The Chemportal

This guy at my workplace is going to grad school in New York while working here in Georgia , the company pays for his tuition and he gets video lecture material all through the net , his major is in chemical engineering , and it seems that this mode of education is becoming a lot more common these days.  He takes his tests through a local center and is proctored by someone who is certified for the matter.  His degree is going to be standard, there’s not going to be any indication of whether he had actually attended the university itself from which he is getting his degree.

But what a life, he goes to work during the day and studies at night.  One is earning money and on a way to getting a degree at the same time ; there’s always the good aspect of furthering one’s learning as well as the increasing the prospect of a higher income in the future.

Part of an extraction procedure that’s employed requires phosphate buffer as the solvent for one of the steps (extraction procedure is confidential).  Now, I never had problems with it before , and had been making it for several months until one day some clear crystals became prominent within the solution ; as in whole chunks of it.  The crystals resemble ice and appear about a day after the phosphate buffer is prepared in a large scale V shaped container.  Again, this had not occured during the first several months (~5 months).

The crystal may be a hydrate of the tribasic component, anhydrous phosphate is the white brittle substance that appears once it’s solid form is placed in water, however the hydrate’s solubility may be drastically altered with temperature as it is with sulfate.

Thus it may be the case that even a 1 to 2 degrees change in temperature over time would have precipitated out the hydrates.