Chemistry Studies

By Professor L. H. Briggs, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Auckland.

Some years ago a retired solicitor came to enrol in Chemistry II, hoping to complete a science degree which he had started fifty years previously but had not completed owing to his change-over to law. He informed me that he had then passed Chemistry I and was therefore entitled to enrol in Chemistry II. He was rather taken back when I advised him that he should take Chemistry I again as the subject had advanced somewhat in the past fifty years. Perhaps he was not alone in thinking that the degree course had not greatly changed in this time. It is on this advance in Chemistry that I should like to comment

Perhaps the word advance is too mild a word and I really could be more correct in describing the explosion of chemistry, typical of other sciences as well, during the last few decades. When some sections of the community are clamouring for a reduction of the 40-hour week scientists of all description are complaining that the days are too short to do all the exciting experiments that come to their mind. The "back-room boys" still continue to burn the midnight oil but are quite happy in doing so.

There was a time when amateurs, including ministers of religion, could conduct chemical research but today the most important results are coming increasingly from the well equipped laboratories which only large institutions can afford to run. Gone are the days, when, to quote the experiments of Lord Rutherford, they could be done with "sealing-wax and string" and today expensive, sophisticated apparatus is a necessity and not a luxury. With the explosion of chemistry and the demand for trained chemists there is now a world shortage of chemists and other scientists which the ever-increasing output of universities and technical institutes still fail to fill.

To engage in research a scientist must firstly find out what has already been published on the experiments he wishes to make and then to check the literature continually to make sure the same experiments have not been carried out in the meantime. He must at least check through the titles of the current papers even if he cannot find time to read all the papers on the subject. But to illustrate the magnitude of the task, Chem Ical Abstracts last year reported on 160.000 papers published in chemistry while the last Decennial Index of work published in the period 1947-1956 alone composed 19 volumes! Although the Library of the Chemical Society, London, subscribes to nearly 700 periodicals there are some 2500-3000 scientific journals publishing some items of chemical interest, while a new journal in chemistry appears on the average every fortnight.

The output of chemical papers continues to increase at an alarming rate and has actually doubled in the last eight years. It is almost frightening to contemplate the mass of chemical facts still to be discovered and described and it is obvious that serious concern is now being given to the form in which chemical facts can be published, including some computing system. Already some physical properties of chemical compounds are being published on a punched-card system.

Parallel to this explosion in the world literature on chemistry there has been the advance in the techniques of chemistry. Although the test-tube and the distilling flask are still common tools of a chemist a large number of instruments have been invented and marketed for the more precise examination of chemical compounds. Such instruments as ultraviolet, infrared, atomic absorption and nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers use only minute traces of materials but still give a clear insight into the nature and constitution of new chemicals. Some new techniques such as chromatography, the separation of compounds on filter-paper, are very simple and very cheap. The discovery of this technique, which can be used on such a micro-scale that only one-millionth part of a gram is required, earned for Drs. Martin and Synge the Nobel Prize.

Other techniques, however, which use very specialised electronic gear, are very expensive — a modern mass-spectrometer costing over £30,000. With this equipment comes also the need for technical assistance in running and maintaining it. New Zealand universities are generally poor in technical assistance compared with the provincial or "red-brick" universities in the United Kingdom. Where there the ratio of technical staff to academic staff is about 2:1 here in New Zealand the ratio is only about 1:2. Without at least some of these expensive pieces of equipment the modern chemist cannot hope to achieve much compared with his well-endowed colleagues overseas. It is not a question of "keeping up the Chemical Jones" but simply of using the measurements of these instruments to give him results that would take his months or even years to obtain by the old-fashioned methods.

Forty years ago the Professor of Chemistry at the Victoria University of Wellington was able to run the whole department, teaching and research, for under £100. Today, excluding the research apparatus provided by the Research Grants Committee and the Golden Kiwi, the running expenses alone would probably exceed £10,000 per annum. It is at these costs of establishing and maintaining a chemical library, the provision of research equipment and the maintenance of a chemistry department that the Government must examine before it can establish such departments in our new universities. It should also be pointed out that there would be few chemists seeking a university position today where, besides teaching which he accepts as a matter of course, he could not carry out original research with at least a reasonable amount of research equipment.

What is the affect of all this on the degree course where a bachelor degree in science can still be obtained in three years? A large part of previous courses in chemistry has always descriptive, the description of the preparation and properties of chemical compounds. This phase of chemistry, however, is being replaced by a more theoretical approach to the subject — how and why do chemicals react — leaving more of the facts to be gleaned from books of reference. New instruments require knowledge of new theories on how they work. In essence, reasoning and theory is taking the place of more descriptive facts.

The modern degree course, it must be admitted, is more designed to teach a student how to conduct research rather than to make him a practising chemist such as for a paint or fertiliser factory, but at least he is being trained to apply fundamental scientific principles to problems which confront him in industry. It is true, that he might not be conversant with the specific analytical procedure to be applied but knowledge of this could easily be obtained from books of references. This fundamental approach to the subject is not unique to the study of chemistry. Today a graduate from the famous Harvard Law School will have a fundamental knowledge of law but will not necessarily be equipped to take over a law practice. Engineers, too, are being trained more in the fundamentals of their subject than in the mere techniques of their profession.

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Chemistry Studies

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The modern student of chemistry has certainly to learn considerably more than the student of some decades past but fortunately he is still able to achieve this in the space of three years and then to proceed to research work for his higher degree. How long the training degree will remain at three years remains to be seen but it is quite certain that soon a student will have to undergo four years of training before proceeding to research.

The science student at least learns something of the excitement of discovery, be it his or someone else's and perhaps it is this excitement that enables him to cope with the rapidly advancing front of science.