for their generous support of Chemistry Night. We all look forward to next year's National Chemistry Week theme, "Chemistry - It's Elemental!"
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