Short nifty thing

Nifty thing, and I actually taught this lab!
C&E News article  about quantum dots.   Specifically this time using as a laser, which our dots were not monochromatic enough to pull off.   But never let anyone tell you that nobody learns anything useful in college.

How willing are you to experiment on yourself?

This is not going to be a detailed scientific post, but it does have something that I wanted to ask.   How willing are you to be your own guinea pig?  I make a lot of my own bath products-mostly so I can make them smell exactly the way I want to.  And I'm willing to experiment on myself by trying differing amounts of shea butter vs. coconut oil.  But I'm working on branching out-I want one single face moisturizer that will have all the effects I want, something I think is illegal to sell.   If anyone knows how to make anti-acne with sunscreen wants to chat, I'm interested.  But this is becoming a lot more of an issue for me-how do I safely test this.   I'm willing to risk dry skin, but skin cancer, less so.   So what are good options to get over this?

Was going to post about laws, got distracted

No, this isn't actually as bad as it sounds.  I've been doing research for my previously mentioned post(probably posts) on legally defensible science.  It's interesting, and I still do intend to do that writing, probably at this point as a series of posts.  Too much to go into in one single post-what to do, different standards under different laws, etc.   For example, the EPA can and does have two different sets of good lab practices, under two different laws.   And then I checked my personal e-mail when I got home from work (no, I don't violate the internet policies at work.  I'm no fun, I know) and found a very interestingly titled e-mail in my box-"Nation's Chemical Law Not Broken".   Now, I'm a member of the American Chemical Society, which is blatantly and by definition a group for industry-chemical manufacturers, even if they have to deal with academic chemists as well.  I do believe that industry is important.   I was honestly stunned by this blatant advertisement by the Competitive Enterprise Institute-I am not going to link them-claiming to be "a nonprofit, nonpartisan public interest group that studies the intersection of regulation, risk, and markets" in my e-mail when their website on the very front page, second level title claims "Free Markets and Limited Government".  I'm not so sold on this impartiality.  They claim that modernization of the Toxic Substances Control Act-an act that I know from working in the chemical industry that it's easy enough to find exemptions to for everything other than PCBs, dioxins-claimed to be some of the most toxic compounds known to man, asbestos and lead paint(this you can still get away with, by the way, just generally not in places children are expected to be) if you work at it-is going to endanger safety by requiring more demonstration of safety.   I couldn't wrap my head around the level of . . . intellectual dishonesty and cognitive dissonance between the e-mail I had been sent and the actual article.  And now I wonder who sold them my name and e-mail address.   I always worry that I will find out it's the ACS.  I hold on to my identity as a chemist, and believe it's important to be a member of professional organizations.  Every time I hear something from them, however, they skirt the line between science and ignoring science for outright industry advocacy a little too closely.   Have they finally overstepped:?   Did any other ACS members get this e-mail?

Gold and Mercury

A cool article on the C&E news website. Gold nanoparticles cleaning mercury.  I worked a lot trying to clean water in graduate school.   Also did a lot of ICP for metals.   One problem that I frequently came up against was vaporization, and contamination of the instrument.   Interestingly, adding gold helps this problem.   A simple google search will yield lots of papers about this effect.  Amalgams with mercury are popular for mining, dental fillings
Some mining examples mining questions and more mining
Dental amalgams are falling out of favor though it's hard to prove any link to specific health problems epa website on dental amalgams
So it makes sense that gold can be used to clean mercury.    However, I enjoy reading about it and hope you do too.

Yet again it's been a long time

You can tell when I have a 40/hr a week job, can't you?   I need to work on that.   Well, here I am.  blogging.   I do still have a job, so I guess that's something-both a blog and a job.  And a super spiffy apartment.  Well, I think so.  
I have a post in mind that I deeply want to get into-regulatory chemistry and defensible data.   Both from the sense that sometimes the regulations are really really important-sign your chain of custody if you're doing anything legal, people.  And sometimes the regulations do have to be followed because that's what you do to be consistent, even if no, that compound might not break down much in three days.
It's what I've been doing, and it is something that I am actually loving. But it's something that makes me get up in the morning, and so I don't really have time to draw out my thoughts tonight.
Also, I missed the local section here ACS meeting last week.   I'm unhappy.

Stereotypes about scientists

I said on Saturday that I was planning to write a full post about scientific stereotypes.   Here it is.   Lots of people have written lots of good ground here, and I'm not going to try to recover everything.  Here are just a couple of links http://www.labmanager.com/  http://www.sciencebase.com.
I could go into a whole lot of questions about the gender politics of the stereotypes, but that's not where I'm trying to go.
I'm pretty sure everyone has heard a lot of the stories about people in many techincal fields.   We're incapable of communicating, we loose interest as soon as anything has to actually deal with people, we can't manage to bathe/attract significant others or friends, etc.  I'm sure there are people to whom that applies.  You can see current examples on the TV show Big Bang Theory, among others.  And there are people who have different opinions about these stereotypes.  I have had guys in a bar in grad school say "Ooh, science majors are hot"  That wasn't the only reason this particular guy didn't end up as boyfriend, but it was reacting to stereotypes instead of learning the reality-not a good relationship foundation.
I recently got the comment that I'm an "atypical PhD-you are actually functional and can talk to people."   I do try for that, and I like(at least some) people. I definitely want to get to decide if I like them, not the other way around.  I worry that I'm not as socially polished as I'd like to be, but I'm pretty sure that's more a function of me having high standards for myself.   Science majors that I just went to school with include a salsa dancing singer with an amazing voice, a model-got pad, mothers of mulitple children, a sailor, a marathoner, and now I'm starting to feel like I don't do much.  All of them very functional people.
There are also many people trying to work on these stereotypes.   The University of Minnesota has a program UMN Gemini program site, that is designed to be a couple of lectures every month to help.   But why do we need to do that in 2011?   Why do I care?   Well, I do feel that there is a big anti science bias in my country, and that stereotypes like this play into it.  Okay, maybe we will do a little bit of stereotype politics.   How many politicians are willing and proud to go on tv and talk about not trusting science?   too many.  How many make cracks about eggheads?   Too many.   and so we get people who mistakenly believe that there is legitimate scientific controversy about global warming, evolution, the safety of vaccines.  because they don't want to be eggheads, and learn about science for themselves.   Now, this is one of many reasons that people have for many different beliefs.  It can't explain everything.  And doesn't happen in a vacuum.  But it's related.

It has been a long time, I know

I have been moving, and starting a new job.   So, that's what's taking most of my time, though I will try and get more up here soon.  
This job is a move out of doing chemistry, and doing research, into looking at other people's results, and verifying that all the QC is within range and that the change of custody has been done properly.  All sorts of things.
I'm kind of enjoying that.    I actually thinking about writing a longer post about some of that-there was an interesting conversation yesterday about stereotypes about scientists.  I've got a lot to say, but I'm taking my time about that because I am trying to keep this blog separate from my work.  I will not be posting on here what the job is, or telling any kind of details-since I know people can put two and two together.