🌟 Molecular Puzzles in Chemical Bathtubs with Chris Brewer: Episode 211 of Under the Microscope 🔬

What to Expect:

In this episode, Chris Brewer shares his innovative research on chemical synthesis and molecular self-assembly. Chris discusses his journey in the field and his work on creating complex molecular structures using chemical bathtubs.

About the Guest:

🌟 Key Takeaways from This Episode:

• Innovative Techniques: Chris’s research involves creating complex molecular structures through chemical synthesis and self-assembly.
• Career Journey: Chris’s research journey has been marked by the exploration of various innovative techniques in chemical synthesis.
• Favourite Experiment: Chris’s favourite experiment involves exploring molecular self-assembly in chemical bathtubs to create complex structures.

🔬 In This Episode, We Cover:

Chris’s Research :

Chris Brewer’s research focuses on chemical synthesis and molecular self-assembly. His work involves creating complex molecular structures using innovative techniques, advancing our understanding of molecular interactions and self-assembly processes.

Chris’s Career Journey :

Chris’s academic journey has led him to explore various innovative techniques in chemical synthesis. His research has been instrumental in advancing our understanding of molecular self-assembly and the creation of complex molecular structures.

Chris’s Favourite Research Experiment :

Chris’s favourite experiment involves exploring molecular self-assembly in chemical bathtubs to create complex structures. This innovative approach has provided new insights into the possibilities of molecular self-assembly.

Life as a Scientist- Beyond the Lab :

Chris values the collaborative nature of scientific research and enjoys engaging with the global scientific community. He is passionate about teaching and mentoring the next generation of scientists.

Chris’s 3 Wishes

1. Increased funding for research: Chris wishes for more financial support to advance innovative research projects.
2. Greater collaboration between researchers: He advocates for stronger partnerships to enhance knowledge sharing and collaborative efforts in research.
3. Improved public understanding of scientific research: Chris emphasizes the importance of public awareness and support for scientific advancements.

Chris’s Time on @RealSci_Nano :

Chris will be taking over the RealSci_Nano Twitter account to share his research on molecular self-assembly and chemical synthesis. Followers can expect to learn about the innovative techniques and complex molecular structures his work focuses on.

Transcript

Developed a Harry Potter themed potions class for the Honors College. You actually went with your, with your little beaker or whatever. [00:00:00] Hi,

and welcome to this episode of Under the Microscope, your science podcast spotlighting materials and nanoscience. My name is Svenja Lohmann. I’m your host for today. And with me, we have a special guest, Chris Brewer, who is a postdoc at the University of California. Texas and Dallas, USA. Welcome, Chris. How are you this morning for you?

Hi, I’m doing well, and thank you for having me. I’m looking forward to being here. We are very excited to hear about your science and your scientific journey. So let’s start right away. Would you explain your research to me and to the listeners in very simple words, please? I’ve worked in a couple of different labs, [00:01:00] so my research has ranged from organic synthesis to surface science.

So, um, long ago as an undergraduate, I synthesized azide molecules that were used as molecular linkers with the goal of being able to do click chemistry in vivo for, for building molecules. As a graduate student. I synthesized organometallic precursors, usually for either, um, photo assisted chemical vapor deposition or electron beam induced deposition processes.

And for there, I also did studies where I looked at how the molecules interact with different conditions like light, because when doing a deposition process, You need to break the molecule apart to be able to form your layer. So, um, as a graduate student, I developed methods to, um, [00:02:00] investigate and determine the mechanisms for how molecules break apart under light.

As a postdoc when I was at NC State, I synthesized new chromophores for, for OLEDs. To try and make some organic ones that were, you know, fully organic, not organic metallic, but also having properties that would be suitable for devices. And now, uh, moving to UT Dallas, I’ve transitioned from synthesis to surface science, and I am looking at techniques for depositing tin sulfide and iron sulfide onto self assembled monolayers Basically look at a model system of how we can do this on to an organic phase.

Okay. So that’s a lot. Hopefully I remain brief. Yeah. Some questions. So you already mentioned, I think, um, LED applications. So what is the, is your research more, you know, fundamental research based, or is that more into an applied? [00:03:00] Direction, what would you say? So, my previous postdoc when I was working on making the OLED chromophores, a hybrid, I was doing the design phase and, you know, the fundamental part to test out different, different designs of the molecule.

So that part I was just kind of making new molecules to see if I change this about the molecule, what does it do to the properties? And so that part, you know, there’s a fundamental aspect to it, but the end goal there was once I made one that was suitable, I handed it off to our collaborator to fabricate into an OLED to see if it was suitable.

So it was kind of an accelerated fundamental approach where once it looked good, we handed it off and, you know, just to see how suitable is it. Okay. So you were in the fundamental side and then you had kind of a partner who was working on the application side and [00:04:00] through close correlation, you can kind of speed up the Fundamental to potential applications, right?

Well, I could get an answer to whether or not what I think is, you know, how I think it’s working in a reaction flask and solution is going to, um, is also true if it’s going to behave when it gets on the surface on a device. Um, now my, my current work Is more on a fundamental level. So we are, we look at substrates that are more, you know, kind of like the size of the end of my pinky there and it we’re using small systems.

So that way we have a lot of control. Because the, so we’re not doing like, um, vapor deposition techniques. We’re doing, um, chemical bath deposition, which is out of the solution phase. So this is used, you can find it used in industry in very large scales, but you know, that’s of course, large, expensive reactors that [00:05:00] have a team that know how to use them and, um, and managing controller properties.

But here I’m doing it on the small system because I can control that in the lab. And I, it’s something that. I can use that system, really understand every component. So, my current work is much more on the fundamental side. Okay, interesting. Just because you mentioned it, and I don’t, sorry, I’m a physicist, actually, by training, but I have not a lot of chemistry background.

Chemical bath deposition. Can you give me like a, you know, like a introduction for dummies? Very brief. So, um, it’s still a deposition technique where the goal is to deposit a material onto a substrate, but chemical bath, actually, it’s kind of just like you’re thinking in the words, it is It’s a chemical bath, like in a, it’s a, it’s literally a beaker with a solution where you mix your [00:06:00] metal precursors and then your different sources for you, you mix your, your source for your metal and then different complexing agents and different, um, reagents in there that have some of, um, to incorporate the different elements that you want into your material.

And here you’re looking at more of the kinetics of how these things react. Thank you. In order to get the right reaction to occur in the solution and have it deposit onto the surface. So, it’s as simple as it sounds, where it’s a deposition being done in a beaker. You know, you don’t have like a traditional deposition system where you have large vacuum chambers.

You know, like where you’ve got to get the substrate in and pump it down. Um, you prep your solutions and you add your substrates and you Wait the appropriate time. Of course, there’s more to it than just that,[00:07:00] 

because it’s, yeah, there’s more to it than just that. But in the simplest terms, that’s an overview. Okay, thank you. I think this is, I mean, there’s always more third, right? There’s always a lot of details, which we can’t see. Always, you know, include on the podcast and maybe too much for everyone. But, um, that was a good press introduction, , and there’s always a way to describe what you do.

That leaves out a lot of , the story . Yeah, I, I know . Okay. So this is basically what you’re doing now. You’re here saying this chemical bath deposition to deposits. What, which materials are you depositing? Yeah, so 10 sulfide and iron sulfides. Why 10? And iron sulfide. So both of [00:08:00] them have known, you know, they’re good for photovoltaic applications, which we’re trying to deposit them onto.

Um, self assembled monolayers that as a model system for being able to do this on other organic systems. So it kind of proof of concept level to show, you know, this can be done and it can be applied to these organic systems, which would be popular for getting to flexible electronics. And when you start looking at organic systems.

If you’re, you remember from when you took, I know you’re a physicist, but, uh, you, you probably at least solve the, um, functional, we have different functional groups that we use in, in the organic, you can pattern a substrate. And the idea is if we can, if we can get the deposition conditions, right, we can get area [00:09:00] selective deposition, which means that depending on how, what, what the end of your organic substrate looks like, you can put.

You can functionalize it in a certain area and hopefully you can tune the deposition conditions to only deposit in one spot. So that way, if you are going to, if we were going to use this in the future to fabricate a device. It wouldn’t just go everywhere for, you know, with no control, we could get it to pattern in a certain spot.

So that’s kind of, you know, that’s the long term goal with what we’re trying to do. And I think that reveals a little bit more of, you know, there’s more to the story there of tuning it and why we’re doing these model systems in the form that we are. Okay, thank you. Very interesting. I understood now that you recently moved to the University of Dallas, if I understand correctly.

Yes, I’ve been here for about one [00:10:00] month. Oh, that’s, that’s very recent. So yeah, I’m still learning the ropes of, you know, my project a little bit. You know, there’s a lot of pieces to learn right now. Yeah, I can imagine that’s a new group, new city, I guess, new, um, techniques. But can you tell us a bit more about how you got there, basically?

So what has been your Career journey. What motivated you to become a scientist? How did you end up where you’re now? So long, long ago, if we look back to when I was in grade school, so this is back in the U. S. high school, I volunteered at the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa. And that was, that was a little bit of my first exposure to, um, some, the science education side.

And after being a volunteer for a little bit, I joined [00:11:00] in a research project that they had there about informal or about it was an informal education project. About how families learn in museums. So we’re looking at, um, developing scaffolding strategies to try and enhance the, the learning experience of families in the museum.

That would be where I kind of started my research experience. So that was back to me in 2008. And. Through those experiences, I also eventually started working as an employee doing science demonstrations and teaching summer camps at the museum. So that experience got me interested in science education.

And I continued working there off and on after I had left Tampa to go to my undergraduate studies at Florida State University. So that was in Tallahassee, Florida at Christmas time and summer. I would return and continue working at the [00:12:00] museum when I was at FSU. I, um, I was a chemistry. Well, I had many different majors.

I was 1 of those that switched, um, where I finally landed during my, uh, 4th years when my major was finally set in stone was. Chemistry and biochemistry. The biochemistry part comes from, I had just taken all of the electives that also satisfied that. But more of the organic and inorganic chemistry is where I was interested.

So while I was at FSU, I also did undergraduate research. So that was my, um, first kind of dive into the discovery side of being in the wet lab. Of, you know, beyond just you take the course and follow the recipe in the book and you get the exact product that they tell you you’re supposed to. Um, that was kind of where I started having the opportunity to explore and be curious in, in the lab.

[00:13:00] Um, so I worked with Professor Leiju. My main project was making these bis azide molecules that would form, that would serve as linkers. in biological systems. And while I was at FSU, I also continued looking at my interest in science education where I, I kind of by luck, I picked up a job that I was in charge of all the demonstrations on campus or not campus for the chemistry department.

I was preparing, you know, I would, I would coordinate with the faculty and prep all this stuff for their classes. Some of them might just hand them materials, some of them might join in their class and do the demonstration for them, and then, uh, you know, so I’d come in and I would get to bring my card in and be the exciting guy in the class that’s there.

Sounds very fun. It was a lot of fun. It was a, it was a very fun job that you might never find one of those, you might not ever find one like that again, but I’m glad I did it for a while. And then I continued [00:14:00] my education experience by going to the University of Florida for graduate school. So that’s in Gainesville, Florida.

So yeah, that, you know, until now we’re still in Florida for my whole life, but I’ve had a lot of good experiences there in LA. And I’m very happy with how I’ve, um, you know, what’s led me to where I am now. So, while at UF, I, um, I worked with Professor Lisa Mackley White, who, she’s also joined you guys on the podcast, I think it was a couple months, months ago.

Yeah, I think we’re getting off the air. Yeah, so I, I worked with her, um, that’s where I worked on my project with designing the mostly ruthenium molecules for, um, chemical vapor deposition and, um, electron beam induced processes. And I also explored some of my interests. I continued to explore some of [00:15:00] my interest in science education while I was at UF.

And one of the things that I did was I developed a Harry Potter themed potions class. For the honors college and actually I’ve I’ve had the I’ve been lucky enough to been able to return To uf the honors college has invited me back a couple of times to help run the program after I’ve left So i’ve been very happy to see it continue to succeed for years after i’ve left the university Um, but that was a lot of fun.

Can you give me one example? What was one? One harry potter theme. I don’t know so We had a lot of experiments and actually it kind of developed into an interdisciplinary class, which was fun because I got the opportunity to get to know a lot of people all over campus and, and get to know a lot more of the resources that were at UF.

So we had, um, one professor who was [00:16:00] down at the med school, but she had a biology and a history background. So she was Professor Sprout and she would join us at the gardens. That were at UF Wilmot Gardens and we would do herbology class there and then up in the Teaching lab. I would do experiments like, um, for our Lumos spell, we would make glow sticks from scratch.

Um, me being, you know, trained as an organic chemist, traditionally that of course I had to throw in a small organic synthesis into the course, but all the students were able to do it. We, we do some other stuff like our, one of our alchemy experiments is we, um, um, We synthesize and extract dyes from either, we use some different chemicals to make Prussian blue or mauve, or we use cochineal insects to extract out the carminic [00:17:00] acid.

So that’s one of our alchemy experiments. And we make these dyes and then the students get to make their own tie dye t shirts using the dyes that they made. And they actually turn out pretty cool. Those are just some of some of the experiments we do. We try our best to, you know, mimic, to use all the spells that we can, but you know, of course we can only, we can only get it so close.

Sounds magical. Okay, that sounds very nice. Where were you before I stopped you there? So UF, so yeah, I had developed the courses and I had done, you know, I had gotten more research experience. So how I got to where I am today. was my main project was looking at photo assisted chemical vapor deposition.

And that was a collaborative project between Lisa’s lab at UF and professor [00:18:00] Amy Walker at UT Dallas. So at the end of my graduate career, I was able to travel out to UT Dallas and get some experience with the depositions. And that’s where I got to know Amy a little bit better. And, uh, and I enjoyed the material science side of the project.

So I, I find, I found myself getting a little bit more interested in the surface science. And so that was right before graduation. And then I went to do my first postdoc at NC State. Working with Professor Phil Castellano, and there my main project was doing synthesis of organic chromophores for OLED applications, but when the funding was up, it just so happened that the timing of everything worked [00:19:00] out just right.

My former collaborator, Amy, was also looking for a postdoc to join for the chemical bath deposition project. So everything kind of timed right, and, and now I’m here. Wow, that’s been quite a few, um, places also you’ve done research in three different states, right? Three different states. The only, I forgot, uh, a, uh, in between FSU and UF, I was at University of South Florida for a little bit doing sugar chemistry.

And one of the, it was an enjoyable experience. That was for a summer REU. Um, one of the most important things I learned from that experience is I do not want to do sugar chemistry, but it was fun to learn, you know, it was fun to learn a new technique and, and, and learn, get involved into a new field for a couple of months.[00:20:00] 

Yeah. And I guess sometimes you, how to say, knowing what you don’t want to do is also, you know, it narrows things down a lot. It does help you because you can at least look at something and say, no, Yeah, , that’s a valuable skill, I think. Yes. I think this sounded like quite an interesting journey, and I’m very impressed actually by, by the museum where you worked.

They, so you, they just employed you even year, you were still in school, right? So, yes. So I started there as a volunteer at 14. I, um, I started working on the research project when I was 16 and. I can, I was, my employment, I was, between volunteering and employment, I was off and on there for about 10 years.

That’s a long time. Yeah, not consistent. Like, you know, there were large spots of it where I was absent because I was in school. [00:21:00] It’s very cool. It’s very interesting. Unique entrance, I guess, into science or a very nice program. It was definitely, you know, it’s definitely different than your traditional classroom.

It was fun. I wouldn’t trade, you know, that kind of way of being introduced to science through science education for, um, for anything I’m happy with where it’s gotten me. Do you, when you go in your place, do you check out other science museums? Um, sometimes. I, um, I’m better about doing that stuff when I’m traveling to somewhere as a tourist than when I live there permanently, you know, when you live somewhere you get, you don’t really explore around like you’re a tourist, but when you’re somewhere for a short time, you look at the map and you decide, okay, well, I’m only here for three days.

What am I going to hit? Because I don’t know if I’m coming back. When you’re, when you live here at home, you look at the map, you drive by the place every day, you say, I’ll get there one day. [00:22:00] So, when I travel, I like to check out some of the science institutions. I’m a lot better about doing it there than where I live.

Yeah, I think we all have this problem that we never are a tourist at home, so to say. So now we heard from a lot of places where you’ve been already, and where you already mentioned quite a bit of different research projects you’ve been involved in. And on this podcast, we have a section which we call In Other Words, where we ask our guests to just pick like their most fun or their most quirky or their favorite research project and explain it to us.

In simple words, as always, because not all our listeners are scientists. So can you pick one and explain it to us, please? If I had to pick one, I was probably most proud of and that I enjoy telling the story about the most. [00:23:00] The, the second major project that I had when I was in graduate school, it was also, it was looking at, just like my first one, it was like looking at ruthenium molecules for photoassisted chemical vapor deposition, but here I, I picked the molecules out and I showed them to Lisa and asked, how about we try these?

She said, sure, looks good. What I had done in this project was I took the lessons that we learned from the first batch of precursors that we did deposition on, and, and the way that, since we’re looking at it in simple words, the way that this deposition works. Is you, you make a molecule and I would ship it over to you to Dallas.

So that way Amy could, Amy and her graduate students could look at the deposition you under vacuum or pulling it into a chamber and once it’s in the chamber, you have substrates here and then you have white that’s shining over it, like in that direction and the [00:24:00] precursors are interacting with the substrate before they are not interacting with the white before they hit the substrate.

Ideally. The light, the molecule should interact with the light, and this will excite them, and what we want to happen when these molecules get excited is for decomposition to start to occur. So we want them to lose ligands upon excitation, and that way we have a more reactive intermediate that will lay down on the surface.

And it should undergo subsequent reactions, and then that way we can form a metallized film that won’t have incorporation of the ligands that I need to, that were there on the molecule. So, my part of the project was investigating how they decompose. Because what I needed to understand on my end was, what pathways do these molecules go when they decompose?[00:25:00] 

And how efficiently is this done? So basically we’re looking at mechanism and quantum yield. So quantum yield is a measure of basically it’s like a percent yield for how many events of decomposition am I getting for in each photon that I put in. When I first joined the lab, one of my first project or one of the first things I had to do Was figure out what equipment do we need to buy to determine these quantum yields?

So I was able to join to design the the system So it the experiment really felt like it was my own You know all the problems that it had were also my own which so, you know, I was responsible for that too. But It felt like, you know, I, I really had a, um, a sense of ownership over that and, and then I, I developed a method to where I could use just [00:26:00] IR.

Um, so infrared spectroscopy to look at the solution. And from there, I could figure out exactly what products are being formed when you shine the molecules light. And from there, I could also use that to determine how much decomposition is occurring. So so I was able to get that information and I was able to figure out through that through some of those experiments, the stepwise process of how do we go from the fully intact precursor all the way down to how the products that I can’t detect that I can no longer spectroscopically detect.

Because once you pop off every ligand. You lose your spectroscopic handles, so there isn’t something that I like if I had carbonyl ligands that were on there. So once you’ve popped off all three of them, there’s nothing on the molecule left for me to see in the eye off. So, you know, I was able to push it as far [00:27:00] as I could, but I was able to get multiple steps and basically understand the full decomposition pathways of it.

So that’s a project I’m probably most proud of. And I enjoy the story because, you know, that one, it was a. It was a, it was a long journey to, to get the answer and once, you know, you have that moment where you felt like you figured it out, it’s pretty exciting. But you, so you found a final working precursor in the end or is it still ongoing?

What I would do is I would design the precursor. I would synthesize them. And I would screen them for suitability by looking at like the mechanism for decomposition. I need to make sure that it will decompose with white and I want to see if I can push it, you know, to get as many of the ligands [00:28:00] off as I can with light exposure.

So that way, In the surface system, it’s, uh, a good probability that we can get rid of all the ligands. And then I was also screening them for high quantum yield values because we, the higher the quantum yield, the more efficient the process is. And that means in the, in the, uh, deposition experiment, you have a higher probability of it working.

Mm hmm. From the design parameters, that was our thought process. So basically I would, once I designed a couple of molecules that I thought were suitable candidates, I would send them to our collaborator for, for trying out, so Amy’s lab would give it a shot and then they would let us know what worked, what didn’t, and we would use that to go from there for designing the next phase.

Of course, [00:29:00] you know, there’s time, it takes all the time to do, to get the molecules to do depositions, to understand the data, so, you know, it’s not as fast as I sent it to them. And the next week we say, this isn’t going to work. There’s a lot more time in there and a, you know, a lot more, you know, kind of stepwise growth on the gens to get to the right answer.

So, so in my work, what I did in that particular project was. Determine molecules that were suitable candidates. And, you know, determined, you know, these ones could work, but not as well. Here’s from the library, the ones that would probably be the best. That work is actually still underway on the deposition side to see how well my mark of suitability stands.

Because once you get into the surface science world, it’s different than doing it in the reaction class. Yeah. As always. Okay, so basically you [00:30:00] have given a recommendation, which you hope is very good, but it’s still, you still need to see if this is true. Yeah, so that’s, um, that was actually kind of a theme in, you know, an overall theme in Lisa’s lab, as a precursor design lab.

What we did was we made molecules. And from the best of our abilities with all the analytics, with all the techniques that we had available to us, we would determine precursors for all the different techniques that we, um, that we designed them for, of this could be a suitable candidate. And based on what we know from, you know, previous molecules that have worked, and how we’ve analyzed this one, we think it has a good probability of working.

And those are the molecules that we would send out to people to try for different processes. Many times we got hits where, you know, it worked well every now and then. No, they did not. Um, because, you know, the story is always different. Every [00:31:00] surface science experiment is different. Um, when you get them in the gas phase, they might behave differently.

So yeah, we, we do our best with the knowledge that we know to Give you something we think will work. So you have to kind of, how to say, have some tolerance for, you know, maybe not working things. And I guess you always have to do this in science, right? Things, there’s a lot of things that are not working.

Yeah. And that’s part of, that’s part of the fun of it. If we, um, when something doesn’t work, you know, we figure out why. And then we, from there, we, it is a learning experience. We do learn. What about that precursor was a problem. Although it may not have worked for the deposition experiment, we learned, we learned a good bit about precursor design.

That we can’t learn from just a bunch of analytical techniques. [00:32:00] Um, knowing that it works or does not work in the, you know, in the Showtime experiment, you know, that, that’s a very important piece of information too. Sounds, sounds good. So we talked a lot about your research now and your research experience, but being a scientist always, you know, entails more than just standing in the lab.

Are there aspects that you like about your job? Well, every day is different. So you don’t walk in and just do the same thing day in and day out. So I like that part. And the whole job is, you know, problem solving. And it’s, um, you have to think about it in the right way. So to me, I think about it, it’s kind of like solving mysteries and puzzles.

Which are fun. It’s not [00:33:00] something you can just answer all of your questions in one day you But everything that you you do it’s important to keep track of it. So and the reason I mentioned that is So in science, you know, we’re given kind of as a researcher You’re given just a project and the project is You You know, it’s on a simplistic scale, you’re told you need to deposit this material onto this surface and we want it to be, or on the synthesis scale, it’s you make molecules for this application or try and make, you know, this drug precursor or something like that.

The projects you’re given are, you know, they’re very simple at the end of the day. Uh, well, not, you’re not supposed to do, but the goal is, you know, it’s a goal that you have. It’s not, [00:34:00] you’re not given a laundry list as a project. If you need to check all these things, it’ll be good for all this stuff. As you go, you learn a lot, and your own curiosity, I can, I can test things, and I can take projects into directions that weren’t planned.

Initially the goal, but are still interesting. And we can learn more things from this, you know, little accidental observations can lead to very important and, and they can lead to very important, uh, discoveries. So like one example of. That would be when I was a graduate student, I had one reaction that for the life of me, I could not get it to work.

I was struggling, I was using, um, I was trying different reagents, I was trying, you know, um, heating it. And then one day I set the reaction up, went out to grab lunch, and I came back, and it worked. But I hadn’t actually started the reaction. All I did was put everything in the [00:35:00] flask and walk away. I hadn’t actually started it with heating all, so, um, and through I could ne I had a really tough time replicating it.

So that what I ended up having to do in that case was figure out that it was because it was a sunny day that day. And this was Florida summer, where in the afternoon, when I was, um, setting up these experiments, most of the time, it was stormy. This one particular day, it was sunny, and the sun was shining in through the window in the lab.

And the light is what actually ended up making it work better than anything. Oh, okay. And through that UV light? Or just any light? Sunlight. We tried replicating it with all of the lights that we had in the lab, all of, you know, the nice high end UV lights, and we couldn’t replicate it the same way, and because of that, [00:36:00] I would set up my reactions, take them to the roof of the building, run them there, because that’s where I could get the most direct sunlight.

You actually went with your little beaker or whatever to the roof of the building? Okay, that’s really funny. So yeah, I had a key to the roof of the building and I would take my reactions up there and let them run and they worked great. So you know, that’s part of the fun part with science, you know. The goal was, I need to make these molecules.

The struggle was making the molecules. The accident was I made them one day, I couldn’t figure it out how, and I tried to reproduce that, and then you get to do fun things like go up to the roof of the building and do your work. And, you know, the other, so, so that’s kind of the aspect of, you know, you never know what’s going to happen, but everything is important.

So [00:37:00] it’s, you know, just one little thing that you do might be more significant than you think. Um, and You know, there was no method for that. There, there was no set procedure for you’re going to need to take it up to the roof. That was all discovery and you get to have fun with it and really create it your own.

Um, and, you know, while I was doing the other project that I was describing earlier. There were molecules that I would decide that I want to make that other people in the lab would try and convince me that, you know, this isn’t going to work. This isn’t, um, this isn’t something you should do, but I wanted to do it.

And they end up, those molecules actually end up being exciting. Um, so, you know, you, um, just because they weren’t in the initial goal doesn’t mean that they. It’s not something you should also just give a shot and see what happens. [00:38:00] Um, so that that’s part of the part that I like about science is I like solving the puzzle.

I like that it, it’s a mystery that you don’t know the answer to, but you have the tools. To get your way to the answer. Um, and, and I like that every day is different. So, you know, I mean, I, I could know exactly what I think I want to do next week experiment wise. But I could see one little observation while I’m prepping my experiment that could tell me, you know, it’s not going to work right.

Or I could see, you know, there could be a color change. It could tell me something else is happening, and the plan has to change. You’ve got to do it. So, you know, that’s the exciting part. It definitely never gets boring. No. Um, well, [00:39:00] you know, there, I’m sure that there are people who can find, you know, the work can get boring, but to me it’s my curiosity that keeps it exciting.

I, I like to, you know, I’ll get curious and I just try something and, you know, even if it doesn’t work, I enjoy it. I think I learned that. Yeah. Um, so for me the curiosity is what keeps it exciting and not getting old. I’m so glad that you’re, you know, this, you’re such a curiosity driven person. And I wish you many more hard to say, lucky accidents, or things that happen during while you grab your lunch, you come back and suddenly something works.

And sometimes serendipity is nice when it works. It’s not The best to, uh, rely on. No. No, but you figured it out in [00:40:00] the end, so it all worked out, I guess. And you know, of course, it’s a long journey to get to the end of the project. It’s not, you know, some of these things, it takes multiple years to solve the problem, you know.

It’s not always, you know, sunshine and smiles in the middle of it. But you, you pull through it. Mm hmm. This is actually a very good turn to my next question, because my next question is, if I say a bit more about, so now we talked about what, what you liked about being in science. Now I would like to go to things that are maybe not so great, or maybe more things that you want to improve.

And we always ask our guests if they had three wishes. What they would ask for. Okay. So the part I don’t like, it can be very frustrating. You know, just like, you know, the part I like is that you’re doing the problem solving and it’s kind of like, you know, you’re solving the [00:41:00] mystery. I like that aspect.

Equally as much as I don’t, because there are questions you have about your system that you can’t find the answer to because someone else has not done it. Otherwise there, there’s not a reason for you to do it. You know, you’re doing things that other people haven’t. So that, when you get stuck, you know, in that time frame, when you’re, you know, when you’re doing the trial and error, when you’re, when you’re sitting there just You know, at your desk, you know, working out stuff on paper, trying to figure out what’s going on.

It’s very frustrating when you don’t know. So that would be the part I don’t like. Is, you know, that, that feeling of frustration. Now, if I, if I could have three wishes to make, you know, the experience more fun, you know, of course I’m going to wish for as much as I can. [00:42:00] But, one thing that is not a surprise is the scientific tools that we use come with a big price tag.

So you, um, you can read about all these tools and literature that people use. You can read about them in textbooks of, Oh, you can use all these different analytical techniques, but when you were at your lab and your university, you have what’s available, you know, because the, this is the suite of instruments that your lab has needed in the past.

This is the suite of instruments that we’ve had, you know, your university has. Funding for funding and most people see the highest usage of Mm-Hmm. Um, but when there’s instruments that you don’t have access to and you know, you’re curious, maybe this might help. You know, it’s not as easy just to do a quick little one-off experiment or, or design an experiment around a tool that you don’t have.[00:43:00] 

I guess, which one would be, you know, just access to any tool you want. Um, now that being said, most places you are, you can get a lot of information from the tools that are available, but you know, it’d be fun to just have any tool you want at your disposal to, well, not at disposal, but, you know, at your, at your availability to you.

So one of the other things that, you know, keeping it kind of on a tool aspect, For me, I would like to have a, you know, through graduate school, I didn’t realize how helpful it would be, but having a better working understanding of how the tools in the machine shop work and, you know, being able to do those kind of skills myself, I think there’d be a lot of help for in my work, because when, when I, if you, if I get an idea on designing something for an experiment, [00:44:00] I would know the limitations of what the tools that people use to build things are, and I could use that in order to design custom setups.

But if I had the ability to use those tools myself, you know, of course I can touch them and use them, but I don’t know how to do any of it properly. But if I had those skills, You know, I could take it from idea to go design something that would make this easier. And I think I could come up with some pretty cool stuff for in my experiments, it would, you know, it’d be, it’d be fun to do all your own, like custom setups, like, well, uh, every, you know, if you’re doing like a deposition experiment, you, everything’s in home built stuff, you know, all this stuff perfectly for that, but, you know, that being said, you can do a lot with, with the materials that you already have.

You can do a lot with traditionally commercially available materials. You don’t [00:45:00] always need the custom setup. For me, that would be fun because I like to tinker with stuff. And I guess the third one, one thing I’ve seen that’s been getting more popular is some of the robotics and the chemistry. And I think there’s a lot of usage for some of that for being able to explore your ideas.

So when you’re at like the postdoc or the graduate student level, If you’re able to incorporate some like robotics to prepare solutions, so that way, you know, you could have a large array of them all done one way, or so like in my case, if I could have it set up a couple of different, you know, deposition techniques, and I focus my time on analyzing what’s happened rather than, you know, preparing all the nitty gritty small steps.

I can explore a lot more ideas faster. Now you do have the aspect of you would have to trust the robot to do it, you know, [00:46:00] to all the same way that you can with your, with your will and hands. But for idea exploration, that would be kind of cool to have for in, in the synthesis lab. I know that that that’s been, it’s kind of a newer tech, it’s kind of a newer thing where you’ve got robots that can do the synthesis.

So this already exists in some labs, or is this more of something that’s still the future? It’s, um, growing. I think is the right word for it. You know, there are, there are labs that do high throughput synthesis with robotics, but, you know, some of these systems, you know, they, they make sense on the large industrial scale.

So, for doing your. You know, for your, for like my application probably involved like designing the system. So, you know, that’s why it’d be a wish because the [00:47:00] design and program, all that, um, if that just existed to me, you know, some of the routine stuff just kind of flow easier and that way, you know, I, I just get an idea, punch in the conditions and it starts and then, you know, I can get like three or four ideas, try it.

You know, you don’t have to weigh the options of, yeah, I could do all of these ideas, but then you look back behind it and say, well, but in order to accomplish these That’s a month or so that I’m off topic, not moving towards the forward goal. So that’d be kind of a wish to help satisfy some of the curiosity.

Might not, might not be impossible, right? This last wish, if you say it’s already exists, it might become, you know, more cheaper and more readily available in the future. It definitely will right now. Yeah. I mean, there’s the price tag barrier. There’s no way, no way that you’d want. [00:48:00] I think, honestly, most, most answers in this category always comes down to time and money.

Yeah. Okay, but they were valid wishes. I hope they all come true. Maybe. We can, we can hope for the best, at least. So my last question is about, um, your week on the Twitter account. I’m just going to quickly explain to, um, new listeners to this podcast, maybe. So this podcast is one part of our real sciences nano project.

And the other part is a Twitter account, which our guests take over for one week to show more of their research. And you can basically follow along and also ask questions. And I basically want to ask you, Chris, what are your rough plans for this week? Yeah, so I haven’t, um, [00:49:00] quite. Sorted everything out exactly, but my, um, my plans as of now are, I’d like to highlight some of the work that’s being done in my current lab because we have multiple different projects that are going on that are all surface science projects.

So I’d like to highlight some of those, you know, rather than just only focus on me because I’d like to highlight our group if possible, and some of that work will highlight some of my previous work. So you know, I think that’s my plans. So I haven’t quite decided exactly how I want to do it, but that’s what I intend to do.

Okay, cool. Is it a big group you’re working in there? No, it’s a smaller group. So everyone gets to have some ownership over their project. And you can have some already after one month, you kind of have an idea what other people are doing. It’s not like, you know, [00:50:00] so big that you cannot, cannot have an overview after, after the short amount of time.

Yeah, it’s definitely manageable. Okay. That’s how it’s interesting that we are not only, you know, getting to know you, but also Other people’s work and other scientists, maybe looking forward to that before I let you go. Is there anything else you want to say anything, you know, that didn’t fit in into into my question so far.Not really. I think you’ve covered a lot. You know, thank you for having me. I’m looking forward to joining you guys. I’m excited to be a part of a part of the real science nano program. Thank you so much for speaking with me and for volunteering to this project. Thanks all our listeners for tuning in and see you soon.