SOUTHWEST RETORT
SEVENTY-SIXTH YEAR
February 2024
Published for the advancement of Chemists, Chemical Engineers and Chemistry in this area published by The Dallas-Fort Worth Section, with the cooperation of five other local sections of the American Chemical Society in the Southwest Region.
Vol. 76(6) February 2024 Editorial and Business Offices: Contact the Editor for subscription and advertisement information. Editor: Connie Hendrickson: retort@acsdfw.org Copy and Layout Editor: Lance Hughes: hugla64@gmail.com Business Manager: Martha Gilchrist: Martha.Gilchrist@tccd.edu The Southwest Retort is published monthly, September through May, by the Dallas-Ft. Worth Section of the American Chemical Society, Inc., for the ACS Sections of the Southwest Region.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS ARTICLES and COLUMNS Letter from the Editor…..…..……..............17 And Another Thing…………………...….....6 NEWS SHORTS A sleeker facial recognition technology tested
on Michelangelo’s David…....…..……..….5
A non-allergenic wheat protein for growing better cultivated meat………….....……..…..8 Lighting up Alzheimer’s-related proteins to allow for earlier disease detection……………..….......9
Puffed-up MOFs for improved drug delivery ...………………………………………….....11 Using magnetized neurons to treat Parkinson’s disease symptoms…..……………….12 Microplastics from natural fertilizers are blowing in the wind more often than once thought……..……….....……..…………….13 ANNOUNCEMENTS ACSDFW Trivia Night…..……………...….7 Meeting in Miniature……………….……..10
Contact the DFW Section General: info@acsdfw.org Education: ncw@acsdfw.org Elections: candidates@acsdfw.org Facebook: DFWACS Twitter: acsdfw
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AROUND THE AREA UT Dallas INDEX OF ADVERTISERS Huffman Laboratories……………..….........3 TMJ Data Entry and Editing.……….......…3 ANA-LAB…………………………...…..…..4
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February 2024
Chair – Rajani Srinivasan Chair-Elect – Denise Merkle Past Chair – Mihaela C. Stefan Treasurer – Martha Gilchrist Secretary – Trey Putnam Councilor – Kirby Drake Councilor – Rebecca Weber Councilor- Mary Anderson Councilor – Linda Schulz Alternate Councilors– Daniela Hutanu Michael Bigwood Danny Tran
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DOCUMENT TITLE
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From the ACS Press Room A sleeker facial recognition technology tested on Michelangelo’s David “Metasurface- and PCSEL-Based Structured Light for Monocular Depth Perception and Facial Recognition” Nano Letters Many people are familiar with facial recognition systems that unlock smartphones and game systems or allow access to our bank accounts online. But the current technology can require boxy projectors and lenses. Now, researchers report in ACS’ Nano Letters a sleeker 3D surface imaging system with flatter, simplified optics. In proof-of-concept demonstrations, the new system recognized the face of Michelangelo’s David just as well as an existing smartphone system. 3D surface imaging is a common tool used in smartphone facial recognition, as well as in computer vision and autonomous driving. These systems typically consist of a dot projector that conA new lens-free and compact system for tains multiple compofacial recognition scans nents: a laser, lenses, a a bust of Michelangelo’s David and recon- light guide and a diffracstructs the image using tive optical element less power than exist(DOE). The DOE is a ing 3D surface imaging systems. Adapted from special kind of lens that Nano Letters, 2024, breaks the laser beam inDOI: 10.1021/ to an array of about acs.nanolett.3c05002 32,000 infrared dots. So, when a person looks at a locked screen, the facial recognition system projects an array of dots onto most of their face, and the device’s camera reads the pattern created to confirm the identity. However, dot projector systems February 2024
are relatively large for small devices such as smartphones. So, Yu-Heng Hong, HaoChung Kuo, Yao-Wei Huang and colleagues set out to develop a more compact facial recognition system that would be nearly flat and require less energy to operate. To do this, the researchers replaced a traditional dot projector with a low-power laser and a flat gallium arsenide surface, significantly reducing the imaging device’s size and power consumption. They etched the top of this thin metallic surface with a nanopillar pattern, which creates a metasurface that scatters light as it passes through the material. In this prototype, the low-powered laser light scatters into 45,700 infrared dots that are projected onto an object or face positioned in front of the light source. Like the dot projector system, the new system incorporates a camera to read the patterns that the infrared dots created. In tests of the prototype, the system accurately identified a 3D replica of Michelangelo’s David by comparing the infrared dot patterns to online photos of the famous statue. Notably, it accomplished this using five to 10 times less power and on a platform with a surface area about 230 times smaller than a common dot-projector system. The researchers say their prototype demonstrates the usefulness of metasurfaces for effective small-scale low-power imaging solutions for facial recognition, robotics and extended reality. The authors acknowledge funding from Hon Hai Precision Industry, the National Science and Technology Council in Taiwan, and the Ministry of Education in Taiwan.
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And Another Thing...Swift Effects February 6, 2024 Denise Lynn Merkle, PhD dmerkle@sciconsult.com Super Bowl LVIII kicks off on Sunday, February 11, 2024. The San Francisco 49ers will vie against the Kansas City Chiefs for world domination - or at least the right to enjoy a festive parade and be touted as Champions for a year. This year, however, what we really have is Taylor Swift vs all those people the world has no desire to identify.
According to multiple public sources1, Swift was born on December 13, 1989. When she was 14, her parents moved to Nashville to help further her musical goals, and by 2006, she had released a single, 'Tim McGraw'. At the age when many teens are trying to decide what college to attend, what to major in, if eating Tide pods is a good idea, or whether to embark on more schooling all, Taylor Swift was enjoying (or so one hopes), her debut album's spot on the US Billboard 200 chart. It peaked at #5. Whether a Swiftie or not (if you are one, you know), one can surely appreciate dedication to career and consistent adherence to defined principles - especially if it takes great courage and determination to power on through. Throughout what could be described as a meteoric career, Swift's dedication to both art and ethos has been unfailing - and supremely successful. Swifties are so numerous that Forbes published an article on their demographics in the USA.2 You don't hear much about fan bases after Nobel laureates are announced, nor are most scientific publications shared on media platforms around the world. Imagine how cool that would be, to buckle into your Electric Vehicle or your hot Subaru and be serenaded with your favorite celebrity's voice, reading in appealing tones, 'The Discovery & Character of Transposable Elements: The Collected Papers (1938-1984) of Barbara McClintock'3 Life wouldn't get any better than that, I tell ya. You'd miss your exit over the thrill of the observation of the phenotype resultant from the first transposon (I'm actually not joking). Comparative performance aside, in early 2024, at 34 years old, Taylor Swift's net worth is estimated to be $1.1B. Her contribution to the National Football League -aka the Taylor Swift effect- impacts just about every aspect of the NFL: purchased tickets, TV viewership, designers' followers, digital and print media, purchase of merchandise -whatever. Revenue increases of ~$331.5 x106 USD have been realized so far. 4 Much of the press, of course, focuses not on Ms. Swift's stunning career, but on her relationship 5, but the results of her mere presence at football games are staggering - and have afforded an even wider platform for her music - and her causes. Oh, Taylor. Why couldn't you date a Climate Scientist6?
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1) a google search for Taylor Swift took 0.38seconds and yielded 758 x 10 6 hits. No, i didn't check them all for accuracy. 2) https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisadellatto/2023/03/14/more-than-half-of-us-adults-say -theyre-taylor-swift-fans-survey-finds/?sh=1ecf327e6877 3) https://www.routledge.com/The-Discovery--Character-of-Transposable-Elements-TheCollected-Papers/McClintock/p/book/9780824013912 4) https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nfl/news/taylor-swift-how-much-money-revenue-nflchiefs/569936c7a2bdc0a2930d6129 5) https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/08/arts/music/taylor-swift-travis-kelce-timeline.html 6) This is not an original thought - and I don't know where I saw it first, but, you know, really. Why not science?
Eventbrite registration link: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/science-trivia-night-acsdfws-february -2024-zoom-meeting-tickets-824944811137?aff=oddtdtcreator
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From the ACS Press Room
A non-allergenic wheat protein for growing better cultivated meat “Cultivated Meat from Aligned Muscle Layers and Adipose Layers Formed from Glutenin Films”
David Kaplan and colleagues wanted to develop plant-based films with it to grow textured muscle cells and fatty layers.
The researchers As the world’s population increases, cultivat- isolated ed or lab-grown meat — animal muscle and glutenin fat cells grown in laboratory conditions — from wheat has emerged as a potential way to satisfy fu- gluten and ture protein needs. And edible, inexpensive formed flat plant proteins could be used to grow these and ridgecell cultures. Now, researchers in ACS Bio- patterned materials Science & Engineering report that films. Then the non-allergenic wheat protein glutenin they depossuccessfully grew striated muscle layers and ited mouse By putting ridges in a plant protein that base, cultured muscle cells grew in a flat fat layers, which could be combined to cells pattern that mimics the alignment of develop into muscle fibers in animals. Adapted from produce meat-like textures. ACS Biomaterials Science & EngineerCultured cells need a base or scaffold to ad- skeletal ing 2024, DOI: 10.1021/ here to produce lab-grown meat. Plant pro- muscle onto acsbiomaterials.3c01500 teins are appealing candidates for the scaf- the protein folds because they are edible, abundant and bases and incubated the cell-covered films inexpensive. Previous researchers showed for two weeks. Cells grew and proliferated that a plant-based film made of glutenin was on both flat and ridged films. As expected, a successful base to cultivate cow skeletal compared to cells grown on control films muscle cells. But for this technique to pro- made of gelatin, the performance of the duce a promising meat-like alternative, the glutenin-based films was inferior but suffimuscle cells need to form aligned fibers, sim- cient. The researchers say further work needs ilar to the texture in real tissues. Additionally, to be done to improve how cells attach to the fat needs to be included in the 3D structure to plant-based film to get closer to the growth replicate the composition of traditional meat on the animal-derived biomaterial. During products. To take advantage of using gluten- the second week of the culture, the cells on in, a protein in gluten that people with celiac the patterned film formed long parallel bundisease or a gluten sensitivity don’t typically dles, recreating the fiber structure of animal react to, Ya Yao, John Yuen, Jr., Chunmei Li, Continued on page 14 ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering
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From the ACS Press Room Lighting up Alzheimer’s-related proteins to allow for earlier disease detection “A Coumarin-based Array for the Discrimination of Amyloids” ACS Sensors Many neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, are difficult to diagnose before symptoms begin to appear. However, disease-related biomarkers such as aggregated proteins called amyloids could provide important insight much earlier, if they can be readily detected. Researchers publishing in ACS Sensors have developed one such method using an array of sensor molecules that can light up amyloids. The tool could help monitor disease progression or distinguish between different amyloidrelated conditions. Neurodegenerative diseases typically involve a breakdown of communication within the brain that is often caused by “sticky” clumps of misfolded proteins called amyloids that interrupt signal transfer. These amyloids are thought to be closely related to the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, so they could be used as a means of early diagnosis to expand treatment options. Currently, radioimaging techniques including positron emission tomography (PET) scans can detect amyloids, but these methods rely on sophisticated equipment and typically focus on one of several amyloids involved in the disease. Instead, fluorescence imaging techniques have been explored as a simpler, yet still sensitive, means of detecting multiple specific amyloids. So, Margaret Sunde, Elizabeth New, Amandeep Kaur and colleagues wanted to develop a fluorescent sensor array for amFebruary 2024
yloids to monitor Alzheimer’s and other disease progression and to distinguish these atypical amyloids from similar, naturally occurring amyloid-forming proteins. The team combined five coumarin-based molecular probes, each of which fluoresced to a different degree when it encountered the amyloids, into a sensor array. However, the team found that using just two of the probes with the strongest fluorescence responses still offered a high level of sensitivity and an identifiable fluorescent “fingerprint” for the individual amyloids. The two-probe array was added to a sample mixture mimicking biological fluids containing moleAmyloids, shown here surrounding a cules that could brain cell, can be easily lit up and detected using a new fluorescent sen- potentially insor array. Signal Scientific Visuals/ terfere with Shutterstock.com sensing. Regardless, the array maintained a high sensitivity and selectivity. Its performance was also tested on samples taken from the brains of mouse models of Alzheimer’s. The team observed that the fluorescence patterns differed between early (at age 6 months) and later (at age 12 months) stages of the disease. Additionally, a unique fluorescence fingerprint was generated for three amyloids typically involved in Alzheimer’s, another disease-associated amyloid and five naturally occurring “functional amyloids” not involved Continued on page 14
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From the ACS Press Room
Puffed-up MOFs for improved drug delivery “Performance of MIL-101(Cr) and MIL101(Cr)-Pore Expanded as Drug Carriers for Ibuprofen and 5‑Fluorouracil Delivery”
carry and deliver even more drug molecules, the pores would need to expand further than current versions can. A research team led by Fateme Rezaei at the University of Miami ACS Applied Bio Materials wanted to optimize an existing MOF and imThe spongelike structure of metal organic prove the polymer’s delivery of two common frameworks (MOFs) allows these polymers therapeutics of different molecular sizes: the to possibly carry and deliver a range of thera- anti-inflammatory drug ibuprofen and a peutic compounds. Now, researchers report- smaller compound 5-fluorouracil, a chemoing in ACS Applied Bio Materials treated a therapy drug used to treat cancer. chromium-containing MOF with a dose of They started with an established method to acetic acid, more concentrated than in vine- synthesize a biocompatible chromiumgar, to expand its pore size and surface area. containing MOF and added a step with an The puffed-up MOFs held more ibuprofen or acetic acid rinse. The acid caused the chemotherapy drug compared to the original polymer’s pores to expand from about 2.5 version and had improved performance as a nanometers (nm) to 5 nm wide. In laboratory experiments to characterize the MOF’s drugpotential drug-delivery vehicle. Taking medications by loading capability, the researchers observed mouth is a convenient that the puffed-up version took in more ibuway to administer phar- profen and 5-fluorouracil molecules than the maceuticals. However, chromium-containing framework with standthis method sometimes ard-sized pores. Then, in drug-delivery exinvolves ingesting sev- periments, they loaded the pore-expanded eral pills per day, or re- and standard MOFs with either ibuprofen or 5-flurouracil and measured how quickly the Increasing the pore size of quires large pills that this chromium-containing can be difficult to swal- drugs passed into a saline solution. Rezaei MOF improved its ability low. So, researchers are and colleagues found that the new frameto carry and deliver two common drugs: ibuprofen investigating how to works released both drugs substantially faster and 5-fluorouracil. use MOFs for drug de- than the original ones. The researchers atFateme Rezaei livery to minimize dos- tributed the higher drug loading and release ing frequency and maximize treatment effi- rates to the larger pores and surface area of ciency. By customizing the polymers’ pore the expanded framework, which provides sizes and structures, scientists have created larger “doors” for the drug molecules to enter nanoscale vehicles that may offer more con- and exit through. trolled and targeted drug release. However, to
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From the ACS Press Room
Using magnetized neurons to treat Parkinson’s disease symptoms “Nanoscale Magneto-Mechanical-Genetics of Deep Brain Neurons Reversing Motor Deficits in Parkinsonian Mice” Nano Letters Electrical deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a well-established method for treating disordered movement in Parkinson’s disease. However, implanting electrodes in a person’s brain is an invasive and imprecise way to stimulate nerve cells. Researchers report in ACS’ Nano Letters a new application for the technique, called magnetogenetics, that uses very small magnets to wirelessly trigger specific, gene-edited nerve cells in the brain. The treatment effectively relieved motor symptoms in mice without damaging surrounding brain A wireless platform that uses tissue. tiny magnets to activate cells in the brain could In traditional DBS, a nerve offer less invasive deep-brain battery pack external- stimulation to ease motor for people with ly sends electrical symptoms early- and late-stage Parkinsignals through son’s disease. CGN089/ wires, activating Shutterstock.com nerve cells in a region of the brain called the subthalamic nucleus (STN). STN activation can relieve motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, including tremors, slowness, rigidity and involuntary movements. However, because the potential side effects, including brain hemorrhage and tissue damage, can be
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severe, DBS is usually reserved for people who have late-stage Parkinson’s disease or when symptoms are no longer manageable with medication. In a step toward a less invasive treatment, Minsuk Kwak and Jinwoo Cheon worked with their colleagues to develop a wireless method to effectively reduce motor dysfunction in people with Parkinson’s disease. For their wireless technique, the researchers tagged nanoscale magnets with antibodies to help the molecules “stick” to the surface of STN nerve cells. Then they injected the sticky magnets into the brains of mice with early- and late-stage Parkinson’s disease. Prior to the injection in the STN, those same nerve cells had been modified with a gene that caused them to activate when the modified magnets on the cell’s surface twisted in reaction to an externally applied magnetic field of about 25 milliteslas, which is about one- thousandth the strength of an MRI. In demonstrations of the magnetized and modified neurons in mice with Parkinson’s disease, the mice exposed to a magnetic field showed improved motor function to levels comparable to those of healthy mice. The team observed that mice that received multiple exposures to the magnetic field retained more than one-third of their motor improvements while mice that received one exposure retained almost no improvements. Additionally, the nerve cells of treated mice showed
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From the ACS Press Room
Microplastics from natural fertilizers are blowing in the wind more often than once thought “Preferential Emission of Microplastics from Biosolid-Applied Agricultural Soils: Field Evidence and Theoretical Framework” Environmental Science & Technology Letters Though natural fertilizers made from treated sewage sludge are used to reintroduce nutrients onto agricultural fields, they bring along microplastic pollutants too. And according to a small-scale study published in ACS’ Environmental Science & Technology Letters, more plastic particles get picked up by the wind than once thought. Researchers have discovered that the microplastics are released from fields more easily than similarly sized dust particles, becoming airborne from even a slight breeze. Microplastics, or small bits of plastic less than 5 millimeters long, have appeared everywhere from clouds to heart tissues. And with these plastics’ increasing prevalence in people and water supplies, they’ve also been found in sewage and wastewater. Though sewage solids might not immediately seem like a useful product, after treatment they can form “biosolids,” which are applied to agricultural soils as a natural, renewable source of fertilizer. According to estimates by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, over 2 million dry metric tons of biosolids — roughly half of the total amount collected by wastewater treatment plants — are applied to land each year. As a result, microplastics in these biosolids have the chance to reenter the
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environment. Because the plastics could carry other pollutants from the wastewater they originated from, they can be potentially dangerous when inhaled. So, Sanjay Mohanty and colleagues wanted to investigate how wind could pick up and transport microplastic particles from biosolid-treated agricultural fields. The team analyzed airborne microplastics in wind-blown sediments that were gathered during windMicroplastics on agricultural fields are picked up and spread by tunnel experithe wind more easily than soil or ments on two dust particles. Bilanol/ plots of biosolidShutterstock.com treated land in rural Washington state. The researchers discovered that these wind-blown sediments contained higher concentrations of microplastics than either the biosolids or the source soil itself. This enrichment effect is caused by the plastic particles being less dense than soil minerals, such as quartz, and less “sticky” — they’re not trapped as easily by moisture as the soil minerals are. As a result, microplastics can be picked up by a breeze more easily than soil minerals, and winds that might not be strong enough to kick up dust could still be introducing microplastics into the air. The researchers say that previous models did Continued on page 15
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From the ACS Press Room continued
A non-allergenic wheat protein Continued from page 8
Lighting up Alzheimer’srelated proteins Continued from page 9
in the disease. The researchers say that this tool could be used to distinguish between In another test, mouse cells that produce closely related amyloids and could inform fat tissues were deposited onto flat gluten- new approaches for earlier and more confident in films. During the incubation period, as diagnosis of amyloid-related diseases. cells proliferated and differentiated, they The authors acknowledge funding from the produced visible lipid and collagen depos- Australian Research Council and the National its. Health and Medical Research Council. The cultured meat and fat layers attached to the edible glutenin films could be Puffed-up MOFs stacked to form a 3D meat-like alternative protein. Because the glutenin material base Continued from page 11 supported the growth of both textured animal muscle and fat layers, the researchers Simple changes such as these could maximize say it could be used in an approach for the effectiveness of MOFs in future drugdelivery applications, the researchers say. As a more realistic cultivated meat products. next step, they plan to determine how slow The authors acknowledge funding from and progressive drug release within specified MilliporeSigma and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Some authors are employ- time frames can be achieved by modifying MOF pore structure. ees of MilliporeSigma, Inc. muscles.
The authors acknowledge funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation.
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From ACS Press Room Continued
Microplastics from natural fertilizers Continued from page 13
not take this sticky effect and other unique properties of microplastics into account when estimating emissions from treated fields. Therefore, these older models are likely to underestimate the actual amount of plastic particles released into the air. Calculations by Mohanty and colleagues indicate that microplastics may be emitted from barren agricultural fields from nearly two and a half times more wind events than previously estimated. The researchers say this work highlights an underappreciated way that microplastics could become airborne.
Using magnetized neurons Continued from page 12
The authors acknowledge funding from the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the McPike Zima Charitable Foundation.
no significant damage in and around the STN, which suggests this could be a safer alternative to traditional implanted DBS systems, the researchers say. The team believes its wireless magnetogenetic approach has therapeutic potential and could be used to treat motor dysfunction in people with earlyor late-stage Parkinson’s disease as well as other neurological disorders, such as epilepsy and Alzheimer’s disease. The authors acknowledge funding from the Institute for Basic Science.
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Around the Area University of TexasDallas Assistant Professor Hedieh Torabifard received a $110K ACS-PRF award, Molecular Modeling of the Demulsification Mechanism of Ionic Liquids, and presented invited talks at UNT and the Nov-2023 ACS-SWRM meeting. Associate Professor Sheel Dodani, received a $700K NSF-CAREER award, Discovering and Engineering Protein-Based Sensors for Nitrate in Biology. Associate Professor Ronald Smaldone, received a $350K NSFCollaborative Research award, Closed-Loop Design of Polymers with Adaptive Networks for Extreme Mechanics. Professor Andrés Cisneros received a $312K NIH-R35 award, Investigation of DNA Modifying Enzymes by Computational Simulations: Development and Applications, and a $138K DARPA IMPACT award in collaboration with Assistant Professor Mike Kolodrubetz, Simulating Electrolytic DNA Chemistry on Noisy Quantum Devices. Robert A. Welch Professor of Chemistry and CPRIT Scholar, Rudi Fasan received a R01 award from the NIHNIAID to work on novel anti-HIV agents with Xiaofei Jia (U Mass Dartmouth) and John Guatelli (UCSD), received the BIOTRANS Junior Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Field of Biocatalysis, and presented invited talks at the Fall 2023 ACS National Meeting, the International Symposi-
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um on Carbene and Nitrene Chemistry, and the International Symposium on Biocatalysis & Biotransformations (Biotrans). Assistant Professor and CPRIT Scholar, Filippo Romiti presented an invited talk at Università degli Studi di Parma, Italy. Graduate Student Bo Couture (Fasan Lab) received a NSF-GRFP Fellowship and a UTDMcDermott Graduate Fellowship, Graduate Students Juan Villada and Pamela Agredo received ACS Bridge Career Kick-Starter Grants, Graduate Student Mary Siriboe (Fasan Lab) received an ACS Bridge Career & Professional Development Travel Award, Graduate Student Michelle Hendricks (Fasan Lab) received an ACS Division of Biological Chemistry Travel Award, Graduate Student Upeksha Dissanayake (Cisneros Lab) received a UTDGRACE award, and Graduate Student Yazdan Maghsoud (Cisneros Lab) received a UTD Eric Moore Chemistry Student Award.
Muhammad Abbas, PhD candidate in the Kenneth Balkus' lab from the University of Texas at Dallas received the Leadership Development Award by the Younger Chemists Committee (YCC) of the American Chemical Society (ACS). This prestigious award recognizes 15 young chemists across the globe based on their leadership and volunteer contributions, to support their journey towards leadership and professional careers.
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From the Editor Take notice of the upcoming major event: the 56th annual Meeting-in-Miniature of the Dallas-Fort Worth Section. Graduate and undergraduate students will give presentations on their research, some for the first time. In graduate school at the biochemistry department LSU, we were required to register for seminar 2 out of 3 semesters (and preferably 3!), which meant presenting a seminar. This was not on your own research—not possible at twice a year!—but on some current science publication (and this was still during the period of using overhead projectors). I hated it...I truly hated it. As a beginning grad student, I just wasn’t good at standing up in front of a room full of professors (who were going to ask me all kinds of questions) and other students. BUT I had to do it...and I got better. The more you get up on your feet and talk about your research or other scientific topic, the better you’re going to be at it. (On occasions where I have taught an upper-level class at local colleges, I always made my students give a presentation...oh, and they hated it too! But I always gave them the little talk above, and we got through it, hopefully with some lasting good effects). Oh, and the M-i-M needs judges! To volunteer, contact Jonathan Dannett (jdannett@udallas.edu) or Prejay Patel (pmpatel@udallas.edu).
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