Chemistry Update
Newsletter 203, July 23 2010
Inside this issue:
Calendar of Events
Departmental Seminar
Departmental Seminar
Date: Wednesday 28th July
Date: Monday 9th August
Speaker: Dr Dominic Walsh,
University of Bristol
Speaker: Shoko Yamazaki, Nara
University of Education
Title: Green Synthesis and
Application of Metal Oxide and
Metal Sulphide Nanoparticles
Title: Lewis-acid catalyzed novel
cyclization reactions using
ethenetricarboxylates
Location: A122, 13:00-14:00
Location: A122, 13:00-14:00
5
Visiting Speaker
Salters Chemistry Camp
Organic
Synthesis
6
Date: Thursday 29th July
Date: 16th—20th August
Graduation
6-7
Speaker: Dr Kerstin Muennemann,
Max Planck Institute, Mainz
Open Day
Events
1
Honorary
Doctorate
2
CHyM
2-3
Honours for
John Goodby
3
Green
Chemistry
4
Fume Hoods
Open Day
8
Outreach
9-10
Departmental
Committees
10
Title: NMR and MRI sensitivity
enhancement by Parahydrogen
Induced Polarization
Date: Tuesday 5th October
Location: YNIC at 14:00
Date: 29th September
Board of Studies Meeting
Pre-application Visit Days
New Staff
10
Energy and
Environment
11-13
General
14-16
Date of Next
Issue:
20th August
Dates: 4, 11, 18 and 24 August
For prospective undergraduate
Chemistry students interested in
2011 entry
More events can be found on our departmental events calendar:
http://www.york.ac.uk/chemistry/cfm/events/index.cfm
Page 1
York Chemist Receives Honorary Doctorate from University
of St Andrews
From left to right: Prof Jim Naismith, Guy Dodson, unknown, Eleanor Dodson and Prof Garry Taylor
Professor Eleanor Dodson, a senior member of the Department of Chemistry's Structural Biology
group has been awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science in recognition for her singular
contribution to science by the University of St Andrews.
The degree was presented on 23 June.
New Scanning Technology Developed in £7m Research
Centre
A team of applicants led by Simon Duckett and Gary Green (YNIC),
have secured a £4.36m grant from the Wellcome Trust and Wolfson
Foundation, as well as financial support from industrial partners and
the University, to build the York Centre for Hyperpolarisation in
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (CHyM) .
The Centre will bring together a range of researchers in Chemistry,
including Duncan Bruce, Rod Hubbard, Ian Fairlamb and Jen Potts,
with researchers in Biology, Psychology and the Hull York Medical
School to develop hyperpolarisation technology. This
technology
could
revolutionise
the
way
medical Page 2
conditions are diagnosed and treated.
Hyperpolarisation with parahydrogen is a technique developed at the University that can
dramatically increase the sensitivity of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), the scanning
technology widely used in hospitals. It is hoped hyperpolarisation will eventually be used to help
doctors make diagnoses in minutes that currently take days, and tailor treatments more
accurately to the needs of individual patients.
The team will also be working with Professor Jürgen Hennig of the University Hospital Freiburg,
one of the world’s leading experts in the medical application of MRI technology.
Double International Honours for Prof John Goodby
Professor John Goodby has been honoured twice in the last few months in recognition of his
internationally leading contributions to liquid crystal science.
John was made an Honorary
Member of the International Liquid Crystal Society (ILCS) at the 2010 International Liquid Crystal
Conference in Krakow last week. John becomes only the 17th member of an elite group of liquid
crystal scientists which includes Nobel Laureate PG De Gennes (deceased) and Professor GW
Gray, CBE, FRS.
John is seen pictured receiving his Honorary Award from Prof Zumer,
President, ILCS.
At the same time, John and colleagues were awarded the 2009 'Luckhurst-Samulski Prize' for the
best paper published in Liquid Crystals journal. Their paper entitled 'Molecular complexity and
the control of self-organising processes' provides excellent insight into understanding the
relationships between intermolecular interactions and phase behaviour for a very wide
variety of molecular architectures.
Page 3
Article—Top 10 Most Read in the Green Chemistry Journal
An article written by Dr Peter Shuttleworth was in the
top ten most read articles for the month of May.
Entitled ‘Switchable Adhesives for Carpet tiles’ it
explores how we can reduce a massive productspecific waste problem, and demonstrate a more
general approach to greener product design
encompassing end-of-life considerations by
producing a novel starch based adhesive.
The article was also featured on the front cover of
the May issue. The article is available at:
h t t p : / / ww w. r s c . o r g/ P u b l i s h in g / J o u rn a l s / G C /
article.asp?doi=b922735k
You can browse the full list of top 10 articles at:
http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journals/GC/top10.asp
Image reproduced by permission of James H. Clark, Sarah Lumley-Holmes and The Royal Society of Chemistry
from Green Chemistry, 2010, 12, 798
Dr Andrew Hunt—Live Press Conference
Andy Hunt from the Green Chemistry Centre recently spoke at the ACS and immediately gave a
media interview to the World’s press. This interview is now live on the following link:
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/7845576
In a long-term project to determine
recycling opportunities for LCD
televisions, the department
has
established a means to separate films in
LCD panels to recover an expanded
polyvinyl-alcohol (PVA). This PVA is
highly porous and water soluble, and
pure PVA is compatible with human
biology. Thus, PVA offers many potential
applications, including biomedical uses
such as pills, dressings to deliver drugs
to particular parts of the body, and as
tissue scaffolds to help parts of the body
regenerate.
Page 4
Health and Safety, Financial & Environmental Costs
of High Fume Hood Sashes
A recent early morning fume hood audit showed an unacceptable number of sashes are being
left open/partially open overnight. Only 43% were properly closed. Sashes must be closed at
night, as well as lunchtimes and every time you step away from the fume hood.
Safety Costs of High Fume Hood Sashes:
Peroxide explosion in schlenk tube:

Green Chemistry, fume hood B02

Fume hood sash partially open
Consequences:

two people injured by flying glass

fume hood sash undamaged by
blast
Financial & Environment Costs of High Fume Hood Sashes:
Current average sash height ≈ 20 cm
≈ £650 per year / fume hood

Energy cost

Greenhouse gas emissions
≈ 8 tonnes CO2 per year / fume hood
Reducing sash height to minimum

Reduce energy cost by
≈ £400 per year / fume hood

Reduce greenhouse gases by
≈ 6 tonnes CO2 per year / fume hood
NB.
A return flight UK to New Zealand ≈ 24,000 miles, equivalent to ≈ 4 ton-
nes CO2
Keep your fume hood sash closed!
Page 5
Organic Synthesis News
Peter O’Brien has recently given research lectures at Warwick University and Vernalis in
Cambridge. At the RSC Organic Division North East Meeting held in Durham, Graeme Barker
(O’Brien group) and Joby Winn (Clarke group) scooped joint first prize in the poster competition –
well done to Joby and Graeme!
A previous member of the O’Brien group, Jianhui Huang,
has just left the UK to return to China as an Associate
Professor at the School of Pharmaceutical Science and
Technology at Tianjin University. Jianhui was the first
person in the Department of Chemistry to be awarded
support from the Wild Overseas Postgraduate Fund. He
carried out his PhD in the O’Brien group from 2003-2007
working on the synthesis and reactions of aziridines.
After successfully defending his PhD, Jianhui moved to the
University of Sheffield to carry out post-doctoral research
with Professor Joe Harrity. Jianhui’s position was funded
by the EPSRC and GlaxoSmithKline. From this project,
Jianhui has published the following papers to date: Org.
Biomol. Chem., 2009, 7, 4052; Tetrahedron Lett., 2009, 50,
5539; Org. Lett., 2008, 10, 781. Jianhui is very grateful for
the help and support from the organic chemists at both Sheffield and York. This is a real success
story for the Wild Fund and we certainly wish him well in his future academic career in China.
Postgraduate Students 2010
Congratulations to the following postgraduate students who graduated on 15 July:
PhD:
Ralph Adams
Sarah Dobson
Karen Hornsby
Jason Hargreaves
Tom Farmer
Peter Ellis
Kerrin Bright
Matthew Pickering
Jonathan Gammon
Mark Thompson
Anthony Atkin
Claudia Szolkowy—in absentia
Qi Shi—in absentia
MSc by Research:
Andrew Smart
Joanna Wong—in absentia
Page 6
Graduation July 2010
The Chemistry summer degree ceremony
took place in Central Hall on Thursday, 15th
July, where 79 Master of Chemistry and 46
Batchelor of Science degrees were awarded.
Congratulations to all.
Graduands and their guests then attended a departmental drinks reception, which due to the unpredictable weather, was held inside. This event went extremely well, a big thank you to all the staff who
worked hard and gave up some of their evening to
make it a success.
Page 7
Open Day—7th July
The departmental open day was a huge success with around 350 people taking part in tours and
an estimated 600 people visiting the department in total.
A huge thank you goes out to the admissions team and to everyone else who participated.
Page 8
The next generation of students have fun in chemistry
Many of you will have been aware that we have had several groups of sixth-form students visiting
our department recently and engaging in a variety of activities. Indeed, many of you have kindly
lent a hand and been involved with these outreach activities. So just what has been going on this
month?
On Friday 9th July we had 85
students here for our second ever
Sixth Form Conference. They
enjoyed a range of experiences
beginning with a couple of lectures.
Andy Parsons welcomed them to
the department and explained to
them about the excitement
involved in a taking a Chemistry
degree at York. John Goodby, ably
assisted by Stephen Cowling,
wowed them with the wonders of
liquid crystals. In smaller groups
they took it in turns to hear all
about spectroscopy, discover
chirality using molecular models and identify a range of functional groups using simple test tube
reactions. Katrina Sayer and I rounded off the day by giving them some top tips for selecting a
suitable chemistry course and applying to university through UCAS. Many thanks to all those
mentioned above and the others who helped: Sue Couling and Adrian Whitwood for running
sessions; Heather Fish, David Williamson, Ralph Adams, Karl Heaton and James Naughton for
explaining the intricacies of NMR, mass spec and IR; Chris Armstrong, Isaac Bruce, James
McKenzie, Neets Mistry and Mary Wheldon for looking after the groups and helping to run the
activities; Amanda Dixon for preparing the lab practical; Tim Elsworth for taking some photos of
the event; Phil Helliwell and the team in the teaching labs for being so accommodating; and
finally thank you to Amra Akhtar for keeping everything running and making sure that everything
was ready for the day.
For the week beginning 12th July I had two year 12 (that’s lower sixth in old money) students from
Ripon Grammar School here to have some work experience. I put together a patchwork of
activities for them, to give them a flavour of the range of chemistry that we do here. They were
overwhelmed by everything they saw and did. On Wednesday afternoon they took part in Nigel’s
symposium discussing student lab skills. Many thanks to all those who helped Emma and
Richard have such a memorable week: Brian Smith, Owain Samuel, Adrian Whiwood, Graeme
McAllister, Sarah Moller, Ed Bergstrom, Martin Cockett, Kazim Naqvi, Emma Dux, Aimee
Gamble, Heather Fish, Shirley Roberts and others in YSBL, Stephen Cowling, Colin Ellis and
everyone else who explained their work or just helped our visitors to feel welcome.
Page 9
On Friday 16th July a group of sixth form students from Great Wyrley School rounded off a
university residential experience by spending the morning in our labs making indigo, which they
then used to tie dye some squares of fabric that they took back to Staffordshire as souvenirs of
their week in York.
This week we have another 20 students, from all over the country, who are part of a three-day
residential STEM summer school for A-level students. During three sessions the 20 chemistry
students will make indigo (more tie dying on the way), explore stereochemistry using molecular
modelling and try a problem solving exercise using the iodine clock reaction. They will be here on
and off until Thursday, so please do say hi if you see them and make them feel welcome.
After that Phil, Helen, Julia and Sue can breathe a sigh of relief, as I will be out of their hair and
out of the labs; that is until the Salters Chemistry Camps start in August…
Annie Hodgson
More about ... Graduate School Board
Purpose:
The academic staff group has executive responsibility for matters relating to specific students
(e.g. approval of examiners, progress reviews, etc.). The full Board is responsible for policy matters relating to both postgraduate research and taught students, following approval from the
Board of Studies.
Current membership:
Meets:
Richard Douthwaite (Chair)
Termly
Victor Chechik (Deputy Chair)
Alice Clifford (Graduate School Administrator)
Term of office:
Sue Couling (Skills Officer)
For students, 1 year, with the option to renew
for a further year. All staff members are ex
officio.
Rachel Crooks (Administrative Assistant)
Alison Edmonds (MSc Green Chemistry Administrator)
Matthew Gosling (PhD student)
Review Date:
Ryan Mewis (Post Doctoral Research Assistant)
October 2010
Adam Morgan (PhD student)
Claire Saville (MSc Green Chemistry student)
Christopher Watson (PhD student)
New Staff
Welcome to Dr Emma Fitzpatrick, who joined the department in July.
Emma is a postdoctoral research fellow who will be working in Green
Chemistry on the ERDF Microwave project.
Page 10
Chemistry Department Energy and Environmental News
The Energy and Environmental group have
been working hard over the summer months on
various eco-issues within the Department,
looking at all sorts of things from fume cupboards wasting energy to growing herbs for
everyone to eat. The herbs and lettuces are
doing well, please help yourself!
Energy Consumption
Good news - overall electricity consumption
dropped by 8762 kW in the month of June, a
3.3% reduction on June 2009. Well done everyone, it’s reassuring to see that we can actually make a difference.
June
2010
(kW)
June
2009
(kW)
A Block Lower
26836
26841
A Block Upper
14856
13479
B Block Lower
17280
21453
B Block Lower
32197
31751
B Block Upper
23612
26841
C Block
41072
41513
D Block Mechanical
D Block Light &
Power
43897
41889
40802
47223
Laser Lab Power
12602
11477
TOTAL kW
254073
262835
£
CO2 (tonnes)
23,578
137.3
18,214
142.1
The meter ‘D Block Mechanical’ measures consumption from the plant room – the vast majority of which comes from fume cupboards. The
increased consumption of 2008 kW can therefore be attributed to people not lowering fume
hood sashes. This equates to emissions of
1.1 tonne CO2 unnecessarily, i.e., this is
pointless waste, and there is no reason or justification for it.
Remember to close your fume hood sash!
Cycle Path Consultation
Attention all Chemistry cyclists!! Have some input into
improving the University’s Cycle Path Network! The Travel
and Transport team are developing a University cycle
route map, and as part of the process are
consulting with staff for feedback on our cycle
paths. They will be putting up ‘boards’ around
campus from ~end of July until October requesting comments, suggestions, recommendations etc. Please keep an eye on York Extra for further updates and information.
Carbon Offsetting For Business
Travel
Carbon offsets are a means of providing
money to different projects designed to reduce carbon emissions. The UoY Travel &
Transport website (http://www.york.ac.uk/
admin/estates/transport/) lists ClimateCare as
an option for offsetting business travel e.g.
international conference travel. ClimateCare
is a non-profit making organisation that has a
track record of supporting effective lowcarbon technologies in developing countries.
Other Carbon Offsetting sites are available,
and are used by other departments.
http://www.jpmorganclimatecare.com/
Please note: Different sites use different calculations to work out the charges, and also
support different offsetting technologies so
you may wish to research before
you purchase.
Sites are also available where
you can purchase emissions
permits in the European trading
scheme to offset all your house- Page 11
hold and travel emissions, and then cancel
them thereby reducing the total number of permits available to polluting industries. See
http://www.sandbag.org.uk/removecarbon
more information.
for
Cycle helmets £15!
Raleigh Tough 100 Bike Locks £16!
Fiona Macey, the Travel Plan Co-ordinator,
(fch1@york.ac.uk) welcomes any ideas of
other products staff would be interested in
buying.
For example:
With ClimateCare a return flight to Paris from
Leeds Bradford (761 mi) would cost £1.40 to
offset 0.16 tonne CO2 (@ £8.81/tonnes CO2),
whereas a long-haul return flight from Heathrow to Sydney would cost £49.51to offset 1.53
tonne CO2. For comparison Sandbag charge
£25/tonnes CO2.
Congratulations Chemistry!
This year the University signed up to the WWF
Earth Hour event and asked staff
to make an extra effort to switch
equipment off over the weekend of
27/28 March. The Chemistry Department consumed 17,489 kW of
power over that weekend, compared with 18609 kW the weekend
before – a reduction of 1120 kW and a saving
of £103.94 and ~600 kg CO2.
Well done everyone, this is a huge 6%
saving!!
Doing this every weekend for a year will save
over £5000 and around 31.3 tonnes CO2.
That’s 20 return trips to New York…
Online Store
The Travel and Transport team now have products at very reduced prices on the UoY online
store. Go to https://store.york.ac.uk and follow
the ‘Travel and Transport’ link. Discount bus
tickets are available, as well as cheap cycling
accessories.
Sustainability Forum
Campaigning to reduce the University’s carbon footprint
Rescheduled Event – Sustainability
without Growth.
All welcome.
The UoY Sustainability Forum is pleased to
welcome Professor Tim Jackson to give a talk
on Sustainability without Growth. Tim Jackson is Professor of Sustainable Development
at the University of Surrey, and the author of
‘Prosperity without growth?’, available from
the UK Sustainable Development Commission:
http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/pages/top10-downloads.html
Tim will be speaking on 9th September, and
the presentation will be followed by drinks and
snacks. Everyone is welcome. Time and
venue tbc.
More news from Estates…
The Energy and Environment Team
Roger Hartshorn has recently been appointed
the Energy and Environment Manager in Estates Services, a job he has been doing for
the last two years. He is responsible for energy and carbon management, travel and
transportation, and waste management.
Heike Singleton is the Energy Conservation
Manager, a job she has been do-
Page 12
ing on and off over the last few years, initially
working with Willy Hoedeman before his retirement.
Fiona Macey, the University Travel Plan Coordinator, has recently changed departments and
is now working with Heike and Roger under the
Energy and Environment umbrella.
10:10 Plan
University of York has signed up to the 10:10
Campaign – to cut emissions by 10% across
the UK during 2010. For further information
about the campaign see:
few months. These screens will display details on departmental energy consumption
and emissions, as well as savings achieved.
Pullman no. 44
Fiona Macey has negotiated a new deal with
the Pullman no. 44 bus service which links
Heslington East with the main campus and
the city centre. This service has been extended to stop at the railway station instead of
the city centre. Discount tickets cost £1.80 for
a return trip; weekly and monthly tickets are
also available from the University online store.
For comparison, a return trip on the FTR
costs £3.
http://www.1010global.org/uk
HEFCE Funding
The UoY Carbon Management Implementation
Plan is currently being updated, and should be
available online sometime in the future.
This is an important document for the University, not least because future HEFCE funding is
to be linked to an institution’s Carbon Management Plan (these links should be in place by
2011-12). HEFCE have
set carbon emissions
targets for the HE sector
of >80% reduction by
2050.
https://store.york.ac.uk/catalogue/
products.asp?
deptid=151&catID=&hasClicked=0
Display Energy Certificates
New ‘display energy certificates’ are on display in the ‘reception’ areas of various buildings around the department – they show the
buildings energy performance operational rating and carbon emissions. More information
on the certificates is available from the Estates webpages http://www.york.ac.uk/admin/
dfm/policies/dec/
Public Display Screens
As part of a wider initiative to improve metering
across campus the Energy and Environment
team are working towards setting up public display screens in each Department over the next
The Directorate of Facilities Management
publish a quarterly newsletter which can be
accessed from their website if anyone wants
further information.
Page 13
From the Archive: A Magnetic Tale
The department has several superconducting magnets used for NMR spectroscopy. This edition
of From the Archive shows part of the installation of the 700 MHz superconducting magnet.
The first photo shows the magnet after it was offloaded from the lorry, being pushed into the department through the A-block lower corridor. Note that parts of the door frame have been removed to allow the magnet through. The second photo shows the magnet before it is turned left
towards the mechanical workshops. The magnet was originally in room A015 where Peter Bernath's lab currently is, and the third photo shows it being pushed into A015. The fourth photo
shows Heather Fish alongside her new “toy”. The outer envelope of hazardous magnetic field is
quite large for this size of magnet. To prevent this field from extending to the offices above, one
of which is the head of department's office, the magnet was sat in a pit. The ladder in the foreground of the fourth photos is the access to this pit.
The fifth photo shows the engineers preparing the pit before lowering the magnet into the pit
which is shown in the sixth photo. A superconducting magnet works by having a current in a coil
cooled to the boiling point of helium at -269oC, this current after being induced in the coil requires
no external electrical power, provided the temperature doesn't increase. The helium is kept liquid
by an outer jacket of liquid nitrogen. If the temperature should increase the coil's electrical resistance increases causing it to heat up more which causes the resistance to increase further etc.
this increase in temperature results in the helium and nitrogen liquids vaporising and being
vented to the atmosphere. This is known as quenching. Occasionally when the current is being
induced in the coil a magnet will quench spontaneously, the seventh and eighth photos shows
the result of such a quench with the NMR lab and outside corridor filling with the boiled off helium
and nitrogen gases.
Page 14
Mechanical Workshop
The mechanical workshop is able to reverse engineer many different types of laboratory
hardware at a fraction of the retail price and once a design has been re-drawn and programmed,
where applicable, it can be recalled and manufactured. Please consider whether it can be
manufactured in house before placing orders for expensive items like reaction vessels, stirrer hot
plate adapters etc. especially if what you require is non standard. Here are some examples of
items recently made in the mechanical workshop.
Clockwise from top left:
Fan, Microwave tube, wax skimmer, inconel reactorblade and inconel reactor.
Right:
Breathing Apparatus training
session
BBQ
The departmental BBQ was a huge success and it also bid a fond farewell to Deborah Turner
who has now left the department to start her new job in of Language and Linguistic Science.
Above: Deborah Turner giving her
goodbye speech
Below: Paul Walton and Gideon Davis
having a race on the children's bouncy
slide!
Page 16