The Chemportal

I was recently at a Shell gas station pumping gas when I noticed the inscription "this gasoline may contain up to 10% by weight ethanol" on a label next to the digital display.  Does this statement provide information that is directly useful to anyone, in particular, to consumers who have no conceptual basis in Chemistry whatsoever?  What is the real utility of describing something by weight percent, as opposed to volume percent.  As far as Chemistry is concerned, it seems that a "mole percent" basis would be more appropriate as it would entail the more important description of just how much ethanol there are in terms of relative numbers of molecules.  This would at least elucidate the notion of whether the solution contains more of one molecule compared to the rest of the constituents. 

Got out of work early today, so I took two hour drive to see my professor.  Driving in the car for more then a hour absolutely makes me crazy so I turned the volume up on the radio and alternated between NPR (national public radio) and country music.  Yep, country music, I've been listening to it more and more lately, it really brings out the surroundings, in the midst of certain songs that is.  I find that there's also a lot of culture involved within the music and at times it's a learning experience. 

The discussion with the professor went well, got a lot of the issues resolved (for those of you unfamiliar with this reference see the posts "Am I a Savage Ignoramous" and "Something is Definitely Not Right...." on this blog).  It's been months, almost a year since I visited the college (UGA at Athens, Georgia), however it seems like yesterday.  I went right into the office of the professor and we conversed casually as if I was there yesterday; no big greetings, the updates came gradually, however all was business as usual. 

By the way, I didn't realize it was spring break........which really shows how clueless I am about my surroundings, in particular that of the college life.  It's been a while, but I should have definitely remembered spring break.

Recent chemistry endeavors that are personal involve reading up on my physical chemistry text as well as researching CARS a bit more.  If I ever become a graduate student it's probably going to be in physical chemistry or analytical chemistry.  Unfortunately I don't have a lot of pics for everyone and whatever goes on at work is supposed to be confidential so I'm not able to write about it.

Recently Kyle at The Chemblog has posted about a recent "accident" that has happened in his lab, that is, due to his part.  Several other 'chemists' have posted their recollections of stupidity in the comment log.

While I don't have any spectacular inputs to this dialogue, I do remember some small mishappenings in an independent research course that I took.  The professor had this nice apparatus which he had designed through the glass blower shop that was within the chemistry department at the time, the total cost of constructing it was ~$500.00 due to the nooks and crannies that were a part of its very small design.  This apparatus was to be implemented into an experiment involving a potentiometer and was supposed to have been unique since it could be hooked right up to the degasser.  Anyways, while adjusting the pH, I had naively (and stupidly) put some sodium hydroxide pellets in there without any prior calculations; this was incredibly stupid in hindsight since the volume consisted of less then 30 mL.  It seems that the sodium hydroxide pellets had interacted with the glassware since it had broken when I had cleaned it.  An even more spectacular event was what followed; the professor himself, after having it repaired, had adjusted it onto the degasser inappropriately, and the apparatus went flying to the floor during the degassing cycle, shattering it into several pieces.  Fortunately, he didn't charge me with breaking it the first time.

Another small mishap was when I was constructing Silver Chloride electrodes through electrolysis for the first time, that is without any supervision.......after seeing green color diffuse from a point in the solution a couple of times, some people at the lab next door came into the lab, claiming that they had smelled Chlorine from that side of the lab.  Well, it was probably Chlorine, and they had exited the lab chuckling after seeing that I was apparently clueless as to what was going on within the experiment right in front of me.