Reflection of a Curious Raver (fifth week)

Day 1:   Monday July 2^nd, 2018 arrived at my lab at 9:00am. Prepped for solar experiment since we had some sun today. We infused different vials of urea solution with different nanoparticles for comparative analysis, after which we had to wait for an hour. Before the hour elapsed, I had to leave for a meeting. It was 10:58am, interns gathered at door 283 in the Mechanical Lab Building awaiting entrance into room. Minutes past 11:00am we were let into the room, we settled in to begin the colloquium, more accurately join the already begun conference. Some of us presented our research thus far, and some didn’t, eventually we all will; and thus, we parted ways, but not before answering the Scoville question, “What does a nosey pepper do?” to which the answer is “it gets jalapeño business”. It was past 1:00pm and I had to return to my lab, where we analyzed aliquots and distillates from the varying solutions (by nanoparticles) for the relative production of ammonia. Collected O.D. (Optical Density) readings from a well-plate reader with which we plotted a graph. Most of our analysis was in preparation for the big group meeting on Thursday, July 5^th when we’d present to Dr. Halas.

Day 2:  Tuesday July 3^rd, it was around 10:00am when I settled into my lab I could still perceive the pang of derelict experiments left in the cooler, reacting solutions left under a hood and stirred perpetually with a stirring rod, dirty gloves and pipet tips collecting in the trash, and containers being cleaned with aqua regia from yesterday. It was past 10:00am and we sought to measure the temperature of illumined urea solution infused with nanoparticles. By illuminating the solution with laser light and imaging the solution with a thermal camera, we were able to measure the temperature over a period. It was past 2:00pm, and we got the FT-IR spectra for cupper nanoparticles synthesized in my lab by a grad student. To begin I cooled down one of the FTIR chambers with liquid nitrogen, put in the silicon wafer that held the particles, and we began analysis.

Day 3: Wednesday July 4^th, it was a nationally mandated day off. I hoped for a sunny day but it rained instead, and “there was no good cause to stop the drops”¹

Day 4: Thursday July 5^th, it was 8:58am and I settled into the conference room which was the venue for the Halas lab meeting. It was past 9:00am and Dr. Halas came into the conference room, talked with my mentor for a tad and then it happens, the climax of my week, she extends pleasantries, shakes my hand and then I introduce myself in person for the first time, for someone with an intimidating curriculum vitae, she is tremendously gracious. A couple projects were presented including ours, and we got feedback that essentially proposed that we do analysis different from what we’ve already done for corroboration. It was 1:00pm and I was back in the lab to join one of the grad students of the Halas lab synthesize of cupper nanoparticles. After several mixings, sonicating, decanting, and spins-down we got nanoparticles, which we prepped for SEM (Scanning Electron Microscopy) and FT-IR (Fourier Transform Infrared) spectroscopy for the morrow.

Day 5: Friday July 6^th, it was 10:00am when we met with the grad student with whom we’ll be scoping our prepared nanoparticles. It was past 10:15am we gathered in the SEM room, placed the silicon wafers unto the metal stand, and into the viewing chamber. We got images enhanced to fine magnitudes: We compared the various sizes, surface structure and surface area of particles on the same wafer and between wafers. The conditions under which the nanoparticles, which include concentration, pH, and volume differences, varied between wafers but the one criterion that was varied from previous syntheses is time. Usually the nanoparticles are left to form over the night, this time we prepped after a couple minutes; some particles had rough surfaces, while others had very smooth surfaces and the sizes of the particles varied, which we hypothesized to be a result of not letting the elixir sit over the night. It was around noon when we went over for the FT-IR spectroscopy, which lasted only a tiny fraction of the time required for the SEM. We did get cupper nanoparticle, we would need to dilute the most basic solution for a better FT-IR -scopy.

My name is Ifeoluwa Adebiyi, my faculty host is Dr. Naomi Halas, and my mentor is Dr. Oara Neumann and if there is anything the fifth week has taught, it is that one of the greatest achievements of a scientist is to curb hubris, to remain simple and open despite the accolades they’ve garnered. Here’s to a summer of learning the wisdom of those before us.

Citation

1 Noises, L. (2010). The Gate Beautiful. On Carry Us All Away. [Audio file]. Retrieved from https://open.spotify.com/album/6cFEEdXLv2zeVIAVe3Cp0j. Monologue in this song is from a radio production of “Les Miserables”.