804th Meeting of the LVACS
Lehigh University
Date: November 12, 2008
Location: Lehigh
University, Asa Packer Dining Room
Reception: 6:00 PM
Dinner: 6:30 PM
Meeting:7:30 PM
Talk: At the
conclusion of the meeting
Menu: *NYC Restaurant Special*
Waldorf Salad with Frisee Lettuce, Chicken in a Wild Mushroom Parmesan
Cream Sauce, Spinach Torta with Fresh Herbs and Mozzarella Cheese,
Buttermilk and Chive Mashed Potatoes, Oven Roasted Asparagus NY Style
Cheesecake
Cost: $20 Members; $10 Students
and Retirees
Contact: JoAnn
DeSalvatore, 610-758-3471, jmd207@Lehigh.EDU
Directions: On the web at
http://www3.lehigh.edu/about/maps/default.asp
Talk: Strengthening our Academic
Foundations: Report from
an NSF ADVANCE Project On the Status of Women Chemistry Faculty in
Doctoral Granting Universities
Speaker: Sally Chapman, Professor of Chemistry,
Barnard College
Concerned by the paucity of tenured women faculty members
in doctoral granting universities, the ACS with the financial
assistance of an NSF Grant undertook Project Progress. Dr.
Chapman served as PI on the grant and supervised the study. Written
surveys and oral interviews in focus groups and were conducted with 877
men and women, including administrators, faculty members, postdoctoral
associates, and graduate students, during one-day site visits at
chemistry and chemical engineering departments in 28 Ph.D.-granting
institutions. A preliminary review of the perceptions of the
climate for women scientists based on the data collected during these
visits has been completed. Discrimination on both the individual
and institutional level still persists, and changing this reality
presents a serious challenge to advocates of gender equity. Some
recommendations are offered by the team which performed the study.
Dr. Sally Chapman was educated at Smith College and
received her PhD from Yale. After postdoctoral experiences at UC
Irvine and UC Berkeley she joined the faculty of Barnard where she has
served multiple terms as Department Chair and has been the holder of
the Ann Whitney Olin professorship. Sally has also chaired the
ACS Committee on Professional Training and the Petroleum Research Fund
Advisory Board. She has more than 30 publications mostly on the
thermodynamics and kinetics of gas phase reactions.
803rd Meeting of the LVACS
Kutztown University
Date:
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Reception:
5:30 PM, Formal Dining Room (SUB 223), various hors d'oeuvres
Dinner:
6:00 PM chicken marsala or California vegetarian pasta, salad,
vegetable medley, rice, and brownie dessert.
Meeting:
McFarland Student Union Building, at the conclusion of dinner
Talk:
At the conclusion of the meeting,
Cost:
$22.00 members and guests; students and retirees $10.00.
Contact:
If attending, please email Ms. Donna Moore, Department of
Physical Sciences -moore@kutztown.edu, with your name, institutional
affiliation, and choice of entree (chicken or vegetarian). The deadline
for reservations is Oct. 23 at 5 p.m.
Directions:
Directions to campus and a campus map are available on the KU
website (http://www.kutztown.edu/about/campusmap/ ). McFarland SUB is
building 8 on the campus map. Free parking is available in lots A1 and
A2 (no permit needed).
Speaker:
David Reingold, Department of
Chemistry, Juniata College
Professor David Reingold came to
Juniata in 1988 with a Ph.D. from the University of Oregon, an A.B.
from Dartmouth College, additional research experience at the
University of Alberta, Canada, and the University of Chicago, and more
than ten years of college teaching experience. He was awarded Juniata's
Lindback Foundation Award for Distinguished Teaching in 1992 and the
Beachley Award for Distinguished Academic Service in 2001. Dr.
Reingold's special interests include synthetic organic chemistry and
molecules of theoretical interest. He has received grants totaling more
than 1.3 million dollars from the National Science Foundation, the
Petroleum Research Fund, the Research Corporation, and the Camille and
Henry Dreyfus Foundation to support his research in the synthesis of
non-natural products. He is author of numerous articles in such
publications as the Journal of Organic Chemistry, Tetrahedron Letters,
Synthetic Communications, and the Journal of Chemical Education. Many
of these papers had undergraduate students as co-authors. He is also
the author of two textbooks published by IA Books, entitled “Organic
Chemistry: An Introduction Emphasizing Biological Connections,” and
“Preparation for Organic Chemistry.” Dr. Reingold is an active member
of the American Chemical Society and the Council of Undergraduate
Research. He holds the H. George Foster Chair of Chemistry at Juniata
College.
Talk:
Juniata’s Organic First Curriculum: Why Isn’t Everyone Doing It?
Abstract:
Like several other schools, we have begun to teach organic first at
Juniata College. Unlike many of them, we have elected not to teach the
standard sophomore organic course to the freshmen. Recognizing that the
students do not have the background of sophomores, we begin the course
with some introductory material that cannot be treated as review.
Recognizing that most of the students taking chemistry at Juniata are
biology-oriented, we have incorporated biological applications
throughout the course, not just in a final few chapters. In order to
make room for all this additional material, some material has been
deleted. Information of use primarily to chemists is postponed until
junior year, when the audience is mostly chemists. The result is a
curriculum that starts with the biological aspects of organic
chemistry, does inorganic and analytical chemistry in the sophomore
year, and revisits organic in the junior year. The talk will describe
the advantages and disadvantages of this curriculum and some data
concerning the success of students who have been through it.
803rd Meeting of the LVACS
Lafayette College
Date:
September 24, 2008
Location: Faculty Dining Hall, Lafayette College
Reception: 5:30, cheese and fruit
Dinner: 6:00
Meeting: At the conclusion of dinner
Talk: At the conclusion of the
meeting, Hugel Science Center, Jaqua Auditorium (Rm 103)
Menu: Chicken Cordon Blue or Beef Brisket, Roast
Garlic Potatoes, Fresh Green Beans, Coffee/Tea/Soda, Chocolate Layer
Cake; Vegetarian Option- Portabello Stacks.
Cost: members $20, students &
retirees $10
Contact: Debbie Bastinelli at 610-330-5213 or
bastined@lafayette.edu by September 19
Directions: On the web at
http://www.lafayette.edu/community/directions.html
Speaker: Scott McN. Sieburth
Dr. Scott McN. Sieburth is a professor of chemistry at Temple
University. Scott received his BS degree from Worcester Polytechnical
Institute in 1977 and his PhD from Harvard University in 1983. He
worked for FMC Corporation for seven years in their Agricultural
Chemical group. Before he moved to his present position at Temple
University, he was professor of chemistry at SUNY-Stony Brook. He has
diverse interests in organic chemistry, especially the [4+4]
photocycloaddition reaction, and the synthesis and biological activity
of silanediols (http://astro.temple.edu/~sieburth/). Scott received the
2008 Philadelphia Organic Chemists' Club Award in recognition of his
outstanding contributions to organic chemistry and service to the
scientific community.
Abstract
Using Silicon to Design New
Pharmaceuticals
Silicon is the second
most abundant element, and the element closest to carbon in its
properties. Despite more than a century of organosilane research,
only two silanes are produced commercially because of their biological
activity, with silicon replacing a quaternary carbon. Unlike
carbondiols (X=C) that dehydrate to ketones, silanediols (X=Si) do not
dehydrate to give silanones. We have employed this property to
design protease inhibitors where a silanediol mimics a hydrated amide
carbonyl. These are more complex than any silanediols previously
prepared and they have stimulated a broad investigation of organosilane
chemistry.
Protease inhibitors are
an important class of drugs, applicable to almost any disease.
Our silanediols have been found to be reliable protease inhibitor
design components, leading to low nanomolar inhibitors of an aspartic
protease (HIV protease) and metalloproteases (thermolysin,
angiotensin-converting enzyme).