This week's Sci-lights

It's spring break at USC, but the main artery of campus is lined with tables and umbrellas and lines upon lines of students.  Why?  Each of the students, dressed in their most impressive interviewing attire is waiting to speak to representatives from companies that are offering jobs or internships.  They are hoping for that face-to-face advantage and trying to say of be something memorable.

Today's Sci-light is going to focus on science but with a networking twist.  Our science highlights come from the web page or YouTube channel of local universities and cover research by university professors.  I just picked a couple of things that caught my eye.

Capturing CO2, an interview with Omar Yaghi

First up is Omar Yaghi from UCLA's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.  In his research, he is focusing on the development of new compounds called metal organic frameworks or MOFs.  In short a MOF is formed from inorganic and organic units.  The structure of the compound creates storage spaces for carbon dioxide and you can see those spaces in the molecular model in the picture to the left.  I know you're curious so to learn more, watch the full interview on YouTube.

Photo courtesy of The Lancet

The next research story is from USC.  Yes, I know I chose arch rivals.  Believe it or not, there are many faculty and staff who went to school in one place and are working in the other.  :)  Now onto the science!  An article by Suzanne Wu called, Lessons from Mummy, reports on the work of Professor Caleb Finch looking for clogged arteries in 137 mummies.  In case you're curious about why this is relevant work, atherosclerosis vascular disease is the leading cause of death in the developed world.  Curiously, the hunting and gathering days of humans were not kinder to the human body as in every population studied, artery plaque was found.  More facts are revealed in the article, so let the curious discover.

I said initially, that I had a networking twist on these Sci-lights and here it is.  Have you ever thought of looking at University research as a mechanism of expanding your understanding of research questions that could be asked?  In these two examples we have a classic cross-disciplinary approach to solving modern day problems.  Mummies informing us about our bodies and inorganic and organic chemistry getting together to assist in solving an environmental problem.

The point--use University websites to find out what professors are researching.  Why?  So that you can first see the breadth of research possibilities and then so that you can follow up with an email to the professor who is doing something you find amazing.