Street Painting!

     One of Drake’s richest traditions, street painting on Carpenter Avenue in between Cowles Library and Jewett Hall took place this past Friday, and it was a blast! If you’re not familiar with street painting, it’s a kick off to the Drake Relays festivities when 54 different student organizations/clubs create a design to reflect their group’s characteristics and uniqueness and the Relays theme. This year’s theme is “Memories in Motion”.
    This was my second year street painting, and this year I even created the Chemistry Club’s square design with my friend and former cross country teammate, Josh (He’s also my VP in Chem. Club). We both consider ourselves to be artistically challenged, but we were both pleased with the output of our work. This year there were actually more designs submitted than squares available, so we felt relieved that our design was selected!
    We decided to make molecules that were running, and dub our theme “Molecules in Motion”. We had to throw the blue oval on their too!
    Overall, there are three stages to street painting:
1.    Background Painting – our color was yellow this year
2.    Sketching – clubs sketch their designs using chalk to prepare for the actual painting
3.    Street Painting! – This when most of the work is actually done. Three hours are allotted for each club to complete their square, and at the end of the night, a winner is selected based on their creativity and how well their square reflects the theme. After clubs have finished painting (or before for that matter too) pain flies everywhere. It’s impossible to leave the street without being fully covered in paint!

Drake has a lot of talented artists! I think it’s safe to say that the Chemistry Club didn’t come close to winning the contest, but I’d give us an ‘A’ for execution! A lot of the designs are very complex, and some clubs took all three hours to finish their design. Walking up and down the street at the end of the night, I was thoroughly impressed. Each square was individually unique and beautiful in its own sense.
One of my favorite designs was actually a collaboration between five organizations: The five clubs teamed up to paint the Earths across all five squares, while adding their own character in other areas of the square at the same time. It’s really cool.
    After washing all of the paint out my hair, I’m really looking forward to this upcoming week. It’ll be full of excitement and track races, and I look forward to cheering on my teammates (and some of my high school teammates) in the relays, and look forward to running a competitive 8k in the “Relays on the Roads” race on Saturday morning! It’s going to be a great week! Check out pictures of our design and some of the square below!

Phase 1: Background Painting

Phase 2: Sketching (hard to see due to the contrast and sunlight)

Phase 3: Street Painting

Molecules in Motion!

The Blue Oval (I painted the blue!)

Not too shabby, looks like we planned!

Josh and I

The cool multi-organization collaboration

The 2012 Campus Fellowship Square! It turned out well! So much detail, I really like how they captured some of the main events we do throughout the year.

V-day!

Back on (the) Track

            This past Friday marked my first track race in one year! Up until about four weeks ago, I’d been dealing with a knee injury that just wouldn’t go away or show any signs of healing. In late October at the end of my cross country season, I slowly began to get pain behind my kneecap, and one morning my body had finally had enough, and it hurt just to walk around.

            In between October and February, I saw upwards of six different doctors and physical therapists – all of which gave me different opinions about my injury. Some were convinced the problem was rooted in some of the smaller ligaments of the knee, while others were certain I had a high calf strain or lower hamstring strain. The first breakthrough came when I saw the track team’s doctor at the start of the second semester. He identified a muscle imbalance in some of my smaller hip abductor/adductor muscles. His best guess was to do some rehab exercises, and see how the knee responded after my balance had been retained. He predicted from that night in early February that my recovery would take another six weeks or so. He ended up being spot on!

            By spring break, I had built up to running for 35 minutes, and started to sprinkle in a few tempo runs to try to get back into decent shape for outdoor track season. In the NCAA, you’re allowed five years to use four years of athletic eligibility, and my freshman year I redshirted my outdoor track season (or saved my eligibility) so I knew that’d I’d run this outdoor season if I could, and realized that the results might be a bit ugly: trying to race after a five month layoff and only three weeks of buildup running doesn’t point to running a fast time relative to where I’d been in the past where I had months upon months of consistent running and workouts built up to base my fitness off of.

            However, in the few weeks I have been running, the workouts have been encouraging. I’ve only done a few tempo runs and three legitimate track workouts, but each has informed me that working out hard in the pool and the elliptical machines have been worth it! My body responded well to the faster pace running, and a workout of 800m repeats I did about a week ago indicated that I could run about 15:45 for 5k, or maintain 5:05/mi for 3.1 miles.

            When the gun went off Friday night, it was surreal. There was no hope in sight for months, and here I was again, racing, back on the track, one year later. I was just pumped to be running for joy again, running for the Lord, and getting the most talent out of myself that He put in me. I didn’t have a performance goal I was shooting for because I don’t think you can accurately assess your fitness after only running for three weeks. My coach and I talked about a conservative race plan of hanging back early in the race, so I wouldn’t blow up and crawl the last mile or two to the finish line. I figured if I raced smart, I’d be able to run about 15:50 or so, which is a bit off of my personal best (pb) of 15:38.

            Early on in the race, I was surprised how easy things felt! The weather was perfect, and I ran a smart race. I went through the first mile about 10 seconds faster than I expected to in 4:54, but I felt smooth and knew I could maintain this pace for a while longer. I crossed through two miles in 9:55, and this is when I think I knew I could challenge my pb. With 1600m to go (4 laps, or just under a mile), I saw 10:35 on the clock, so I’d need about a 5:00 mile to get a new record, I was up to the challenge. At this point in the race, a lot of guys who went out hard were starting to crash, so I passed probably 5-6 guys in the last mile, which also boosted my confidence. With one lap to go, I knew I was still on pace, and gave that last lap everything I had and crossed the line in 15:34, a 4 second pb!

            When I look back on the race, I just remember how much fun it was! It had been so long since I’d raced, that I almost forgot how good it feels to go out and give your best effort. I’m still not sure why my body was able to run as fast as it did two days ago, but I’m excited for the next month or so! Workouts are going well and some more big races are coming up, so more pbs are on the horizon!

            I would not have been in the position I was Friday night if it wasn’t for the help of many people! Almost everyday leading up to the race, I did rehab exercises with our track trainer Gary, who put me through sometimes up to 90 minutes of core/hip strengthening drills. He believed and saw potential in me, and was willing to invest a boatload of time into getting me better. I was also able to receive treatment at DMU from a Med student named Katie. She helped relieve pressure points in my legs, and saw that I had a really tight IT band. I think loosening that up certainly improved my knee as well. I also had encouragement from lots of friends and family. My first race back, my parents made the trip down from the Twin Cities to watch me run, I heard their support the whole race, which certainly helped propel me to a new pb.

            It’s funny how things work out sometimes. At points over winterbreak and early on in the semester I had to accept the fact that my competitive running career may be over. It’s something I love to do, but I’m thankful that it’s not the lord of my life anymore! God works in cool and mysterious ways, and decided to bring running back when all hope seemed lost. I’m pumped to see what else he has in store for the future. For this track season, the rest of this semester, and life.

With dad, we went to the Waveland Cafe for breakfast yesterday, it was excellent!

My mom!

Chemistry Against Cancer!

     About a week ago, Drake partook in the annual “Relay for Life”, a volunteer-driven fundraising event sponsored by the American Cancer Society. If you’re unfamiliar with the event, you can read more about it HERE.
    This year I was the captain of the Chemistry Club’s team, and our theme was Chemistry Against Cancer! The chemistry club is composed of students who will mostly be entering medical and/or research related fields, so it was awesome to help out and raise support for a good cause that many of us will be directly involved with someday. Our team was composed of 17 members (all students, and one lab instructor), and we ended up raising just over $600 for the event through our individual fundraising efforts.
    One of the coolest things this year was that we were also able to donate an additional $2,5000 from our club’s funds! At the beginning of each semester, we sell lab notebooks and goggles to raise funds to support kids in chemistry and a few social events each semester. For the past few years, we’ve had a surplus of money in our account that wasn’t doing much, so we decided to make a big donation! With this donation, we were one of the top fundraising team at Drake this year!
    The actual event is really cool! Teams walk around a track (located in the Knapp Center) from 6pm-6am to raise awareness and honor those who have had cancer. There’s also lots of free food and fun activities including comedians, sports competitions, and my favorite, free foot massages.
    Something I was unaware of before the night of the event was that the lab instructor on our team, Greg, is actually a survivor of Leukemia. He’s a really cool guy! He graduated from Drake in 2009, after going through chemotherapy in all four years at Drake! That’s impressive! In the fall of 2010, the cancer was completely gone! He actually was the top fundraiser on our team, and I was really glad we could make the extra donation, because he’s living proof that events like this matter and make a difference! Check out some of the pictures of our team below! Thanks to all those who have donated, you’re money helps so many people, and is being invested to find a cure for cancer! Happy Easter!

Team Chemistry Against Cancer!

We had to do a goofy photo!

With Greg at the "Hope" letters. Cancer survivor right there!

The free foot massages were off the chain! I got one after Shivali did.

Enjoying the evening!

   

Metallacrowns

As I alluded to in my previous post, this summer I will be researching Metallacrowns at the University of Michigan. In this post, I will describe some of the things I will be doing in my 10 weeks in Ann Arbor. I apologize ahead of time if many of the things I am about to discuss are difficult to grasp. Unless you’ve taken a year of general, organic, and inorganic chemistry, much of the terminology/topics will be hard to grasp, but I’ll try to make up for this by adding a few visuals.

First of all Metallacrowns are inorganic analogues of crown ethers, which have –[C-C-O]_n- repeating units. Metallacrowns introduce transition metals into the backbone and have –[M-N-O]_n- repeating subunits, where M is a transition metal.

This field of chemistry was discovered accidently In 1989, the Pecoraro group was studying salicylhydroximate-vanadium complexes and found out that they accidently synthesized the first Metallacrown – they made something they weren’t expecting to! Here are a few examples of the structures of these molecules, which have been characterized using x-ray crystallography. 

Compared to their organic counterparts (cyclic ethers, macrocycles, cryptands, etc…) they are much easier to synthesize, are produced in high yields using common lab solvents (very cost effective!). The inclusion of transition metals also eliminates structural restrictions. New geometries such as octahedral (the classic geometry seen in coordination chemistry) and trigonal bipyramidal become accessible and allow one to build complex structures in two and three dimensions. 

All of this would be worthless unless Metallacrowns could be applied in practical ways. Currently, they’re being used as encapsulation and molecular recognition agents (think removal of heavy metals in lakes and streams), single molecule magnets, liquid crystals, and antibacterial compounds, to name a few. 

This summer I will be attempting to implement some previously made Metallacrowns into Rotaxanes, which are like a molecular ring and axle. We hope to incorporate these new molecules into molecular machines, drug delivery devices, and stimuli responsive materials.

I’ll also be introduced to many new instrumental and analytical techniques that aren’t available at Drake, including: electrospray mass spectrometry, ¹H NMR, and x-ray diffraction/crystallography. It’ll be an exciting 10 weeks to discover if a career in research and pursuing graduate school is right for me!

This Metallacrown has encapsulated a Lanthanide ion

A 3-D complex with three encapsulated metals

A Summer in Ann Arbor!

    It’s been a while since I’ve blogged about my research experience for undergraduates (REU) search. Ultimately I applied to five different programs (Colorado State, Graz University of Technology (Austria), Michigan, Penn State, and Syracuse). About three weeks ago I received my first offer from Penn State, and then several days later I received an offer from Michigan and accepted it the next day! This means that I’ll be a part of the chemistry REU from May 30 – August 7 this summer. There were several observations I took away from the application process.

1.    The funding for science has gone down the drain! It used to be the case that getting an REU wasn’t too hard to do. Now, each program has become ultra-competitive (over 400 applications for 5 spots for the Graz experience, 350 applications for 15 spots at Michigan). All this does is inhibit and discourage the future innovators of tomorrow. These REU programs are meant to instill excitement and purpose for America’s future, and with the budget cuts, many of our country’s future pioneers will not get to experience the thrills of working in the lab first hand. Syracuse and Austria, programs that have excellent reputations and that had received funding for 25 consecutive years, did not receive aide this year. I was also planning on applying to Georgetown, which was not supported either.

2.    God works in cool ways! When I first found out that I was accepted to Penn State, I was just about to start writing a four-page abstract to apply for a research job at Drake over the summer, as a backup plan in case I was not admitted to any programs. I was back home in Minneapolis for the weekend to see my (twin) sister ride in her last collegiate equestrian meet (she goes to the University of Minnesota Crookston), and by being accepted on the spot, it meant I got to spend more time with my family that weekend, instead of drafting a proposal.

When I was offered positions at Penn State and Michigan, I had to accept or decline the offers within a week, or else they would extend the invitation to someone else. These two schools both have highly ranked graduate programs, and I believe now, would be the best places for me to see if it is in the Lord’s will for me to pursue an advanced degree. Ultimately, my 10 weeks in Ann Arbor will be essentially 10 weeks of graduate school while I’m an undergraduate – straight research!

I found out this past week that I was also accepted to programs at CSU and Graz, but can see the Lord’s greater purpose in this. A summer in the Rockies (altitude training) or adventures in the Alps would be awesome, but ultimately, Michigan will most clearly depict the accurate experience of a graduate student in the U.S. When I received these offers, I had to decline because I was already locked in with Michigan, and I feel that’s the perfect place for me to be.

3.    Drake rocks! I know I certainly would not be in the position I am in without all the help and support I get from my professors and others at Drake! The odds of getting into many of these programs are slim by the numbers, but the fact that I (and students older than me in the past) have been/will be able to participate in experiences like this reflect tremendously on Drake. I can’t thank my chemistry professors Dr. Bohorquez, Dr. Cairns, and Dr. Vitha enough for all of the wisdom and assistance they’ve given me in this process. They helped me secure an awesome, all expenses paid study-abroad experience in Madrid last summer (which is why I have this blog), and have now helped me obtain another great opportunity! I can’t forget to mention my parents who helped me out a ton too!

    In my time at Michigan, I will be working for Dr. Vincent Pecoraro on his Metallacrown project (I actually gave a 25 minute presentation on Metallacrowns last month for my Junior Seminar course). I’ll be in the lab anywhere from 40-60 hours/week (like grad school) and will also get to participate in some sweet extracurricular activities. I’m really excited to meet some new people, there are 14 others from around the U.S. who will be there, as well as about 25 others from an exchange program with a school in Beijing – that’s not to mention the other graduate students, post docs, and professors I’ll come into contact with!
    The Michigan program also appealed to me because I knew there was some sweet fellowship I could get involved with over the summer at New Life Church! It’s very similar to the church I attend now, and I look forward to this as well. This is all exciting to me, but I can’t forget that in the meantime I’ve still got seven more weeks of my junior year to finish off! There are a lot of cool things coming up, it’s going to be a fun ride, I’ll keep you updated!

Spring Break and Running out of Time

    Spring break is here! This is certainly one of the best times of the year in my opinion because it gives me an opportunity to take a short break from the semester, allowing me to recharge and finish the year out strong. It’s also a sweet opportunity to hang out and spend time with family and friends!
    So far much of the break has consisted of relaxation! I’ve been able to kick back (not use an alarm clock!) and just enjoy life at home without having to worry about any upcoming assignments nor tests. Over the weekend, I was able to get a nice run in with my friend Kyle before he headed back to school yesterday, and I’ve also spent some time with my sister Melanie, who returned to school yesterday as well. In my spare time, I’ve been keeping tabs on the NCAA tournament (March Madness!) and have been able to read some good books.
    The outdoor track season is only weeks away, and within the past two weeks I have resumed running moderately without pain! I’ve only built up to 30 minutes so far, but yesterday I did my first tempo run (15:00 @ 5:30/mi), which wasn’t too hard, so I’m encouraged that I may be able run some personal bests this year. One thing I don’t get to do too often in Des Moines is go biking. I love going out for a long relaxing ride, and am blessed to live in the most “bike-friendly” city in the U.S.! I got a nice two-hour ride in this morning, and plan to bike out to my hometown Chanhassen later this week and go for a nice ride with my dad on the weekend.
    One of the most enjoyable parts of watching college basketball is witnessing how teams respond when their seasons are on the brink. Often times, teams will play like they’re sleepwalking the first 35:00, and then in the last 5:00 realize, “Oh crap, if we don’t start going bonkers right now, our season might be over”. This leads to some epic comeback and exciting finishes, but you wonder if a team would even need to be in that position if they had been playing with a similar kind of intensity and effort from the start of the game.
    Too often we can do that with life too. We drift through life aimlessly, without purpose, and then when we realize that a chapter in our life is coming to an end – or life itself is coming to an end we react out of instinct because we innately don’t want to “waste our lives” and let them slip away.
    One of the books I’m reading right now, Tuesdays with Morrie, is about a professor who learns he has ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and has to accept the hard truth that he only has a year or less to live. His response to his circumstance is encouraging, and should serve as a guideline for how we ought to view each day of our lives: “Do I whither up and disappear, or do I make the best of my time left?” (P.10)
    Whether we realize it or not, all of us our like Morrie – each day we are one day closer to our death (I’m also thankful I’m one day closer to seeing Jesus!). We can allow life to slip away, or we can live with gratitude and purpose for the lives we’ve been given.
    Thinking about this, I remember a music video I saw in high school, which was very sobering (check it out below). I don’t particularly like Nickelback nor the song Savin’ Me, but the film is intriguing. Often times we believe that we’ll live until we’re 70-80, and then pass away, and everything will be all-good. The reality is that each of us has tiny little clocks above our heads (like the video), that will eventually expire. We assume the clocks have plenty of time remaining, and can often cruise through life with a laissez-faire attitude, but we don’t know for certain. I would like to think my clock has 75+ years remaining on it, but only God knows for certain.
We can begin each day, living with intensity, passion and purpose, like the team that’s down by 5 points with 1:00 left, knowing that their season is on the brink, or we can just allow life to slip away. That’s the beauty of choices; thinking about this inspires me to not waste my remaining time at home or at Drake. Before I know it, the clock will hit zero.

Up-Up-and Away-Ward

The past eight weeks or so, I’ve had the privilege of helping out with a sports ministry league of basketball and cheerleading called Upward, through the church I attend here in Des Moines, Walnut Creek. This year I’ve coached one of the 7^th/8^th grade boys teams with two of my friends here at Drake. We’re the Sycamores. Each week we have a basketball practice on Monday followed by a game on Friday or Saturday. We had our second to last game this past weekend, and will have our last practice tomorrow. I’m bummed that I won’t be able to make our last game because Drake students will be on spring break (I’ll be home in MPLS!).

This season has been fun, and vastly different from my experience last year where I helped coach 1^st/2^nd graders. Each age level presents its own challenges and unique opportunities, but I’d say for the most part, I have enjoyed coaching the older kids more.  

I grew up playing basketball competitively from 5^th grade up through my junior year of high school (when I quit to start running!). You could say that basketball was my first love. Some of my best childhood memories include times where I would spend the weekend playing in basketball tournaments all throughout the Twin Cities metro. It was a blast!

Upward provides an opportunity to combine two of the things I love – God and sports! I’ve really enjoyed working with the older kids this year, teaching them techniques in regards to proper shooting form, ball handling, passing, etc... We’re also able to design plays and run offenses that are too complex for the 1^st/2^nd grade level.

Each week at practice, we go through a devotional, centered on a specific verse from the Bible. It’s been encouraging to know that we are helping young men become better at basketball, and at the same time inspiring them to pursue a relationship with Jesus. On our team, if a player successfully memorizes one of our Bible verses, they’ll receive a green star that they can iron onto their jersey or undershirt. This year we’ve given away a lot of green stars!

One of the most heartening experiences of Upward actually came this morning at church. I ran into a player from my 1^st/2^nd grade team last year and his mother at church. At each basketball game, there is a devotional at halftime, and the Gospel is presented and shared throughout the season. It was really cool to see how God has worked through sports to bring members of the community to church, and ultimately to Him! Everything we do can be a spiritual act of worship for the Lord! 1 Corinthians 10:31, “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God!”