From owner-chemistry.,at,.ccl.net Sat Aug 29 19:09:01 2009 From: "Kalju Kahn kalju^chem.ucsb.edu" To: CCL Subject: CCL: And now something completely different! Message-Id: <-40117-090829190532-15645-iA0gUcbe9Ggzkc2J7w6ojg*server.ccl.net> X-Original-From: "Kalju Kahn" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Content-Type: text/plain;charset=iso-8859-1 Date: Sat, 29 Aug 2009 16:05:11 -0700 MIME-Version: 1.0 Sent to CCL by: "Kalju Kahn" [kalju-#-chem.ucsb.edu] Good point, Anatoli > Sent to CCL by: Anatoli Korkin [a_korkin,+,yahoo.com] > While the nature of science can not (and > should not!) be changed, a closer ties between scientists and society via > popular education is important. Computational chemistry in fact is very > close to this point with its fascinating and artistic images generated by > molecular design software and other jewels of virtual reality. Another interesting thing going for computational chemistry in this regard is that its tools are easily accessible to general public, compared to the rest of modern chemistry and physics. Kids know computers, kids know how to download stuff (programs and basis sets, including), and they can figure out how to run these programs because of manuals or tips on the web if they want to. Maybe some "academic software" developers could state clearly that everyone is welcome to download it for free for general home/educational use. No, they may not exactly grasp what it means that their calculation is not size consistent or suffers from a severe spin contamination, but they are able to get "results" and make pretty MO pictures, and show vibrating molecules off to their friends. This provides the sense of instant satisfaction, like beating a level in a video game. It releases the packet of dopamine that our brain needs to go on. Cool! Low cost! Safe! Mom and dad would feel well about buying a pair of GTX295 for a birthday to help with offspring's science projects. And who would not like to brag about their kick-ass home supercomputer! Consider any other branch of chemistry for comparison. Well it is mainly experimental. Purifying DNA from bananas, or adding different toothpastes to a Petri dish with colonies of own's microflora is sure a cool thing for seventh or eight grade science projects. But say, you really want to do something that resembles a modern science. Nope, this microwave oven will not work as a PCR thermocycler, and the colorimeter in high-school chem lab probaly will not go down to 260-280 nm. There were times when mixing chemicals that I cannot name under US Patriot Act provided plenty of entertainment but this sort of chemistry does not fly well in modern times. The bottom line is that there is little that a high-school students can do in terms of experimental chemistry at home or school that would be considered cool and exiting by friends and parents, and would provide a quick sense of accomplishment. Coming back to where it all started, I see nothing wrong with using oversimplified models with general audience in mind. Ideally, one would have some links nearby pointing to more rigorous descriptions, and maybe even links to college course pages where these subjects are developed in detail. I would not complain if a student choose to attend, say Iowa State (or Moscow State, or University of Oslo) because watching a video about people dancing like electrons sparked their curiosity, and lead them to downloading a free program like GAMESS (or Firefly, or Dalton). Best wishes, Kalju ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dr. Kalju Kahn Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry UC Santa Barbara, CA 93106