Fun with chemistry

Hi, I'm 22 years old and a chemistry student. I've created this blog to share my journey to become a chemist and also to improve my English (I'm brazilian). So, if I write something wrong, please try to ignore haha :)

[yourfunwithchem]

6th semester

This week my classes started and I'm taking 6 courses:

Theoretical organic chemistry 3

Experimental organic chemistry 2

Experimental inorganic chemistry

Analytical chemistry 4

Theoretical physical chemistry 4

Experimental physical chemistry 2

I'm really excited for some classes! :)

[yourfunwithchem]

Analytical lab: determination of Fe2+ in limestone by the orthophenanthroline method :D

[yourfunwithchem]

Organic lab: determination of alcohol content in gasoline (left) and salting out effect (right) :D

[yourfunwithchem]

My 5th semester

As I said in the last post, I've just finished my 5th semester. So I'll summarize what I did. Last semester I took 5 courses: 

Theoretical Organic Chemistry 2

 Experimental Organic Chemistry 1

 Theoretical Inorganic Chemistry 2

 Analytical Chemistry 3

Theoretical Physical Chemistry 3.

In general, I liked all the courses, but the course that I definitely most liked it was Theoretical Organic Chemistry 2. (I liked it so much of doing mechanisms that now I'm working in a lab of biotechnology and organic synthesis. But I'll talk about this in another post). Well, what can I say about this semester? I think I can summarize in one word: electrochemistry. I studied electrochemistry in physical, analytical and inorganic chemistry. Don’t get me wrong, I'm not complaining. I really enjoy studying electrochemistry :)

The most difficult course I think it was Inorganic. I think coordinate chemistry is really interesting, but a little confusing sometimes. The easiest course was experimental organic chemistry and the experiment that I most liked was the characterization of functional groups.

In Analytical, I studied instrumental methods of analysis, more specifically, potentiometry and spectrophotometry. In Physical, I studied electrochemistry and than kinetics.

Now I'm organizing my schedule for the next semester. I intend to take 5 courses again. Four of them are already defined and the other one it'll be an elective that I’m still looking, but I'll tell you about it in a future post.

[yourfunwithchem]

Am I back?

Wow, it’s been almost 1 year that I don’t post anything here! Actually, I don't know why I stopped to post here. I guess I didn't have much time. Now I'm on vacation (I've just finished the 5th semester. Yeah! \o/) so I think I'll tell you in my next posts what I did last semester.

Well, that's it. This post is just to say that I'm still alive haha.

[yourfunwithchem]

I'm a chem major too :) but I speak Spanish not Portuguese, even tho they are very similar!

Cool! Yeah, there are something in Spanish that I understand because it’s very similar and I’ve never studied. But I know that there are a lot of false cognate haha :D

[yourfunwithchem]

4th semester

My classes began this week! I'm really excited but a little worried because I think this gonna be the hardest semester until now.

These are the courses that I'm taking:

Electricity and Magnetism

Theoretical Physical Chemistry 2

Theoretical Inorganic Chemistry 1

Theoretical Organic Chemistry 1

Analitical Chemistry 2

I have some news to tell you about the new lab that I'm working, but I'll tell you in another post. :)

[yourfunwithchem]

The dangers of a chem lab

As you know I work in a Natural Products research lab and today something unexpected happened.

Me and the others researchers assistants were cleaning up some glasswares and we found a beaker of 500ml (if I'm not wrong) with some extract (we thought it was an extract but it didn't have a label). When we started to wash the person that was washing realized that the texture and the color was very strange, it was a bright orange. In the time, I thought it could be some substance with chromate. We weren't expecting this because we don't work with chromate. We asked a professor that was in the lab and he thought it really was chromate. We panic! We weren't using gloves and masks because it wasn't supposed to be anything dangerous in the sink. 

After we separated and labeled the chromate we texted our Ph.D. to inform what happened. She told us to wash our clothes, take a shower and drink much water when we arrived at home.

Well, it was an irresponsibility of the person that used the chromate not label the glassware, putting everybody in a complicated situation.

Anyway, a tip that I could give to everyone who works in a lab is to be careful in manipulating some substance that you don't know what it is.

[yourfunwithchem]

Last physical chemistry test! \o/

[yourfunwithchem]

Hi! I'm going to start my pre-meds next year, so I need to study chem during the summer and reach that level (it's been almost 5 years since I studied it), do you have any tips on how to self-study chemistry without going crazy? Thanks!!

I don't know if I can help you because I have no idea how pre-med works.

However, during my high school, I didn't have a lot Chem classes and I was very interested in scientific olympiads, so I had to study by myself. I took the most famous Chem book used in high school and I read and tried to solve some problems. When I had some questions I asked some friends, searched on the internet or watched some video on youtube.

Well, unfortunately, I don't have any specific tip for your situation. Sorry :/

[yourfunwithchem]

Last Analitical Chemistry test! \o/

[yourfunwithchem]

Chemical prospecting :)

[yourfunwithchem]

Hi! Glad you're generally happy with your exams so far. Was just wondering, what's your favourite branch of chemistry and why?

Well, I think I can’t answer this question right now because I’m in the third semester and I’ve just had Analytical and Physical Chemistry so far. Next semester I’ll star to study Organic and Inorganic too.

I’m currently working with Organic Chemistry in a Natural Products and Medicinal Chemistry Lab, but I’ll change of lab next semester because I want to explore other fields. My current interests are in Materials Science and Bioinorganic Chemistry.

I’m really excited to study Inorganic, so... Maybe from here to the end of the year, I’ll be able to answer your question. :)

[yourfunwithchem]

The Molecular Shape of You (Ed Sheeran Parody) | A Capella Science

I had to share this parody because it’s awesome!!

[yourfunwithchem]

Update

1) This week a received the result of my first physical chem test and I got 5,1/10. I already knew that it hadn't gone well so it wasn't a surprise. The second test was last Thursday and I think I did a good test.

2) Yesterday I had my second calculus test. It didn't go as well as the first test but I hope to get a good score.

3) I think I didn't tell you that I got 10/10 in my first physical test! \o/

4) In practical analytical chem test + theoretical test I got 8,5/10

So far my grades are not that bad. As you can see, the most difficult class is being physical chemistry.

[yourfunwithchem]

Feeling like a real chemist

Last week I had my practical analytical chemistry test and it was amazing.

Our professor gave us a salt (a different salt for each student) and we had 2 days (2 hours each day) to tell her what was the anion and the cation. The salt could be solid or in aqueous solution.

In the first day, I just identified the anion and it was Cl- and I was suspecting that the cation was Al3+.

In the second day, I did the test for Al3+ and the test was negative. I continued the procedures and in the end, the cation was Ca2+.

However, I was thinking about a possibility of a false positive for Cl- because I didn’t remember if I had washed the pipettes with distilled water. So, less than 1 hour for the end of the test, I did the test for Cl- again. Positive.  My salt was CaCl2!

I’m so happy that I could identify the salt! \o/ :D

[yourfunwithchem]

Today I received the result of my first calculus test and I got 9/10! Yeah!!! \o/ :D

However I’m not so confident for the second test this week...