Physical Chemistry Symposium Workshop for Undergraduate Chemistry Majors

American Chemical Society National Meeting
Boston, MA
August 22 - 26, 2010

Following on the very successful undergraduate workshops on Physical Chemistry Symposia at the last two fall ACS meetings, William Polik (Hope College) will be organizing a Workshop for Undergraduate Chemistry Majors at the Fall ACS meeting in Boston. The focus audience are current junior chemistry majors who will be seniors at the time of the Boston meeting. Applications are due February 12, 2010.

Up to 25 outstanding undergraduate chemistry students will be selected for a series of undergraduate-focused talks and social events during the Boston meeting. The 2010 program chair for the Division of Physical Chemistry, Professor Mark Johnson (Yale University), has assembled a dynamic program that touches on many of the most exciting areas in physical chemistry. In order for this program to be more accessible to undergraduate students:

• The Division of Physical Chemistry will organize a series of introductory talks for the undergraduates by symposia organizers or speakers to provide background content and additional context on the symposium topics,
• The Division will schedule a dinner with selected speakers so that students and faculty can discuss science and graduate education issues informally, and
• Student participants are invited to present their research results as part of the Division of Physical Chemistry poster session.

With the financial support of the Division and a generous gift in honor of Professor Paul Raccah, we are able to pay for the student registration fee (and student membership fee, if needed) for the 25 undergraduate participants. We are not able, however, to support transportation, housing or meal costs (except for one dinner with symposium speakers and organizers). We therefore ask that as part of the nomination process, your institution commit the funds needed to make student participation possible.

Ideal candidates for participation in this program will be chemistry majors who meet most or all of the following criteria: they have completed at least one semester of physical chemistry, are planning to spend next summer engaged in undergraduate research, will be seniors at the time of the Boston ACS meeting, and are considering graduate school in a chemistry-related field.

Application Instructions

A complete application consists of:

1. The one-page application form (pdf, ms-word) to be completed by the student nominee
2. A copy of the student's undergraduate transcript (an unofficial copy is adequate)
3. The institutional commitment form completed by department chair or relevant official (included with the application form)
4. One letter of recommendation from a faculty member who knows the nominee well.

Applications will start being processed on a rolling basis on Friday, February 12, but will be considered through March 1, 2010. All materials must be sent to:

Nominees will be notified of the status of their applications in early March. The deadline for submitting poster abstracts is April 5, 2010.

Questions? Contact Will Polik at 616/395-7639 or polik@hope.edu

Physical Chemistry Symposium Workshop for Undergraduate Chemistry Majors
American Chemical Society National Meeting
Boston, MA
August 22 - 25, 2010

Introductory talks will be organized to support the following Physical Chemistry Division Symposia

• Electrons in Bio-Molecules
        Organizers: Jack P. Simons (University of Utah), J. Mathias Weber (University of Colorado)
• Molecular Systems for Efficient Solar Energy Conversion and Storage
        Organizers: Vivtor Batista, Charles Schmuttenmaer, and Gary Brudvig (Yale University)
• Challenges for Density Functional Theory
        Organizers: Weito Yang (Duke University), Xiaosong Li (University of Virginia)
• Physical Chemistry of Spectrochemical Analysis
        Organizers: Richard N. Zare (Stanford University), Brooks H. Pate (University of Virginia)
• Metals in Biology
        Organizers: Amy Palmer (University of Colorado), Thomas Brunold (University of Wisconsin)
• Hydrates, Interfaces, Aerosols, and Their Relationship to the Climate System
        Organizers: Veronica Vaida (University of Colorado), Stephen S. Brown (NOAA)
• Advances in Ion Mobility for Analysis and Characterization of Macromolecules
        Organizers: Michael T. Browers (UC Santa Barbara), Erin Baker (PNNL)
• Chemical Computations on General-Purpose Graphics Processing Units
        Organizers: Thom H. Dunning (University of Illinois), Volodymyr Kindratenko (University of Illinois), Todd J. Martinez (Stanford University), Robert J. Harrison (ORNL), Jeffrey Madura (Duquesne University)