Green Chemistry @ MUN

During the profs’ trip to Florida for the ACS meeting, Courtney Laprise (co-supervised by Kerton and Kozak) appeared on the Broadcast and was interviewed by Jane Adey. You can find out about Courtney’s research on this page: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/waves-of-change-alternative-fish-guts-1.5083058

There is also a facebook video.

Note: we are not endorsing the capture or aquaculture of additional fish to produce plastic. We are using by-products/waste from fish processing plants to obtain a low grade fish oil (not suitable for human consumption) and using this to make new materials that should show enhanced biodegradation. Experiments and tests are ongoing. Any companies interested in this technology should contact Dr. Kerton and Dr. Kozak.

Hart’s research on cationic aluminum complexes has been accepted for publication in Inorganic Chemistry. Thank you to Louise and Jen for their crystallographic contributions, and all other advice including the referees and editor.

I will post the link once the paper is available online. The proofs have just been returned to ACS Publishing, and I need to go watch some more talks at #ACSOrlando

**UPDATE: Inorganic Chemistry, 2019, 58,  (8), 5253–5264, http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.9b00347 **

Earlier this month, Courtney’s latest blog post was shared by the School of Graduate Studies: http://www.mun.ca/sgs/studentblog/struggle/ The good news is Courtney’s departmental seminar went really well and she has had many exciting results in the lab too 🙂

Sorry we forgot to share this blog sooner – it discusses really important #mentalhealthmatters. Remember, you are not alone.

The School of Graduate Studies has just made a wonderful 3 minute video featuring Kori Andrea. Kori is a Vanier Scholar in Dr. Kerton’s group. She is passionate about her research and a wonderful mentor to undergraduates in our group and also in our teaching labs.

For more information on Vanier Scholarships see: http://www.vanier.gc.ca/en/home-accueil.html

Also, our department hosted a #GlobalBreakfast yesterday as part of the #IUPAC100 celebrations. It was one of ten events across Canada: http://www.cnc-iupac.ca/news_e.html There will be a news story on the breakfasts in the CIC magazine later this month. Thank you to Juliana (Kerton group), and Steph and Silvana (Merschrod group) for your hard work and skilled organization of this event! The two quizzes (Women in Science, and Periodic Table Trivia) were challenging and made us all realize we need to study a bit more 😉  See @MUN_GWB on twitter for photos of the event

Thank you to Artur for preparing the eye-catching poster.

Chris was recently invited to speak with a local radio show host about vinyl and playing records using a plastic $20 bill. https://soundcloud.com/vocm/feb-5th-drchristopher-kozak-good-vibrations-using-new-20-bill-to-play-music?in=vocm%2Fsets%2Fvocm-morning-show&fbclid=IwAR2QLpcolwqHPdbQpAckJpLqTcLdspInqvyHe6w468o6WKxK7Br1whL83zA

A short blog post 🙂

Today, we have set up our control system (i.e. non-degradable polymer) to test our polymer biodegradation system and get a baseline for zero carbon dioxide production.  We will be setting up some seawater studies soon too.  We thank the Association of Commonwealth Universities for funding our collaborations in this area with ACU Blue Charter Fellows spending 3 months in our group.  Our experimental set-up is based on this PLoS ONE paper, which is open-access.

Biodegradation Experimental Set-up

Yesterday was a big day in the group, as George successfully defended his PhD on “Mechanochemical Transformations of alpha-Chitin”.  Today – he will begin doing his corrections and start looking for a postdoctoral position in earnest.  The past 5 years have flown by so quickly!

George is in the bottom center of all photos; Top = group photo, bottom left = supervisor and supervisory committee members present , bottom right = examiners, chair and supervisor/supervisory committee. Congratulations Dr. George Margoutidis

…Congratulations Kori Andrea! Kori’s work has just been accepted by ACS Catalysis, https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acscatal.8b04282

The MUN Green Chemistry & Catalysis Group went to the Graduate Student Union Pub, Bitters, for lunch on Friday – to the celebrate the start of the semester and officially welcome our two ACU Blue Charter Fellows: James Beament (Bath), Dr. Nigel Jalsa (The University of The West Indies). We hope they have a very productive time with our group studying degradable polymers.

Happy New Year everyone!

Due to many group members traveling over the festive season and exams beginning at our University today, we celebrated together last Saturday. We had a great time eating pizza, bowling, watching Elf, decorating the tree, eating cookies and more!

We wish you all a safe and happy holiday season.

Congratulations and thank you to everyone in the team: Kori Andrea (Vanier Scholar), Tyler Brown (NSERC USRA, 2016), Jennifer Murphy (NSERC CGS-D, and crystallographer), Dakshita Jagota (MUCEP, Winter 2018), Declan McKearney (Squid data collection, at SFU).

Our paper on some mu-oxo compounds of iron that can be formed during reactions of epoxides has been accepted for publication in the ACS journal Inorganic Chemistry. The formation of such compounds is important biologically as some Fe-containing metalloenzymes detoxify epoxides through deoxygenations such as this, and of course, this reaction is an important consideration for catalytic epoxide/carbon dioxide reactions that are of industrial relevance for the formation of polycarbonates and cyclic organic carbonates.

K. A. Andrea, T. R. Brown, J. N. Murphy, D. Jagota, D. McKearney, C. M. Kozak and F. M. Kerton, “Characterization of oxo-bridged iron amino-bis(phenolate) complexes formed intentionally or in situ: Mechanistic insight into epoxide deoxygenation during the coupling of CO₂ and epoxides”, Inorganic Chemistry, 2018, Accepted, http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.8b02109