Green Chemistry @ MUN

Congratulations to Juliana Vidal! Ju is in her final year working with Dr. Kerton and Dr. MacQuarrie. She found out today that she has received a Dr Liqin Chem Graduate Excellence award ($5000 CAD)

Earlier this semester, Ju received 1st place in the #RSCEnv category at the #RSCPoster Twitter conference. Her poster is shared below, and here is a link to her RSC Poster Pitch, https://twitter.com/juliana_lvidal/status/1366731969355218945?s=20

We will add more news as the semester progresses 🙂

Dr. Kerton with the NRC has a scholarship as part of the Ocean Graduate Excellence Network. The NRC are the National Research Council of Canada and they are Canada’s largest federal research and development organization. This is an exceptional opportunity for a talented student to join our team of material chemists who work on adding value to waste materials produced in the fishing and aquaculture industries. Students will spend some of their time at NRC labs to further their research and personal development.

Applications consisting of a cover letter, CV/resume and transcript(s) should be sent to Dr. Kerton by the end of March 2021. Dr. Kerton and her NRC collaborators will shortlist a group of students to interview and the successful candidate will be notified by late April 2021. The start date is September 2021. An advertisement in Science can be viewed here.

Students will have their tuition and other fees covered, and will receive a stipend of ~$33,000 CAD per annum for 4.5 years. They will also receive a professional development allowance to attend conferences, workshops etc. This scholarship is open to Canadians and international students.

We are looking to recruit a strongly motivated student who has an undergraduate honours degree in chemistry and ideally has completed an M.Sc. in a relevant discipline (e.g. Materials Chemistry). The latter is optional as excellent students (1^st class standing with research experience) can be admitted directly into the PhD program in Chemistry at Memorial University after completing undergraduate studies. Students are expected to demonstrate a strong interest in sustainable science and ocean science. Note: this program is competitive and we cannot promise to respond to all applicant inquiries.

We forgot to get a screen grab in our first 2021 group meeting last week. We remembered this week 🙂 Only 2 missing from the shot (Fatma and Sachel)….hopefully we’ll catch them another time. Next week’s focus is on e-posters ahead of the RSC Twitter poster conference. Wishing everyone around the world a science-filled 2021.

We had our last virtual group meeting of the year and would like to wish all our friends, collaborators, colleagues and family a safe and happy holiday season.

We have been very lucky in Newfoundland and Labrador so far, with few cases of covid-19 compared to many places around the world. This does not mean that 2020 was without its challenges for us. Our labs were closed for research from mid-March until July, some group members got caught out when travel restrictions were introduced, and new group members have had their start dates postponed until January 2021. Also, once our labs were open, we had to work to strict covid workplace guidelines with limited occupancy of our labs. We have had great successes too – honours students graduating, virtual conference presentations, grants funded, papers published and more. We are happy and optimistic for a fun- and science-filled 2021, and a relaxing break during the holidays.

Jevon Marsh (Kerton Group, NSERC USRA 2016) has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to conduct his PhD studies at the University of Oxford. Congrats on your MSc from Queens and good luck in your future studies at Oxford. Everyone at MUN is very proud of you!

Dr. Jen Murphy (PhD 2019, Kerton group) discovered an unusual form of calcium carbonate when investigating potential uses for waste mussel shells. This new materials chemistry is now online in the journal Matter. Both Dr. Kerton and Dr. Murphy have been busy chatting with journalists over the past two weeks about this unusual discovery that happened by chance. We hope that the ‘sponge’ can be used in a range of different areas – so far we have only looked at it for adsorbing dyes and oil but we think it has much broader applications.

News coverage

Materials Today: https://www.materialstoday.com/biomaterials/news/absorbent-sponges-made-from-waste-mussel-shells/

Chemistry World, from Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing: https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/inorganic-sponge-made-from-seafood-waste/4012758.article

CBC The Broadcast, with Jane Adey, https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-122/clip/15809681

Radio Canada, interview with Gino Harel: https://ici.radio-canada.ca/premiere/emissions/les-annees-lumiere/segments/reportage/208649/universite-memorial-coquille-moule-acide-acetique–materiau-spongieux

Cosmos Magazine, from the Royal Institution of Australia: https://cosmosmagazine.com/technology/materials/to-create-a-sponge-just-add-acetic-acid/

The Gazette, at Memorial University: https://gazette.mun.ca/research/hard-to-soft/

Christian Science Monitor: https://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2020/1110/Science-on-the-half-shell-Mussels-yield-new-material

Interesting Engineering: https://interestingengineering.com/seafood-waste-based-sponge-could-help-clear-the-sea

ScienceDaily Website: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/11/201105113017.htm

Phys.org Website: https://phys.org/news/2020-11-hard-soft-sponges-mussel-shells.html

Welcome to our Honours (490A/B) Research Students, Olivia, Cassie and April! Also, our new MSc Students, Mikhailey and Cyler. Lots of new new green chemistry and catalytic reactions going on in our labs again. We look forward to more new graduate students arriving once Canadian borders are open again 🙂

Today we are celebrating our wonderful graduates. Dakshita held MUCEP positions in the Kerton group working alongside Kori Andrea (Vanier Scholar and PhD candidate) on iron-catalyzed reactions of epoxides with carbon dioxide. She then did her honours research in the Kerton group working with Juliana Vidal (PhD candidate) on biodegradable polymers using some materials prepared by MSc graduate Courtney Laprise (now, MUN Education). This research has involved collaborating with the Sit group at St. Mary’s University. We are excited to cheer Dakshita across the virtual convocation/graduation stage as she receives her B.Sc.(Hons) Degree in Chemistry (Biological). Congratulations Dakshita! Please stay in touch when you begin your adventures at MUN’s Faculty of Medicine in the Fall when you begin your studies in medicine 😀

Today we are celebrating our wonderful graduates. Mikhailey held a MUCEP position in the Kozak group working alongside Keegan Start M.Sc. on iron-catalyzed coupling reactions. She then did her honours research in the Kerton group working with Juliana Vidal (PhD candidate) on biodegradable polymers, including a collaboration with the Sit group at St. Mary’s University. We are excited to cheer Mikhailey across the virtual convocation/graduation stage as she receives her B.Sc.(Hons) Degree in Chemistry. Congratulations Mikhailey! We are excited to have you stay in the MUN Green Chemistry and Catalysis Group for your M.Sc. studies beginning in September 😀

Congrats to Ju (Kerton Group), who will be one of three early career chemists representing Canada in Trinidad and Tobago during May. More details are available in the ACCN magazine: https://www.cheminst.ca/magazine/article/commonwealth-chemistry-struts-its-stuff/

We wish all the Canadian representatives including Dr. Mona Nemer (the government of Canada’s Chief Science Advisor) and Dr. Steven Holdcroft (vice-president of the CSC) a wonderful congress! and a successful visit to the Caribbean.

**Postscript: March 6, 2020, the congress has been postponed due to concerns regarding travel and the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19)**