On Thursday, November 4th UConn Early College Experience, and the UConn ECE Faculty Coordinator for Chemistry, Associate Professor in Residence Dr. Fatma Selampinar met with certified Chemistry Instructors for their annual professional development conference.

The keynote speaker was Assistant Professor Dr. Kerry Gilmore, UConn, Department of Chemistry who shared his presentation “Green Chemistry – Making Medicines and Chemistry in the Classroom”. Part of the abstract for his talk is below:

“ A longstanding goal in chemistry is the replication and improvement of natural processes for the synthesis of molecules. One of the most efficient processes in the natural world is the conversion of light into chemical energy. While photochemistry has been an active area of research over the past 100 years, it has only been in the last 15 years or so that we have seen an explosion in the capabilities and applications of photochemistry. This is in part due to the introduction of continuous flow technology, allowing chemistry to be performed in processes more akin to assembly lines than the big buckets currently used.

In this seminar, we will talk about this more green and efficient means of production and it’s facilitating impact on photochemistry. We will then showcase the power of this approach for the generation and use of singlet oxygen and discuss how chemistries can be performed in the classroom, and open up the discussion for collaborative work in this area in the development of new processes, screening natural catalysts, and bringing advanced chemical processes to your classrooms.”

Later in the morning, Dr. Selampinar spoke to the instructors about their UConn courses and provided updates about the program.

UConn Chemistry courses offered through ECE.